AA County Council Presentation

Presentation before County Council December 2, 2024    

John Pantelides 1609 A Virginia St. Annapolis

A week ago, you received a report from me titled Crownsville, “A New Beginning” offering a different vision for the Crownsville property than what was presented by the County administration.

Oversimplified, the implementation of the County Executive’s vision would make Crownsville a memorial park and the vast majority of the 500 acres would remain as a sanctuary of meadows, forest, and open space to provide areas for mental and racial healing. 

I have read the County’s entire report and there are some worthy functions

However, we propose that the best way to honor the history of Crownsville is to use the majority of the land to meet the pressing county wide needs of the living such as

Affordable housing for our veterans, seniors, work force and our service workers.

Expansion of Mental Health and Addiction services

A vocational center for both patients and the entire county

Creation of an Allied Health Park which could become a mental health, addiction and research hub for the region state and country

Crownsville belongs to all the residents of Anne Arundel County. Yes, there has been public input over the past year but it came primarily for those neighboring communities We need to have an outreach into the other 6 councilmatic districts. The future of Crownsville is far too important to be decided by just those living nearby who may be inconvenienced.

We can make a significant dent in the need for affordable housing by providing the land so the applicant only has to qualify for the building materials.

In summary, I am asking you to slow down any approvals until the rest of the County has had an opportunity to weigh in and consider our proposal.

We need to get a handle on the real costs and future expenditures.

The County’s plan does not provide for income generation to pay for their vision which we estimate could be close to a billion dollars.

I would welcome any questions you may have.

Additional Points

On June 26, 2008, John Pantelides, prominent African American leader George Phelps and engineer Ron Johnson of Ronald W. Johnson and Associates, responded to the state of Maryland’s requests for Redevelopment of the former Crownsville property site.

 Our vision in that 2008 plan was: “The redevelopment of the Crownsville property presents an exciting opportunity to achieve both public and private objectives. Our plan provides for a range of housing with an emphasis on workforce housing and affordable senior housing. In addition, the establishment of an Allied Health Park, renovation of some historical buildings for residential/office/museum use, retention of existing tenants, clean up of the site and an overall plan for the full development of the property are achieved with the full development of the property.”

The developer who was selected in 2008 had financial difficulties and the state proceeded to try and get Anne Arundel County to take the Crownsville property.  Finally, the County acquired Crownsville on December 2022 and not much has happened on the site except maintenance. 

Our current revised plan, “A New Beginning,” which includes a museum as did our 2008 plan, was submitted to the County on November 20, 2024 with the goal of using the majority of the property to meet pressing county wide needs such as affordable housing, expansion of mental health and addiction services, an Allied Health Park, vocational school, and youth recreation area. Let us discuss affordable housing.

The Arundel Community Development Corporation has been providing affordable housing since the 1990’s by providing surplus county land to the applicants with a mortgage lien due in 30 years. Thus, the applicant only has to qualify for the building materials making the house affordable. If the applicant sells or transfers the land before the 30 years then the lien on the county property must be paid back. Unfortunately, there are not enough surplus county lots to make a real impact. 

Once the County determines the affordable housing need, then Crownsville can be part of the solution by providing the land

In Oct. 2024, the average sold price in AA County was $601,468; the average sold price just 5 years ago was $392,000-that is a 53% increase since 2019. Active inventory is currently 815 units while in 2019 active units were 2,099. We have 38% less inventory than we had in 2019.

In the face of a housing crisis, the Crownsville Hospital Memorial Park Plan (CHMP) page 152, provides for 27 total units of affordable housing, 11 studio units,10 one-bedroom units and 6 two-bedroom units. 

For transitional housing it shows 65 units, however when you add 19 one bedrooms and 23 two bedrooms it adds up to only 42 beds. 

Thus, a total of 69 housing units are being created under the CHMP plan to address affordable and transitional housing.

