Anne Arundel County is looking to buy 19 acres of land that would extend Quiet Waters Park and allow the county to expand water access options for county residents.
The proposal is still in the early stages as the county is gathering money from private donors as well as state and federal funding. The land is expected to cost about $8 million with the county’s share reduced down to about $3 million. The 19 acres are located on the south side of Quiet Waters Park near Loden Pond.
County officials said they expect to use Program Open Space funding to pay for about $2.8 million of the purchase. Another $350,000 will be used for overhead and come from the county general fund. The county is applying for a $2 million grant from the state and $1 million from the federal government. A private donor has also put up $2 million that will be handled by the Chesapeake Conservancy.
The county wants to expand water and trail access through this purchase, said Rick Anthony, Recreation and Parks director. Quiet Waters Park was an initiative of former County Executive Jim Lighthizer.
“We’ve been trying to acquire this property for a number of years,” Anthony said. “It is valuable to us because it does complete Quiet Waters Park.”
The purchase of Quiet Waters Park is another in County Executive Steuart Pittman’s plans to buy and preserve land. The county is also looking to buy 12 acres of land near the Deale Community Library, and Pittman has publicly called for the state to sell the Crownsville Hospital Center Grounds to the county.
But the Quiet Waters Park deal is much more expensive per acre than the Turtle Run at Deep Cove land purchase in Churchton. The county bought those 140 acres for $2.6 million. The Quiet Waters purchase is about seven times smaller than that land for about the same price.
Pittman’s senior adviser Chris Trumbauer said the Quiet Waters Land is just more valuable — near a park and waterfront — but the county is also minimizing its investment through private donations and other funding sources.
“Location, location, location,” Trumbauer said. “It is waterfront land next to a flagship park.”
Outside funding for the Quiet Waters purchase has not yet been finalized. County officials are still in talks with the state and federal government to secure funding. The federal funding is from the Readiness and Environmental Protection Integration program aimed at protecting land near military institutions.
Councilwoman Lisa Brannigan Rodvien is the representative for the Quiet Waters Park area. She supports the county’s plans.
“It was basically a great opportunity for the county to get a really good deal on some waterfront land that could be easily added to an existing park,” Rodvien said. “I feel wonderful about it.”
Development and growth were key issues in the 2018 county executive election, and Turtle Run was a point of attack for Pittman. He criticized Schuh for buying the land at an inflated price.
The Capital reviewed appraisals tied to the land and found the proposed projects were not legally allowed on the land at the time of the sale. The appraiser deemed the project as “hypothetical.” County lawyers anticipated those legal troubles would ultimately fail so the site was appraised based on the proposed developments.
Trumbauer said Pittman is confident the county is getting a good deal on Quiet Waters, especially with the outside funding. And unlike Turtle Run at Deep Cove, the County Council voted on the purchase in the budget. Schuh’s administration used fee-in-lieu funds to buy Turtle Run. That money is given to the county by developers who pay for cut down trees and can’t replant them as required. That purchase didn’t require a council vote.
The Quiet Waters purchase was approved by the council in a unanimous vote. But the amendment was introduced in the final moments as part of the supplemental budget. The supplemental budget are amendments to the proposed budget introduced by the county executive’s administration.
Trumbauer said the late introduction was due to finalizing outside funding sources.
That late introduction concerned some of the members of the council despite their eventual support of the project.
“My big concern is I was worried this was not a properly vetted deal,” said Nathan Volke, R-Pasadena. “If the county is spending whatever money, I wanted to ensure that amount of money was spent on a purpose that wasn’t a favor to a friend or big political contributor.”
