Council takes Central Industrial Park site plan amendment under advisement

Prince George's County Council, sitting as the district council, on April 28, 2025 took under advisement a detailed site plan (DSP-23020) from American Resource Management Group seeking to amend the development district overlay (DDO) use list to allow a contractor's office and storage yard at a 1.63-acre property on the east side of West Hampton Avenue, about 200 feet south of Maryland Route 214 (Central Avenue) in Council District 6.

Planning staff presented the application. Dexter Covert of the county's Urban Design Section said the site is in Planning Area 75A and within the prior zoning ordinance's I-1 (light industrial) zone with both a Development District Overlay (DDO) and Military Installation Overlay (MIO). Covert said the site includes an existing one-story 5,831-square-foot brick building, a roughly 339-square-foot block shed and a roughly 440-square-foot metal-sided building, with open storage cover structures on the property. He said no new gross floor area is proposed and the plan limits changes to minor site work, including one bike rack, striping for seven parking spaces and a pedestrian pathway. He noted the Planning Board recommended approval with conditions (Planning Board Resolution No. 2025-017, condition referenced on page 12 of the resolution).

Thomas Haller, an attorney representing American Resource Management Group, described the property's history. He said C&P Telephone Company (now Verizon) once owned a larger parcel that included an office on Central Avenue and a contractor storage yard behind it; that yard operated for decades. Haller said the property was subdivided and later placed in a DDO when Prince George's County adopted a Subregion 4 master plan and sectional map amendment. Under that DDO, the applicant said, contractor storage yards were excluded from the permitted use list even though the underlying I-1 zone would normally allow them. Haller said the owner, Bob Bilo, operates a company called Daiko, founded in 1969, and seeks only to occupy the site and obtain a use and occupancy permit without building new structures.

Council Member Blaguet asked whether the application would change the property's frontage and why the property could not already be used under I-1 zoning. Haller and staff said the restriction stems from the parcel's inclusion in the DDO when the larger tract was mapped, which removed some uses from the I-1 permitted list; staff confirmed the requested change would apply only to this property and not alter DDO restrictions elsewhere. Sam Brown (planning counsel) stated he concurred with the Planning Board recommendation.

Council Member Blaguet referred the item to staff for preparation of a document and said she would take it under advisement; the clerk noted no vote was required and that the item was being taken under advisement for further staff preparation. The Planning staff record lists an appeal-by date of 04/24/2025 and an action-by date of 05/27/2025.

The council's action was procedural: staff will prepare the written document and the item remains under advisement pending that follow-up. No formal approval or denial of the use amendment was recorded at the meeting.