Reply to S/O - More Rezoning and University Boulevard Corridor Plan

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Reply to "S/O - More Rezoning and University Boulevard Corridor Plan"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]University Blvd Corridor Plan is basically yet another not-so-thinly veiled gentrification push in one of the last affordable yet pleasant parts of MoCo.

The County’s Office of Legislative Oversight (OLO) has issued a Racial Equity and Social Justice (RESJ) impact statement for the UBC Plan, as is required for any Zoning Text Amendment (ZTA).

Full text is here:

https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/OLO/Resources/Files/resjis/ZTA/2025/ZTA25-12.pdf

The Office of Legislative Oversight anticipates ZTA 25-12 could have a negative impact on racial equity and social justice  in the County. Given the high rates of homeownership of Black and Latinx community members in the University Boulevard Corridor Plan area, the proposed rezoning that is inherent to ZTA 25-12 could disproportionately displace existing Black and Latinx homeowners for the development of market-rate housing units that primarily benefits White, Asian, and Pacific Islander community members.

Today, the UBC Plan area is a racially and ethnically diverse community of nearly 10,000 community members; compared to the County, Black and Latinx community members are overrepresented in the Plan area.

The UBC Plan area is primarily a single-family home community where most community members are homeowners.  The rates of homeownership for Black and Latinx community members in the Plan area are much higher than in the County overall.

The UBC Plan notes the “Plan area is 
characterized by its general affordability compared with the County as a whole in sales prices, rents, and the large amount of housing stock that is income-restricted.”

Of note, tear down projects that replace older, more affordable single-family homes with newer, more expensive ones are not common in the Plan area.

Allowing multi-family housing in the proposed rezoning area could also adversely impact RESJ by encouraging the development of market-rate multi-family housing that could disproportionately displace existing Black and Latinx homeowners. A market analysis for the UBC Plan found that in the short- to mid-term, redevelopment in the rezoning area would most likely result in duplexes and stacked/piggyback townhouses.  Thus, new multi-family housing development in the rezoning area would likely consist of smaller scale market-rate developments that do not require moderately-priced dwelling units (MPDUs).
 [/quote]

The council will not deny developers the opportunity to get relatively cheap land so that they can push homeowners out and build apartment buildings. For some reason a majority of the council doesn’t want people to own homes so wherever there’s naturally occurring affordable housing they change the zoning. At some point in the next three these properties will be reassessed and the homeowners whose land was involuntarily rezoned will get big surprise tax bills. [/quote]

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