Frederick County has become an area where many of its workers cannot afford to live. Minimum- and moderate-wage earners are caught amid escalating housing costs and a shortage of affordable houses in a county where the median price of a single-family home has increased 45 percent over the past five years.
Consequently, the middle class has joined the working poor in an exodus to outlying areas in search of affordable housing. In response, citizens groups and local government agencies have joined forces to turn the situation around.
The Board of County Commissioners of Frederick County held a public hearing Tuesday on a proposal requiring new residential developments in the county to include moderately priced dwelling unit (MPDU) developments subsidized by the developers. Community groups and housing agencies are advocating its passage, which has been more than a decade in the making.
"We all know the need is definitely there," said Alice Cooper, director of the county's Department of Planning and Community Development. "Frederick County is one of the higher land-value counties in the state. ... The rents are skyrocketing. People who work here in this county can't afford to live here."
The Department of Planning and Community Development, at the request of the commission, presented its proposed program, along with zoning text specifics and three resolutions that establish income limits, maximum sales price and maximum rental rates.
Frederick County's prospective MPDU program in part was modeled after a similar program in California, where more than 75 local governments have adopted "inclusionary zoning" policies that reserve a specific percentage of housing units for lower-income households in new, residential developments.
Closer to home, Montgomery County also served as a model for the Frederick County plan. Enacted in 1973, Montgomery County's MPDU law requires private developers to build mixed-income housing everywhere.
The law covers any new subdivision, townhouse complex or apartment development with at least 50 housing units. Under the county law, up to 85 percent of the new housing can be "market rate" (at the builder's discretion), but at least 15 percent must be "affordable" housing, or MPDUs.
For a family to qualify for an MPDU, its income cannot exceed 65 percent of the county's average household income.
In compliance with Montgomery County's ground rules, private home builders and apartment developers have produced more than 11,000 MPDUs - two-thirds for sale, one-third for rent. Buyers include schoolteachers, county deputy sheriffs, office workers, grocery clerks and fast-food cooks - mainly civil servants and retail and service workers.
"The whole concept is that the builders and the developers are the ones who are best equipped to provide affordable housing. If we can give them density bonuses that are sufficient, they will be able to do it," said Cooper.
Meanwhile, the latest figures paint a grim picture for the state.
Maryland is the seventh least-affordable state in the nation in terms of housing costs, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition.
Last year, Maryland became No. 1 in the nation for greatest increase in the disparity between income and housing cost. Baltimore - up 22.68 percent - had the largest increase in housing wage out of the country's metropolitan statistical areas.
Nationwide, the picture doesn't look much better. In 2001, a person had to earn an average hourly wage (a "housing wage") of $13.87-more than twice the federal minimum wage - to afford to rent a modest two-bedroom home, according to the NLIHC. This year, the NLIHC reports, the national housing wage has risen to $14.66.
In Maryland, the housing wage is $16.82; in Frederick, $19.21
James Upchurch is president of Interfaith Housing of Western Maryland, the largest nonprofit housing developer in the four-county region.
He believes that inclusionary zoning is the best solution for the county's housing woes and is hopeful that the commission will come to the same conclusion.
"If you determine housing wage - how much per hour do you have to be earning to afford the rent for a two-bedroom apartment - and compare it with the previous year, you see the trend in terms of whether we're getting better or worse," he explained. "It's not good news."
"You have your choice: you can either come to Frederick County, where there are jobs but you can't afford to live, or you can go to Allegany County, where there is an aging but underutilized housing stock that's cheap. But, of course, you can't get a job while you're there."
The unintended consequences of the disparity are obvious to Upchurch.
"Run around Frederick County and see big box stores and restaurants. Ask yourself, are we able to do that without having any more people falling into that category? We know what they make, and they don't make terrific wages. And the answer is: Go on Route 340, going over to Jefferson County, W.Va., in the morning and go on Highway 15 and watch the stream of traffic coming down from Pennsylvania.
"We've developed a situation here where you can't live where you work and you can't work where you live."
At one point, Upchurch recalled, the owner of a local food franchise sent a bus to Allegany County for the two-hour bus-ride back for employees who couldn't afford to live in Frederick where they worked.
"All that starts clogging the roads and adding to a lot of infrastructure and growth problems here, and of course that ironically leads to calls for suppressing growth, on the grounds that we've got to resolve that.
"Then, when you suppress growth by clamping down on permits issued or through moratoriums, Washington County is reeling from the effect in Frederick County and announced a one-year moratorium. It's spreading throughout the region here.
"So, where do you escape to? Where do you go? You have to commute longer distances.
"All these disruptions come back to the fact that we have not invested adequately in affordable or moderate-income housing. And we have had some poor policies. Right now, we're building zero-affordable housing in the types of areas like Frederick, with the small exception of what we nonprofits are able to do."
Recognizing the need for more affordable housing, the county commissioners directed the county's planning and zoning staff to develop a preliminary MPDU program for consideration.
"Basically, any development over 25 units on public water and sewer will require a 12.5 percent MPDU. There is also the potential for density bonuses and up to 22 percent MPDU," Cooper said.
Opposition has been vocal. Developers consider the initiative an unfair infringement on their business. Some have taken their ideas before the commission, hoping to deter the MPDU ordinance.
Flexibility in design will be essential for developers to embrace the program, one developer said at a September hearing. Requiring a percentage of houses for MPDU and restricting those units to larger homes is impractical, he said. Proponents agree, conceding that the industry cannot successfully build moderately priced housing without the ability to build modest housing.
They are hoping that the final plan will include such amendments.
Several people are questioning whether now is the time to consider such a plan, given the absence of current development. As Cooper puts it, "With all the water restrictions and everything else we've got, builders and developers aren't knocking on anybody's doors right now."
But, she points out, it is a measure that will help an estimated 25 percent of Frederick's households at risk (with incomes of less than $35,000), once production resumes. Developments already approved will be grandfathered in.
A housing study commissioned by the county in the late 1980s recommended an inclusionary housing plan; however, the board did not act on that recommendation until now.
"When you get such rapid increases without corresponding increases in wages, it's not just the very poor who need assistance," Upchurch said.
"Right now, the poor and the not-so-poor are competing for a scarce supply of housing. And in the competition for this basic human need, the poor are always going to lose.
"We certainly have that situation in Frederick County, compounded by a whole range of policy issues that limit growth. ... And MPDU inclusionary units would provide a greater degree of income mix, which is good. This could be the single most important affordable-housing policy to be enacted in decades in Frederick County. No question about that."
Tuesday's hearing ran late and ended in limbo, at least for the moment. It was a disappointment to all concerned, admittedly, but the commission did not put the issue to sleep. Instead, it will open the floor to further discussion - and perhaps a decision - at the next meeting, on Nov. 21.