Applicant seeks to add 36 nursing beds, 24,873 sq ft expansion at Sterling Care Hillhaven in Adelphi

Maureen McNeil, the Zoning Hearing Examiner, convened a July 28, 2025 hearing on a special exception (SE-24003) and alternative compliance requests (AC-25008) submitted by Hill Haven S and F Realty LLC to expand the existing Sterling Care Hillhaven nursing and care home at 3210 Powder Mill Road in Adelphi.

The applicant seeks to add a 24,873-square-foot building addition that would increase the facility from 126 beds to 162 beds — an increase of 36 skilled nursing beds — and enlarge the special-exception boundary to about 8.34 acres by including Parcels 23, 24, 2324 and 108. Jeff Kagan, manager of Hill Haven S and F Realty LLC, said the expansion “adds 36 new skilled nursing beds, most of which are going to be in private rooms.”

Why it matters: the proposal would add skilled-nursing capacity to an existing long-standing institutional use and requires approvals that touch environmental controls, specimen-tree removal, landscape buffering standards and transportation adequacy. The Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission technical staff prepared a July 10, 2025 report endorsing findings and recommending conditions, and the applicant presented revised site, landscape and tree conservation plans in response to technical review.

What the plans show and applicant testimony Phil Rhodes, a professional engineer with AMT (AMT Engineering/AMT), described the draft special-exception site plan and related engineering elements. Rhodes said the proposed addition is located on the lower-left quadrant of the site plan to avoid floodplain and stream-buffer areas and that the new building…