Building a Green Maryland : Maryland Green Building Lawyer & Attorney : Megan Reuwer : The Law Offices of Megan L. Reuwer, P.A. : MD Green Building, Sustainability

On May 11, 2011, HB 972 was signed into law. This is enabling legislation that allows the Department of Housing and Community Development to adopt by regulation the International Green Construction Code and authorizes local jurisdictions to adopt and make local amendments to the International Green Construction Code.  It becomes effective on March 1, 2012.

Will we soon see local jurisdictions begin to adopt the IGCC in its entirety or make amendments to the Code?

• Probably. Maryland is an environmentally progressive state, and many of its jurisdictions have been quick to incorporate some form of green building requirements or incentives into their local laws, therefore, it's easy to anticipate that provisions of the IGCC may be appealing to local governments as they continue to mandate "green."

So what is the IGCC?

• It is intended to provide model code language that is designed to link together concepts of green building design, building performance, and building safety. It is an overlay code that is intended to advance our existing codes, and uses provisions of the International Energy Conservation Codes as a baseline.

Similar to other green building initiatives, the IGCC focuses on things like energy conservation, water efficiency, building owner responsibilities, site impacts, building waste, and materials and resource considerations. Unlike other green building initiatives (LEED being one example), the IGCC, if adopted by your local jurisidiction (in whole, or in part), will become enforceable and mandatory as part of regular code compliance.

Therefore, the provisions that local jurisidictions choose to adopt and/or to amend will be very important for builders and developers. If and when your local jurisdiction introduces legislation to adopt the IGCC, you will want to become involved in that process as early as possible to voice your concerns. The beauty of HB 972 is that it gives local governments the flexibility to pick and choose those provisions of the IGCC that will work based on that locality. We'll take a look at some of the model language from the IGCC in a follow-up post so you'll be aware of some of the important provisions of the code.

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I want to very briefly announce the formation of my new law practice, The Law Offices of Megan L. Reuwer, P.A. The opening of my own doors is a very exciting milestone in my life and I am thankful for those who have helped to make it possible! If you're ever in the area, I invite you to stop by for a tour of my new space located at 5300 Dorsey Hall Drive, Suite 107, in Ellicott City, Maryland. I look forward to keeping you informed of developing legal issues impacting the building and development industry on this blog, and I look forward to working with you in the future should you ever require real estate related legal services.

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As a state, we have green building laws that have existed and that continue to come into existence in the northern and central parts of Maryland (Baltimore City, Annapolis, Howard County, and Montgomery County), but I think that we're beginning to see local governments moving - albeit at more of the turtle's pace than the hare's-  towards integrating green building requirements in the southern counties. In particular, I'm talking about the exceptionally lovely Charles, Calvert, and St. Mary's Counties.

Charles County: Charles County is beginning to take a more active role in mandating green building for some publicly-owned or funded buildings.

• The Town of La Plata passed Town Council Resolution #08-2, which requires that all town-owned and town-funded new construction and major renovations greater than 5,000 square feet become LEED Certified. According to this Resolution, the Town of La Plata is leading the way in green building in Charles County - its La Plata Town Hall is the County's first LEED certified building.
• "LEED or its equivalent” language is becoming integrated in zoning approvals.  For example, a bill passed in 2009 rezoned 48 acres from the Agricultural Conservation zone in Charles County to the Planned Employment Park zone which allows for the inclusion of industrial, office, and retail components.  As a condition of that bill, the owner-applicant is required to obtain LEED certification “at both the site level and the architectural level.” As a side note, this is an interesting (read: complicated!) requirement because the LEED certification process isn't broken down into two levels of certification.  There is no site development certification that is separate and apart from the building/architectural review - therefore, it could prove difficult for the owner to satisfy this condition (self-serving plug in 3...2...1: if you're a developer facing issues like this, you might benefit by having a land use attorney that's familiar with green certification requirements on your team). 

Calvert County: Calvert County is in the planning phases for green building laws.

•  At the end of 2008, the Director of Planning and Zoning began advocating that the Board of County Commissioners consider enacting green building amendments to the Zoning Ordinance– but, to my knowledge, nothing has been implemented yet.
• Calvert County has created a Green Team that is charged with the task of making recommendations regarding the County's future green building goals.  Some of the Green Team's recommendations include preparing town center ordinances that facilitate green site and building design and requiring future county-owned buildings over 10,000 square feet to comply with LEED Silver certification.

St. Mary’s County:  St. Mary's County is home to some incredible LEED-certified institutions.

• The Evergreen Elementary School is LEED Gold certified and won an award last night at the USGBC Maryland Chapter's 5th Annual Awards Ceremony. 
• St. Mary’s College has a LEED Silver certified academic building

Predictions: There's a pattern that counties, towns, cities and other municipalities follow when going green.  The first step is to require that publicly owned or funded buildings incorporate green elements or achieve various levels of certification.  As the local government becomes more comfortable with legislating green, the focus may start to transition towards the private sector (Baltimore City and Annapolis are good examples). While the shift to mandating green building for private construction might be a bit far off in the future for these southern Maryland counties, I think we're beginning to see the first steps.

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