When Jacqueline R. Scott spotted an advertisement last May seeking a new Howard County Board of Appeals member, she thought the position provided an opportunity to do her civic duty with little publicity.

"Until recently, it was a board that you don't hear much about," said Scott, an attorney who lives in Columbia and will join the board in April.

"I'm not ready to see my name in the newspapers, but I guess that's something that I'll have to get used to," she said.

The board's controversial handling of an expansion plan for First Baptist Church of Guilford and the County Council's decision to try to oust a board member almost two years before his term's end thrust the board squarely into the spotlight this month.

"Whenever you are making zoning-type decisions, you are going to have critical views," said former Councilman Darrel E. Drown. "That's part of the job."

Established in 1968 as part of the charter that created Howard County, the board is responsible for ruling on, among other things, administrative appeals and special exceptions and variances of the zoning code.

The five-member board generally has the final say -- short of an appeal to the Howard County Circuit Court -- on issues ranging from an oversized sign to a proposed rock quarry.

Appointed by the County Council, members must be county residents and registered to vote. No more than three members can have the same political affiliation. They earn a $2,000 base salary and $45 a hearing.

One of the board's most vocal critics is attorney Susan B. Gray, who fought unsuccessfully last year for Glenwood residents appealing county approval of a 116-unit condominium complex near Cattail Creek.

Gray termed the board a "kangaroo court."

"I have no respect for the board," Gray said. "Disdain is probably a better word, and I think the feeling is mutual."

The attention makes some board members uncomfortable. Three agreed to be interviewed, but Jerry L. Rushing, the board chairman, declined to comment, and Robert C. Sharps did not respond to several requests for an interview.

When things were easier

Being a board member hasn't always been so stressful. Until 1977, the board was composed of three people who handled cases more efficiently than the current five-member board, said former board member Michael Lauriente.

"It was easier to make a decision back then," he recalled. "If you have more than three [people], it's very difficult to come to an agreement."

As the county's population doubled from 118,572 in 1980 to 237,874 in December, so too have the number of cases before the board. In the late 1970s, the board scheduled cases one month in advance. Today, a petition waits about three months before the board reviews it.

The board reviews actions by county agencies to determine if they followed proper procedures, and usually ratifies those decisions. But that doesn't make the members' jobs any easier, because people who lost before the agencies want a reversal.

The one thing that has remained constant is the diversity of the board, whose members can serve no more than two consecutive five-year terms.

Rushing, a 43-year-old Republican, runs a home-building and remodeling company from his home in Savage.

Retired farmer and Democrat James W. Pfefferkorn, 68, lives on his farm in West Friendship.

Sharps, a 51-year-old independent, is the former owner of American Speedy Printing Center in Columbia and a business consultant.

George L. Layman, who will be replaced by fellow Democrat Scott April 1, is a 56-year-old limousine driver who lives in Ellicott City.

Donald B. Messenger, who may also leave -- the council has asked the 63-year-old Republican to resign -- is a business law attorney who lives in North Laurel.

The benefit is that board members bring unique perspectives to cases. The pitfall is that they don't always agree.

An adversarial relationship

The two most likely to confront each other during a public hearing are Rushing and Messenger.

During a hearing in October on a proposed Chick-Fil-A restaurant in Ellicott City, Messenger declared that he would vote against the project because a bus stop adjacent to the proposed site did not provide sidewalks for waiting students.

"He felt like I had stabbed him in the heart," Messenger recalled of Rushing, who voted to approve the restaurant. "He thinks he should control the board and that there should be no dissent."

But Layman, who was chairman for three years, said Messenger contributes to the friction.

"I think it's Don using his background as an attorney sometimes," Layman said. "He forgets why he's there. Sometimes he can't take off his hat when he walks into a hearing."

Gray questioned Rushing's objectivity, arguing that his job as a builder taints his votes on development projects.

"I have no idea where he's coming from," Gray said.

Layman is a target of criticism, too. Although no one begrudged his right to run for Drown's County Council seat in 1994 and last year, some questioned the more than $1,800 in campaign contributions he received from developers, home-building companies and attorneys who represent developers who had appeared before the board in past cases.

Several community leaders who led an unsuccessful fight against a proposed quarry in Jessup accused Layman of treating the residents rudely and disrespectfully during more than a dozen public hearings in 1997.

"He cut me off, he didn't give us an opportunity to talk, he was yelling at us," said Tim Maier. "Sometimes it's frustrating for someone not used to testifying."

Others said the board listens. Kenneth Chamberlain, former president of the Ellicott Park Townhouse Condominium Section Two Association Inc., which persuaded the board in October to disapprove the proposed Chick-Fil-A restaurant, praised the board for being attentive to the community's worries.

"We were ill-prepared going in," Chamberlain acknowledged. "They bent over backward to accommodate us."

One of the more unusual cases occurred last Tuesday when the board dismissed a plan to add a 2,000-seat sanctuary, a 636-space parking lot and a 34,000-square-foot community center at First Baptist Church of Guilford. The deadlocked vote came after Layman changed his vote from approval to denial, then withdrew his vote and recused himself from the case.

Layman's actions left church leaders and community activists irritated and confused.

Board member Pfefferkorn said the challenge is to remove one's personal feelings from every case.

"But if they meet the criteria, we have to vote according to the rule of the law, not the rule of whims," Pfefferkorn said. "I would like to make everyone happy, but that is just not going to happen."

Gray said there was some "extremely informal" talk four years ago about diminishing the role of the board and hiring an administrative hearing officer to review major cases -- similar to the system in Anne Arundel and Baltimore counties.

Messenger and former board member Elizabeth Bobo agreed that a hearing officer would provide expertise and reduce the board's caseload.

"If the board has such a heavy workload that it can't get to cases for months, it might be something that would be a good idea," said Bobo, now a Democratic state delegate.

But another former board member, Wayman Scott Jr., said he is "definitely against" the hearing officer idea.

"He can go out and look at something and say, 'I like it' or 'I don't like it,' " Scott said. "You might have an honest individual or a not-so-honest individual. If he's not honest, we're really in trouble."

Getting prepared

For Jacqueline Scott, the focus isn't on the brewing controversy, but on preparing herself for an overload of new information.

"I'm taking baby steps," she said. "I want to go into the situation with my eyes wide open."

Pub Date: 3/07/99