Planning commission forwards draft Saint Mary's 2050 plan to County Commissioners after amendments; two members dissent

The St. Mary's County Planning Commission voted Aug. 3 to recommend the draft Saint Mary's 2050 plan to the County Commissioners, approving multiple refinements to the draft and instructing staff to include new implementation language and an attainable-housing work group.

Jessica Andritz, director of the Department of Land Use and Growth Management, told the commission the plan was developed using state population projections and three rounds of community engagement since late 2024. "The plan was drafted with those... aggressive numbers," she said, adding staff will provide updates to the implementation matrix every two years to track progress and reconcile assumptions with departmental data. Commissioners approved the motion to forward the plan consistent with the refinements adopted that night.

The vote was not unanimous. Two members recorded "no" votes and urged clearer upfront assumptions. Commissioner Patty Robrecht argued the plan contains inconsistent data with the Board of Education's enrollment figures: "You cannot reference growth and... say we're losing students," she said, calling for the plan to state its assumptions more prominently. Staff and other members responded that the plan uses state projections to account for a wide range of future scenarios and that more granular alignment will occur as departments update implementation data.

Planning staff also secured a narrowly tailored addition establishing that the County Commissioners would appoint an attainable-housing working group and provide oversight; the commission asked that the fair-housing component be explicit in that group's charge. After the vote the project team said it would forward the recommended draft to the County Commissioners, who must hold their own public hearings before final adoption.