How will rezonings benefit community?

Sussex County’s Planning and Zoning Commission has two significant rezoning applications from the Lewes and Rehoboth Beach area pending.

One request would allow a change from agricultural/ residential to commercial, to make way for a regional shopping mall on Route 1.

In the Overbrook area west of Red Mill Pond, the proposed mall on a 114-acre parcel would be larger than the three Tanger Outlets shopping centers on Route 1 combined.

The other rezoning involves the 127-acre Old Landing Golf Course at the end of Old Landing Road. That proposal seeks a change from agricultural/residential zoning to medium residential/residential planned community. The rezoning would allow construction of 170 single-family houses and 180 townhouse units, or 350 total units. Current zoning, at two units per acre, would allow something in the neighborhood of 240 single-family homes.

It’s no mystery why the applicants are seeking the changes. A more intensive zoning classification - which both of these projects represent - is worth lots of money.

But that’s not a criterion that is part of the discussion. The most important questions a zoning change request should answer are how will the general welfare of the community be improved, and what need is being addressed?

For the Overbrook shopping center proposal, aren’t miles of existing commercially zoned property along Route 1 from Nassau to Dewey Beach, with hundreds of stores and room for more, enough to meet current and future needs for the next few decades?

As for Osprey Point, it might make sense to allow the developer to cluster townhouses ­at the currently allowed density - and retain more open space on this environmentally sensitive parcel rather than simply cutting up the land into single-family lots.

But rezoning and adding an additional 110 units on a single-lane in and single-lane-out road begs the question: how will 110 extra homes possibly benefit the larger community?

Anyone with eyes can see that these two proposals will reap benefits for the landowners. But that’s not enough. Zoning changes should demonstrate a clear benefit to the community or the greater good. So far these proposals have not.