Affordable Housing Could Increase With Silver Spring Zone Change

SILVER SPRING, MD — The County Council is set to vote on a rezoning proposal that could make way for 76 new units of multi-family housing in Silver Spring at its meeting Tuesday afternoon. The new units would be restricted to tenants who make 20 to 80 percent of the median annual income in the county for the first 15 years — after that 15 percent of the units would be Moderately Priced Dwelling Units.

The owners of Park Montgomery — a high-rise 141-unit apartment building in Silver Spring —are seeking to change the property’s classification to a Commercial Residential Town Floating zone so that it can build another multi-family building with the new 76 units.

The purpose of a floating zone, as defined by the Montgomery County floating zone requirements, could be:

• To allow development of mixed-use centers and communities at a range of densi- ties and heights flexible enough to respond to various settings
• To allow flexibility in uses for a site
• To provide mixed-use development that is compatible with adjacent development

Development funding stems from the County Housing Initiative Fund and Low-Income Housing Tax Credits and the developer says they will renovate the existing 141 units as part of the project.

The Hearing Examiner and County Planning Staff have both recommended that the rezoning be approved by the County Council, stating that it “furthers the public interest in expanding the indentified [sic] need for affordable housing… ”

The property is at 8860 Piney Branch Road in Silver Spring, less than 1,000 feet from where a new Purple Line station is being built, the report says.

Read the full report here.

See the County Council’s full agenda for July 20 here.