Opinion ID: 2209492
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: Self-created Hardship as a Sole Factor

Text: Petitioner presents the issue of whether self-created hardship, by itself, is sufficient to deny a variance without consideration of the remaining conditions contained in the ordinance. In other words, is it a sole disqualifying finding, or is it a factor to be considered along with other factors to determine whether practical difficulties or unwarranted hardships exist. The Board and the Court of Special Appeals held that in all cases, whether an area or a use variance is sought or whether practical difficulty or unwarranted hardship is the standard, a self-created hardship, by itself, is sufficient to deny the granting of a variance without any consideration of any other factors. In other words, if self-created hardship exists, the administrative entity need go no further. We do have cases in which we have upheld the denial of variance relief where the agency has found that a self-created hardship existed. We have been unable to determine from the language of our cases whether this Court was ever expressly asked to address the question presented herethe issue of whether self-created hardship alone is sufficient to deny an area variance. We have appeared, in the absence of having it presented as a question by the parties in the various cases, to have assumed, without any extensive investigation of the matter, that it was sufficient. We shall not resolve that issue in this case as we are holding that there is no self-created hardship in the first instance. Accordingly, we leave that issue for a future case, in so far as Maryland law is concerned. [12] In the present case, the only condition required by Anne Arundel County was that the reserved parcel not be used until such time as it passed a percolation test. It imposed no other conditions. Often the need to reserve parcels is caused by then present circumstances that make the parcels, areas, or lots, then un-buildable, and thus, generally, unmarketable. Nonetheless, they are legal parcels or legal lots. They in fact are sellable, although rare may be the buyers for parcels with notations on the plats that they are presently defective, for whatever reason, as to building use. Later, if the circumstances change and the express and implied conditions placed upon the use of the property can be satisfied, the parcel stands in the same position as any other lot in respect to the right to seek variance relief. It is a legal parcel of property. The parcel in question has always been considered a legal lot by the county. During the re-subdivision process permitted and encouraged by the Antiquated Lots Law and the pre-existing statute which placed the lots in nonconformance prior to the re-subdivision, the property combinations resulted in a parcel of land that was not then suitable for the erection of a residential structure because the portion of the parcel that remained after areas had been used for subdivision infra-structure would not, at that time, percolate or otherwise permit development due to critical area requirements. [13] The area was designated as a reserve parcel, i.e., not then qualifying as real property upon which a house could be built. Nonetheless, the parcel remained the property of the subdivider. The only express restriction as to the reserve parcel is contained on the re-subdivision plat itself: Reserve Parcel No. 2, unbuildable until a passing perc test is performed. That limitation was required by Anne Arundel County authorities. The county subsequently approved the re-subdivision plat. [14] It was clear to anyone examining the Administrative Plat that there was only one express limitation imposed on the subject property by the re-subdivision approval, i.e., that no residences could be built on the parcel until, and if, it passed a percolation test. No other limitations were noted on the plat. Our examination of the record does not reflect that any other limitations were imposed on the parcel during the process. Subsequently, it was determined that there was an area within the parcel that could, and did, pass a percolation test. However, the use of that area for the sanitary system to be utilized for a residence on the parcel left an insufficient remaining area to accommodate the type of structure required to be built by covenants that affect the lots within the development and still be in compliance with yard, and other requirements, both critical areas and otherwise, of the zoning ordinance. At that point, the petitioner sought the various approvals, by way of area variances, which would be needed in order for a residential structure to be constructed on the parcel. Because the land, or a portion of it, was either in the critical area, or the critical area buffer zone, review by the Chesapeake Bay Critical Area Commission also was sought. That Commission interposed no objection to the project. Petitioner then sought critical area and other variances necessary to accommodate her proposed project. [15] The relief she sought via the variance process was of the same type, if not scope, of the relief she might have had to seek had she never re-subdivided the property in the first instance. [16] Respondents proffer in their brief that The very laws Stansbury seeks to abridge were in existence before she created her reserved parcel. To be sure, some, if not all, of those laws were in effect prior to the re-subdivision. It was the impact of those very laws upon the preexisting lots and parcels that created the conditions necessitating the applications for the variances. Prior to the time those very laws were passed, Stansbury would have had the right to either rely on the non-conforming character of the lots, a non-conformity created by subsequent statute, or would have had the right to seek a variance of the statutory provisions that put the pre-existing lots out of conformity. The Antiquated Lots Law, which we presume respondents are referring to, created another potential restriction on petitioner's property by imposing a condition that adjacent lots had to be recombined, if in the same ownership, in an attempt to put the lots in conformity, or closer conformity, with the lot size requirements of the new statute. If the Antiquated Lots Law applied, petitioners re-subdivision brought the property into closer compliance. Permissive re-subdivision (or any subdivision for that matter) that decreases nonconformance is not a self-created hardship in respect to remaining small areas of property that require variance considerations before they may be developed.