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An appropriate use
Once again, the county’s Planning Commission has tabled a request from J. J. Dwyer for a special exception permit for a cluster of houses to be built on his Blackrock Farm near Massie’s Corner.
We believe the planners should recommend approval of the permit, with the deed restrictions which Mr. Dwyer has indicated he would be willing to proffer.
As John McCarthy pointed out during the commission’s discussion of the application, “This is just the sort of activity that the ordinance is intended to foster.” It does, as Mr. McCarthy observed, keep a large amount of open space while not ui\justly depriving a landowner of development rights.
And the special exception process itself insures that a precedent would be set only if another landowner could demonstrate identical circumstances — an unlikely situation.
While Commissioner Krebser’s concern about a later subdivision of the remainder of the parcel is perhaps valid, Supervisor Newbill Miller addressed that point with his observation that the restrictions would hold as long as the zoning ordinance’s density requirements remain intact.
As for the argument against the concept of cluster development advanced by Commissioner Fannon, we’re afraid that he weakened his own case when he ultimately suggested that the houses would be rented to families with children, thereby raising school costs and taxes.
It’s not a matter of preventing development, and thereby a rise in taxes—Mr. Dwyer can build the houses by right if he puts them on 25-acre lots, as he pointed out.
Mr. Dwyer is attempting to develop responsibly a portion of his property. As he put it, “I’m going to put houses up. The question is where... Do you want to see the Fodderstack Road and Rt. 522 lined with houses?”
Mr. Dwyer has given the Planning Commission a choice, perhaps seen by some as an ultimatum. We feel that the cluster proposal provides the safeguards which will help control unsightly development. We urge the planners to recommend approval of the application.
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