The case against sprawl

Our view: The ailing Chesapeake Bay merits a more serious approach to growth controls

Baltimore Sun

September 30, 2008

With so many signs of its continued decline and the expectations of 1 million more people living near its shores in the next 20 years to add to its woes, the Chesapeake Bay is more in peril today than ever. But just because the task of protecting Maryland's most precious natural resource is difficult does not mean it's time to give up hope or abandon the effort.

If there is a thread that might connect - and correct- the various sources of pollution, from failing backyard septic tanks to storm-water runoff and excessive shoreline development, it's the need for more stringent land-use planning. Maryland moved modestly in this direction this year with the update of the state's Critical Area law protecting sensitive waterfront areas from further development. Far more needs to be done.

What happens when growth is allowed to continue as indiscriminately as it has in the past? More open space will be lost to sprawl. Rural lands will be carved up into subdivisions. Forests will be leveled. More streams will be fouled, rivers worsened, the bay overwhelmed.

What's needed is Smart Growth - or more specifically, a Smart Growth program that transcends the modest efforts of a decade ago. Maryland's current Smart Growth law offers small carrots (money for roads, water, sewer and other infrastructure) to encourage counties to concentrate growth and redevelop urban areas. It's time the law had teeth - and perhaps some bigger carrots, too.

That can start by making "priority funding areas" - the neighborhoods eligible for Smart Growth funds - a part of every county's comprehensive plan. Too many counties are allowing too much development outside these areas, making the designation superfluous.

Next would be to make sure local zoning laws are consistent with comprehensive plans. Plenty of counties and municipalities set goals for containing growth but don't back them up. State authorities ought to help keep track of local decisions and make sure they comply with growth criteria.

Maryland also needs specific goals and measures to make sure Smart Growth is more than a feel-good idea. Too much farmland lost to development in a given year? Policymakers ought to be made aware and have a chance to tighten growth controls, if necessary.

And finally, the state ought to tie more grants to Smart Growth and attach more strings to it. Local governments need to make infrastructure decisions based, at least in part, on their environmental impact and not merely to accommodate developers or a favored project.

As Sun reporters Timothy B. Wheeler and Rona Kobell documented in their two-part series "Tainted Waters," a generation of cleanup efforts has not saved the Chesapeake Bay. With heightened concern over global warming and energy costs, the case for Smart Growth has never been more compelling.

While it's easy to become discouraged over the health of the bay, that's no excuse for inaction. Making Smart Growth smarter won't be easy (one can hear the counties moaning to Annapolis about the loss of local land-use controls), but it could help spare the Chesapeake a truly dismal future