Town hall talks growth in Charles

Commissioner President Reuben B. Collins II (D) held a town hall on March 21, addressing growth in Charles County.

Collins invited Jason Groth, the acting director of the county’s planning and growth management department, to speak on what the department has been working on and upcoming projects.

“Charles County has been evolving constantly in the past half century,” Groth said.

He shared details about the Waldorf Redevelopment Corridor but said that it will take a while to build and attain the “downtown type area” that planners seek to create. He said that the development is not quite on the scale of the National Harbor, although it would be very walkable.

Another point of discussion was St. Charles Parkway and how it has a master plan that dictates how certain land will only be used for specific developments, like new schools or homes.

Despite citizens thinking that development is taking place too fast within the county, Groth said, “We build at a pretty average pace.”

Collins then introduced Charles Rice, the county’s planning director, saying, “He’s the visionary for the county.”

Rice began by polling the attendees, asking them to raise their hands if they believed that the county was growing too fast.

A large portion of attendees raised their hands, but Rice challenged that by saying that this level of growth could conversely be a good sign for the county.

To Rice, the growth means that people see something desirable within Charles County and want to live there because of good amenities or having a good school system.

“Why I think Charles County is so attractive, we have a little bit of everything here,” Rice said. “The state looks at us as having some of the highest value natural resources.”

As Rice finished, Collins took the microphone to speak on his reflections on growing up in Charles County and how he perceives the growth.

Collins moved from Washington, D.C., as a child to Charles County and said that any long-time resident knows that today’s Charles County is vastly different from the county of the past.

“There’s an attractiveness that exists in this community,” Collins said.

He mentioned how Charles, within the past two years, became the wealthiest Black majority population in the nation and how impactful the county’s proximity to Washington, D.C., is.

Collins was asked about the county’s revenue being down despite people coming to the county more frequently.

The commissioner said that the revenue issue was not just limited to Charles, but is a statewide problem.

Funds from the American Rescue Plan Act are now drying out and it is one of the biggest sources of the reduction of revenue in the county currently. Collins said that this may lead to tough calls in cutting departments or raising taxes, but he urged residents to become actively involved and share their inputs so he and the other commissioners have a better sense of what their priorities should be.