Applicant seeks rezoning of Marlboro Station parcels along Marlboro Pike

Maureen McNeil, the zoning hearing examiner, opened ZMA2025007 at about 9:30 a.m. on Sept. 16, 2026, and heard the applicant's case for "Marlboro Station," a proposed rezoning of 5541 and 5545 Marlboro Pike from RMF‑20 to RMF‑48. The applicant, represented by counsel Abdullah Hejazi, called the property owner, who testified about purchase price, current uses and development intentions.

The owner, who goes by Rob and said he is the sole owner of ZT of Maryland LLC, told the tribunal he bought 5545 in 2022 for about $1,400,000 and 5541 in 2024 for about $900,000 and has invested more than $2.6 million including engineering and consultant costs. "We did," he testified when asked if ZT of Maryland LLC purchased the two properties. He said the front of the site currently operates as a used‑car dealership and an auto‑repair shop and that, without rezoning, he would continue to rent the parcels to those commercial users rather than demolish and redevelop them as housing because the current zoning would not produce a viable residential project.

Two land‑use experts — Eddie Diaz Campbell and Mark Ferguson — testified for the applicant. Both argued that a combination of public investments on Marlboro Pike and surrounding private reinvestment has materially changed the corridor and that a historical split‑parcel treatment left in county mapping created an inaccurate factual premise when the 2009 sector plan rezoned the property. They recommended RMF‑48 as the more appropriate zone for the property given current conditions and constraints.

The examiner asked the applicant to file several documents before the record closes: a certificate of good standing for ZT of Maryland LLC, and, if an ownership interest in the LLC is confirmed for the owner’s wife, an ethics affidavit. The applicant agreed to provide the documents and additional exhibits (a PG Atlas overlay and excerpts from a prior case file). The hearing was left open to receive those items before a decision.

Why it matters: The case pits long‑standing neighborhood plan assumptions against recent street and development changes along Marlboro Pike. Rezoning could allow higher density residential development at a site currently occupied by automobile‑oriented businesses, affecting local land use and development patterns.