The Baltimore City Council is again considering how amending the city’s zoning code to allow for smaller multi-family housing buildings could ease the demand for affordable family homes. A new suite of housing bills was introduced to the city council Monday night.

When Rian Hargrave of Onyx Development tried to renovate a North Gilmor Street home into two family units, she ran into an expensive snaggle of zoning and parking prohibitions. Eventually, she abandoned the idea and went the traditional route by restoring it for one family.

“It's beautiful — I call it a mini mansion — but it's well more than, I think, what a lot of people could really use here,” she said, speaking about her property during a Monday morning news conference at Baltimore City Hall. “This bill will allow for developers like myself to put two units in these huge homes.”

The “Housing Options and Opportunity Act”, introduced by Mayor Brandon Scott, would create a category of ‘low density multi-family’ homes. Think new duplexes and fourplexes — which aren’t allowed in much of the city, or country.

The bill currently before the council defines “low density” as not more than four dwellings and reduces the amount of land required to build those units.

The new legislation works to undo that while expanding access to housing Baltimoreans need, city leaders say. Proponents of low-density multi-family housing argue that it increases housing stock by allowing for more units but also expands options by creating smaller homes for starter families or empty nesters. Some housing experts call it “the missing middle.”

After a 1917 Supreme Court decision ruled that racial zoning violated property rights, segregationists sought new ways to keep Black Americans (and also immigrants and low-income Whites) from buying property. Across America, including Baltimore, cities changed zoning laws to require lots and homes to be of certain sizes, often with the caveat that they be single-family homes. The practice disproportionately impacted Black Americans without the means to purchase such homes.

“What we see today in many parts of Baltimore are enclaves of Black excellence and success, built in spite of exclusion and injustice,”said Scott. “So I want to be very clear: This is not about pushing anyone out of their neighborhood, especially those who live in those enclaves of Black excellence. This is not about erasing what you’ve built."

China Terrell, a corporate lawyer with decades of experience in development and co-founder of Peace Legal, worries that the legislation could have just the opposite effect.

“The bill will help lead capital out of these communities that are struggling and begging for capital, and put them in communities where the money already wants to go, like Roland Park, like Wyman Park,” said Terrell, listing two neighborhoods that are notoriously wealthier and populated by mostly White residents.

Essentially, Terrell thinks that although the bill may be well-intentioned, developers will see they can make more return on investment by building four dwellings where high demand already makes single-family homes hard to come by.

“Those are the neighborhoods, though, where the development already wants to happen because it's a safer bet,” said Terrell. “It's a safer bet than doing something in any of the West Baltimore neighborhoods that are primarily African American, right?”

While cities around the nation are making this change to their zoning codes, a 2022 attempt by Councilman Ryan Dorsey in Baltimore failed.

“Unfortunately our housing crisis locally and nationally has only worsened,” said Dorsey during an interview after the council meeting. “It’s my hope that enough people are coming to their senses to make it easier to build the kind of housing that is in very high demand.”

Four additional bills now sit on councilmembers' desks, all with the goals of working together to facilitate rezoning and construction.

Bill 25-0062 allows buildings of up to six stories to be constructed with a single staircase, while meeting fire safety standards, to reduce lot size for building and construction costs

• Bill 250063 moves the Zoning Administrator to the Department of Planning (it is currently within Housing and Development) with the intent to streamline how zoning laws are applied.
• Bill 25-0064 changes bulk and yard standards to residential zoning with the intent to give more flexibility to homeowners on adapting their properties
• Bill 25-0065 would eliminate parking minimums so that new construction does not automatically require a certain number of off-street parking sites