The properties that have drawn controversy included in a bill that would rezone dozens of parcels in New Castle County will likely be excluded from the bill by the time the County Council weighs in.
At an October Planning Board hearing, New Castle County Land-use General Manager Charuni Patibanda said it is her department's intention to recommend that several properties be taken out of the controversial bill, including the Alapocas land where Incyte wants to build a five-story office building and a property abutting the Town of Whitehall in southern New Castle County where a warehouse development is proposed.
Patibanda's comments followed similar remarks made in previous public hearings by county councilmembers Janet Kilpatrick and David Carter. In August, they said they planned to introduce amendments once the bill reached the County Council that would force the rezonings for the Incyte and warehouse projects to be considered separately.
An artist rendering of the proposed Incyte office building in Alapocas. The Brandywine runs to the left of the view. The Wilmington Friends track and the Alapocas neighborhood is visible to the right.
The Planning Board and the county's Land Use Department will give their recommendations to the County Council following a Planning Board business meeting tentatively scheduled for Dec. 12. A vote of the County Council will be taken in the following weeks.
The county's Land Use Department proposed the ordinance, known as a comprehensive rezoning, to bring the county's zoning code in line with a planning tool called the future land use map. The county modified the future land use map as part of a comprehensive planning process that wrapped up last year.
The future land use map categorizes every property in the county, using broad descriptions like residential, business flex and manufacturing, and is supposed to embody the county's overall vision as outlined in the comprehensive plan. The zoning code, however, holds the actual legal power to prescribe what can be built on each property.
The properties included in the comprehensive rezoning bill have a future land use map category in conflict with their zoning district. The Incyte property, for instance, is now marked as business flex on the future land use map but zoned suburban. As proposed, Incyte's office building requires office regional zoning.
By grouping dozens of rezonings together, the ordinance would reduce the opportunity for the public to provide input.
Typically, to change a zoning district, landowners must receive approval from the County Council following a process that requires at least two public hearings. For the larger rezoning package, the public can comment on the proposed rezonings in hearings for the bill, but, should it pass, those rezonings would not face individual scrutiny in their own public hearings.
Most of the more than 3,000 acres affected by the rezoning bill are state- or county-owned land, but a few properties are included where a developer or business has proposed a project that would require rezoning.
Those are the properties that have drawn the most attention and raised questions about the comprehensive rezoning. The Land Use Department says it was following state code that requires the county to rezone land to correspond with changes in the comprehensive plan within 18 months of adoption.
The Wilmington Friends Lower School Campus where Incyte wants to build a five-story, 400,000-square-foot office building.
"The comprehensive planning process was very ambitious," Patibanda said. "Given that this is a new process and that this comprehensive rezoning ordinance contains several rezonings at once, we absolutely recognize that this is not the normal force and not what people are used to."
In a meeting lasting several hours, community members spoke against the Incyte office project and a proposal to build three warehouses and a self-storage facility near Jamison Corner Road. Patibanda said land use will propose amending the ordinance to remove the property Incyte wants to build on and two properties bordering the Town of Whitehall that would provide access to the proposed warehouse project, as well as four parcels controlled by the Delaware City Refinery where a hydrogen plant has been rumored as part of the Mid-Atlantic Hydrogen Hub.
Land use did not share any intent to remove other properties included in the ordinance that have active development plans.
Between Route 13 and Route 1 in St. Georges south of Port Penn Road, a large auto sales and service center has been proposed. The project needs a rezoning from suburban to commercial regional, which is included in the rezoning package.
The Delaware City Refinery as seen from an artificial island near Pennsville, N.J. that technically belongs to Delaware. Four parcels controlled by the refinery were included in the comprehensive rezoning, but could be removed.
Ten acres between the highways south of Hyetts Corner Road would also be rezoned from suburban to commercial regional under the ordinance. Sentinel Self Storage has proposed building six mini-warehouse/storage buildings, a small warehouse and an office there.
A small shopping center has been proposed next to a Wawa at Pole Bridge Road and Route 13. The property is a mix of suburban, commercial regional and single-family zoning. It would be switched to commercial regional under the ordinance, the zoning required for the project.
