Growth Allocation is limited to 5 percent of the County’s overall total Resource Conservation Area (RCA), less State tidal wetlands and Federally owned lands.
“Growth allocation” permits RCA land to be remapped as LDA or IDA lands or LDA land to be remapped as IDA lands. As a result, at the outset of the Critical Area Program, Queen Anne’s County had a total of 1,528 acres of Growth Allocation available, with 153 acres that were pre-mapped during the initial program adoption.
The Growth Allocation process was established with the adoption of the Critical Area Ordinance. Amendment of the development area classification is on a project-by-project basis and all conversions count against the County’s total allocation.
Taken together, the 1987 Comprehensive Plan and the 1989 Critical Area Program accomplished three significant growth management objectives:
1. The overall development potential of the County was significantly reduced as a result of development restrictions on agricultural and waterfront lands. This was accomplished at a time when the County’s population was relatively small and the vast majority of its land was undeveloped. Unlike the suburban Western Shore counties, Queen Anne’s County adopted substantial growth controls before market driven development consumed much of the County’s rural and waterfront lands.
2. Zoning districts and Critical Area mapping were arranged in such a way as to direct the majority of new development to within and around existing communities that had infrastructure or had the potential for infrastructure expansion. Vacant lands within and on the perimeter of existing communities were generally planned for future development. Rural areas were generally planned to stay rural, an approach to land use management later endorsed in the Statewide 1992 Planning Act.
3. Environmental protection standards for sensitive areas such as tidal wetlands, non-tidal wetlands, forests and habitat areas were are now firmly integrated into development regulations. A combination of local and State regulations ensured that new development projects were reviewed for their impact on the environment. Read: 1993 Comprehensive Update
