A Web of Waivers and Exemptions Threatens Wheaton's Green Forested Buffer

Even though the County Council adopted language specifically protecting Wheaton's Green Forested Buffer when it approved the Wheaton Sector Plan last November, this forest remains in jeopardy.  

Trees within this buffer protect adjacent neighborhoods from , but the County government insists on allowing the trees to be cut down by Westfield and Costco for any reason, at any time, under the web of waivers and exemptions that the County departments have woven for Westfield.  Our coalition is doing everything in our power to save this five-acre wooded treasure, the last significant forest in the Wheaton Sector Plan area. We are clearing away this cobweb to reveal that there is no basis for the waivers and exemptions, and to insist on full enforcement of our environmental laws.

Our County's Forest Conservation Law (FCL) applies to development projects that meet certain criteria, and that involve impacts to certain natural features. One such natural feature that triggers the Forest Conservation Law is the presence of a stream on the site.

The FCL requires that developers who plan to cut down or damage trees next to a stream must submit a Forest Conservation Plan (FCP) to the Montgomery County Planning Department.  A Forest Conservation Plan is a detailed map and text that shows the location and fate of each large mature tree, the extent of the planned construction activity that could destroy or damage certain trees, the exact location of the trees and forest areas that will be saved and the method for saving them.

A stream does in fact exist in the forested buffer - it's the headwaters of Silver Creek, but the Planning Department is refusing to delineate the stream buffer and to require Westfield to file an FCP. Silver Creek is acknowledged in the new Wheaton Sector Plan, and by the Department of Permitting Services (DPS), which issued a sediment plan and stormwater waiver to the Costco Mall project.  Last December, even Westfield's own engineers delineated the stream buffer on their Stormwater Concept Plan for the Costco gas station. 

Westfield plans to discharge stormwater runoff for the entire Costco Mall Addition development project into the heart of the forest. This requires destroying and damaging trees to construct a stormwater conveyance system that will empty into Silver Creek, Kensington Branch, Rock Creek, Potomac and the Chesapeake Bay.  Without an approved FCP, this construction could proceed unfettered without any oversight, essentially destroying the remaining forest's heart. 

The Westfield-Costco Mall Addition is now under active construction, and the bulldozers are getting closer.  Audubon Naturalist Society and its partners have asked Planning Director Rollin Stanley to require Westfield to prepare a Forest Conservation Plan for this project.  Download 1.13.12 Letter to Rollin Stanley requesting Administrative Review of FCP Exemption 42011026E.  We've asked Rick Brush of DPS to revoke the Sediment Control Plan waiver his Department reportedly issued for this project, and to require Westfield to submit a full-fledged Sediment Control Plan.  We just don't understand why Montgomery County has woven this web of waivers and exemptions for Westfield and Costco, when doing so jeopardizes the last remaining forest and headwater streams in the Wheaton Sector Plan area -- natural resources that the County Council required to be specifically protected less than two months ago.