On page 118 of the CHMP it further demonstrates the intent to make the majority of the Crownsville land into a park. The site is broken down into 10 components. The vast majority of the land is contained into the following 4 components, Historic Farmstead, The Meadows, North Forest, and South Forest. These 4 components are to be left in their natural state of forested areas, meadows, and open space to promote mental and racial healing.

Do we really need another park that will serve one section of the County?

From the County website, it states that Anne Arundel County has 160 parks and sanctuaries meaning 7,160 acres of recreation land and the county has an additional 9,900 acres of natural resource land. The city of Annapolis has 40 parks and trails over more than 200 acres.

Opposite from the Crownsville property on Rt. 97 is the Bacon Ridge Natural Park which is approximately 1,200 acres. Before the state looked for proposals in 2008, approximately 500 acres were donated from the Crownsville to the Bacon Ridge National Park.  

Again, a better use of Crownsville is to meet the existing county wide needs of the living not the creation of another park.

Please note that the majority of the land in Anne Arundel County is zoned mostly rural and low density; Residential Agriculture RA, one home per 20 acres, Residential Low Density- I home per 5 acres, R-1, and R-2, 1 and 2 homes per acre respectively. It appears that over half of the County’s land is planned for Rural and Low Density uses and when that is combined with land designated as Natural Features (Open Space and environmental preservation areas) the percentage increases to nearly 60% of the County’s land area. 

This is not fair land use.

The current General Development Plan as well as the current comprehensive zonings completed continues the trend of not providing enough land with the proper density which could lower the cost of housing. 

In our opinion, the mental health and addiction crisis is the number one challenge facing our society. Thus, in our plan, we provide for the expansion of mental health and addiction services. Furthermore, we provide for the establishment of an Allied Health Park which could become a mental health, addiction, and research hub for the region. 

We would have an outreach to the National Institutes of Health, Johns Hopkins, Sheppard Pratt, University of Maryland, and others who are treating people and doing research into mental health and addiction, as well as pharmaceutical and research labs to establish a presence at Crownsville.

We provide for the creation of a county wide vocational center. Considering the existing shortages in the construction industry, trades and transportation industry, hospitality and technology, there is need for a strong vocational component. We have talked to several businesses who need workers now and could assist with this training.

Furthermore, for those high school students who are not going to college, we need to provide a direct pipeline for public and private schools into this vocational complex. It is unacceptable for high school seniors to graduate without having a clear path as to do what they will do upon graduation.

That is why in our proposal we have included an area for retail/office use so that those in treatment as well as citizens county wide can get hands on experience.

The CHMP Master Plan does not identify how it’s plan will be funded. If I am correct, I heard Budget Officer Chris Trumbauer say to the County Council at a Nov. 28 2024 work session that there was $35,216, 279 received from the state and that the County has spent about 15% of that amount thus far which equals approximately $5,250,000.

The costs identified by KCI Technologies Inc. Table ES-1 Capital Cost Summary dated May 23, 2006 (page 3 of our proposal) were $25.4million dollars and that was 18 years ago. A new Capital Cost summary needs to be performed but even at a multiplier of just 10 those costs would now be over $250 million dollars.

Just looking at what is proposed in the County’s Master Plan the costs could easily reach 1 billion dollars.

In addition, to Federal, state and county assistance the site must have income generators. 

In addition, we plan an outreach first to the many local and national multimillion and multibillion dollar foundations headquartered here in Maryland such as Harry and Jeanette Foundation, The Abell Foundation, The Ann E Casey Foundation. Then the team would approach major corporations in Maryland and the nation. The banking industry has Federal requirements to assist in housing

The County has said that they want to have an approved Master Plan in place by the end of 2024 which I assume they would then want the County Council to approve.

We suggest, that before any approvals are granted as to direction and use, we need first to get real cost estimates for this sanctuary park vision and how it will be funded.

We are asking the Council to slow down any approvals until the rest of the County has had an opportunity to weigh in, get accurate costs and consider other options such as our vision “A New Beginning, Proposal for Redevelopment of the former Crownsville Hospital Center Campus

Respectfully Submitted,

John S. Pantelides

John S. Pantelides and Associates, LLC