La Plata, MD – The process of redefining what cases the Charles County Board of Appeals should or should not hear has been batted around for a few months. Charles County Attorney Rhonda Weaver reviewed the draft document during the Charles County Commissioners Tuesday, July 18 meeting.
“The new document makes clear that a decision of the Charles Board of County Commissioners cannot be appealed to the Board of Appeals,” Weaver said. “Any decision of this board cannot be appealed to the Board of Appeals but must be appealed to the circuit court. A decision by the planning commission goes to the Board of Appeals.
“The idea is all that litigation will be clear in our statute,” she said. “This new document spells out the process for these types of cases.”
She added that there was no change in the county’s requirement that all meetings of Board of Appeals are public. Weaver also said that in order to file an appeal to be heard by the Board of Appeals, the person filing the appeal “must be aggrieved.” She noted that during the appeals process the same information presented before the Charles County Planning Commission must be presented before the board.
“An appellate body shouldn’t have information the former body whose decision is being appealed didn’t have,” she said. “A lot of time and resources can be invested in the planning commission that can be a very long process.”
She also said that if an error in the project was finite, they may also streamline the process in those cases so that the whole presentation made before the Planning Commission doesn’t have to be made in its entirety before the Board of Appeals.
“We get so bogged down in bureaucracy that a lot of these cases never move forward,” Weaver explained. “If it goes to the Board of Appeals, you don’t have to redo the whole process if the error is a finite. To do the process all over again is not efficient.”
“So, just to be clear, it appears almost everyone who commented, including the Planning Commission agrees with this except for comments,” said Commissioner Ken Robinson [D-District 1]. “Everyone will have a chance to weigh in on this.”
“Absolutely,” Weaver responded.
County leaders voted overwhelmingly to send the measure to public hearing Sept. 12.
Contact Joseph Norris at joe.norris@thebaynet.com