The serene comity that generally produces unanimous votes in Baltimore City Council hearings fell away last week when Councilman Mark Parker spoke out forcefully against an amendment to a bill sponsored by Ryan Dorsey, chair of the Land Use & Transportation Committee.

Community critics have been calling the bill a “backdoor” way to allow single-family rowhouses to be turned into multi-family dwellings without public review or legislative approval.

At a hearing last Thursday, Parker described it that way, too.

Bill 26-0195 represents the city’s effort to comply with a 2025 mandate from Annapolis to begin allowing Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) defined as independent dwelling units, attached or detached, located on the same lot as a detached single-family residence.

At issue was an amendment crafted by Dorsey, then fine-tuned by Councilman Zac Blanchard, that Parker called “a gross violation” of the bill as initially presented.

Under Blanchard’s amendment, any single-family dwelling – whether a rowhouse, semi-detached or detached – could be divided “by right” into two dwelling units.

One of the two units would be labeled an ADU as long as it is no larger than 40% of the building’s gross floor area, including the basement.

“I strongly oppose the amendment,” Parker said at the committee hearing, calling it “a gross violation of the bill in front of us.”

“The concept of an ADU by reason, logic and state law is that it’s a separate structure . . .  a structure that is separate from the primary structure or attached as an addition to the primary structure,” he said. “There is no such thing as ‘an internal ADU.’”

Responding, Blanchard spoke in favor of “internal ADUs,” calling them distinct from multi-family conversions and saying they “will have a very meaningful positive impact and create opportunities for real people in a lot of different situations.”

“I don’t think it’s right to ban it across most of our districts,” he added.

So-called Internal ADUs “will have a very meaningful positive impact and create opportunities”  – Councilman Zac Blanchard.

Parker seized on this, noting that his southeast district is already “full of multi-family conversions,” achieved in R-7 and R-8 zoning districts by the property owner getting their council member to put forward an ordinance to convert a rowhouse to two or three dwelling units.

“To act like this is solving a problem that exists because of a ban is disingenuous because it’s not banned,” Parker said. Acknowledging that the current “clunky, slow” conversion process needs to be fixed, he called for that to be undertaken as a separate legislative effort.

“To backdoor it and pretend that a second unit somehow is magically not multi-family housing is just – I mean the code defines multi-family structures. It already exists in the code. So now we’re going to have two things?” he said.

“So if you want to convert your basement.”’he continued, “you could either file for an ordinance through your council person and go through this whole process. Or you could just be like ‘Oh, it’s an ADU?’”

“No, it’s one thing,” he asserted. “It needs to be one thing in the code.”

A Close Vote

When time came for the vote, all members present voted in favor of amendments by Dorsey and then Blanchard’s amendment was put to a vote.

It was approved, with council Vice Chair Sharon Green Middleton and Council member Phylicia Porter, along with Dorsey and Blanchard, voting “yes,” and Parker and Paris Gray voting “no.”

For the vote on the bill as amended, Councilman John T. Bullock returned to the room. Dorsey apparently needed the 9th District lawmaker’s support to get it passed. And it was by a vote of 4-3.

Voting yes: Blanchard, Bullock, Dorsey, Middleton.

Voting no: Porter, Gray, Parker.

With that, Bill 26-0195 advanced to second reader consideration at tonight’s full council meeting starting at 5 p.m.

“You’re not fooling anybody”

Parker was not the only person to speak out against the bill on Thursday. Dorsey allowed four members of the public to speak at the start of the committee session before he presented and explained the amendments.

(City resident Deb O’Neill, who organized an online petition against the bill, was waiting online to speak, but Dorsey decreed that she would not be allowed to testify because she spoke at a previous hearing on the measure.)

Remington resident Doug Armstrong, who was present in the chamber, denounced what he called “the 11th hour amendment” as “malpractice” and “dishonest.”

“If you take a two-story rowhouse with a basement and you convert it into one unit on the first floor and one unit on the second floor, which is what this amendment calls for, that’s just a multi-family dwelling,” he said. “You’re not fooling anybody.”

If lawmakers had made this change explicit by showing it in the zoning tables, “people would catch on like they did with Bill 25-0066,” Armstrong  added.

(This was a reference to a highly unpopular bill that would eliminate the single-family home requirement in residential districts across the city. Bill supporters were “ignoring the Black homeowners in legacy neighborhoods,” Middleton said at one of the tumultuous hearings held on the measure in February before it stalled in committee.)

“A one-size-fits-all approach is not the answer. Collaboration means balancing housing flexibility with the voices of directly affected residents”  – Hillsdale Heights President Nichole’ C. Gatewood.

Testifying online, housing activist Linda Batts denounced the bill to allow ADUs “by right,” meaning that adjacent property owners would receive no advance warning and have no opportunity to object.

“Zoning appeals are a critical community guardrail against unchecked by-right discretion,” she said. “They provide a fair forum for residents to challenge decisions that may substantially alter the character, capacity and quality of life of their communities.”

Nichole’ C. Gatewood, president of the Hillsdale Heights Neighborhood Association, echoed Batts’ message about the need for guardrails.

“Give us clear eligibility limits on placement, lot coverage, pervious surface loss, protection for trees, drainage loss and stormwater issues,” she said.

“We understand aging in place, multi-generational housing, caregiving [and the need for] rental income. But,” Gatewood continued. “A one-size-fits-all approach is not the answer. Collaboration means balancing housing flexibility with the voices of directly affected residents.”