A charming former railroad hub along the Patapsco River, Sykesville is home to a vibrant community, a thriving downtown, and numerous attractions for the whole family. As a state and nationally designated Main Street Community, the Town has plenty to offer its residents, business owners and visitors. Contact us today to find out how Sykesville and Warfield can be a part of your future.
Amenities
Benefits of Warfield: Beautiful Location
Warfield is located on MD Route 32 in the Sykesville town limits and, in addition to substantial acreage for new construction, includes twelve separate buildings on a 17-acre parcel constructed in the early 20th century and utilized by Springfield Hospital Center until the early 2000s. The buildings carry historical designations from the National Park Service and Maryland Historical Trust and comprise about 185,000 square feet of the total 600,000 square feet of potential non-residential density. The existing buildings are eligible for federal and state historic tax credits because of these historic designations.
Benefits of Warfield: Quality of Life
Located in the heart of Carroll County’s Piedmont region, Warfield at Historic Sykesville is a mixed-use project that is zoned for up to 600,000 square feet of office, light industrial, and retail space, approximately 181 residential units, a full-service hotel, and a 27-acre town park. Contact us today to find out how Warfield can be a part of your future.
Let’s Talk about Warfield: Online Community Information Sessions
Community engagement is an integral part of any large-scale historical preservation project like Warfield. It’s important to us that members of the Sykesville community be included in the conversation about Warfield’s future, so we’re organizing two 90-minute community information sessions via Zoom to update local residents on the status of the project and field questions, comments, and concerns.
The sessions will take place on the following dates:
March 30, 2021, 7:00 PM – 8:30 PM
April 1, 2021, 7:00 PM – 8:30 PM
Each session will begin with a 30-minute overview of the history, current status, and future of the Warfield project. Specific topics will include:
- The history of the property;
- The current approved plan;
- Possible future changes to the plan;
- Project challenges and initiatives to advance the project;
- A summary of the local real estate market;
- The impact of the Warfield project on the Sykesville community;
- The current political climate (state, county, and local).
The remainder of the session time will be devoted to answering questions and addressing comments and concerns. We ask that you submit your questions in advance so we can provide thoughtful and detailed answers. We want to be responsive and tailor our presentation to what the community wants to discuss.
Pre-registration is required for these sessions and spaces are limited to ensure maximum engagement, so if you’d like to participate, sign up now to reserve your spot.
Please note that these sessions are restricted to residents of Sykesville at this time. Future sessions may be added to include non-Sykesville residents.
We look forward to speaking with you and answering your questions in these sessions. If you’d like to keep up with all the latest Warfield news you can sign up for updates on our website, and don’t forget to follow us on Twitter and Facebook.
Senate Bill 885: You Can Play an Important Role
On Wednesday, March 3, Senate Bill 885 was in front of Maryland’s Senate Budget and Tax Committee. We asked members of the community to assist in supporting the bill prior to the hearing, but this is just the beginning of the journey – there are still many ways you as a citizen can get involved to help this important legislation move forward.
The above video of the testimony for SB0885 is a great place to start for basic information about the Income Tax Credit for Catalytic Revitalization Projects. If you’d like to learn more about how you can support the bill, contact Steve McCleaf as soon as possible. No amount of support is too small – even something as simple as an email or letter to a legislator can make a big difference.
Also, don’t forget to sign up for updates on our website, and to follow us on Twitter and Facebook for all the latest information.
How You Can Help Change Warfield’s Future Right Now
Things are moving quickly for proposed legislation that could act as a significant boost for Warfield and other large-scale historic preservation projects. Senate Bill 885, a potentially game-changing bill that proposes a tax credit for catalytic revitalization projects like Warfield, will be in front of Maryland’s Senate Budget and Tax Committee at 1 p.m. on Wednesday, March 3, 2021. Here are some main points of the bill, how the tax credit will benefit Sykesville, the Warfield project, the surrounding community, and the state, and how you as a citizen can get involved right now to give this bill the public support it needs to move forward in the legislative process.
Taken in December 2019 at the National Park Service’s Historic Preservation Training Center in Frederick, MD. Left to Right: Roger Conley (Warfield), Moss Rudley (Superintendent of the Historic Preservation Training Center), MD State Senator Katie Fry Hester, Steven D. McCleaf (Warfield), and Nicholas Redding (Preservation Maryland).
Senate Bill 885: Income Tax Credit for Catalytic Revitalization Projects
This bill was introduced by Senator Katie Fry Hester on February 9, 2021. The purpose of the bill is to allow the owners of qualified properties to claim a credit against state income taxes for certain rehabilitation costs and other construction costs for projects in the State of Maryland identified as “catalytic.”
According to the bill, a catalytic project must:
- Be located in the State of Maryland;
- Be presently or formerly owned by the State of Maryland or the federal government;
- Foster economic, housing, and community development within the immediately surrounding communities if developed;
- Have been previously used as a college or university, K-12 school, hospital, mental health facility, or military facility or installation.
The tax credit would be in the amount of 20% of eligible costs up to a maximum of $15 million. Warfield would be able to make full use of this tax credit in rehabilitating the remaining vacant historic buildings located in Parcel D, which contains all of the project’s historic structures.
You can read the full text of the current draft of the bill here.
What This Bill Means for Warfield, the Sykesville Community, and the State of Maryland
Most large-scale historic preservation projects like Warfield require multiple government incentive programs to achieve financial viability because the cost to preserve and rehabilitate historic structures far exceeds the cost of new construction. Federal and state historic tax credit programs typically play an essential role in bridging this gap.
The Warfield team has worked hard with Senator Hester, the Department of Planning, and the Department of Housing and Community Development on this bill because the existing Maryland Historic Preservation Tax Credit program falls woefully short of what is needed to support the redevelopment of Warfield and similar large historic complexes in Maryland. Current program caps currently stand at $9 million annually and $3 million per project (compared to $100 million in Virginia and even unlimited funding in several states).
All of this said, this bill is not just about saving and preserving cultural resources— it’s also about economic stimulus. When states invest in historic preservation tax credit programs, the result is community revitalization and economic development that pays for the tax credits many times over. Ethan Reed of Real Property Research Group estimates that each $1 of tax credits invested yields the state $8.13 in total economic output. He also indicates that job creation is significant, with 49.2 jobs created during the construction period throughout Maryland for each $1 million investment by the state.
If Senate Bill 885 is successful, Warfield would likely be the first project approved for the new catalytic tax credit given that the Warfield team has been at the forefront of the effort to champion this program. It is also important to recognize the positive impact that the tax credit proposed in this bill could have a huge impact in saving Warfield and several other historic campuses around the state and spurring economic development in the communities in which these complexes are located.
How You Can Get Involved
Public support for Senate Bill 885 is essential and we strongly encourage all members of the community to get involved as soon as possible ahead of the March 3rd hearing date. IF YOU WANT TO LEARN MORE AND HELP, please contact Steve McCleaf as soon as possible but no later than March 1, 2021.
Lastly, please sign up for updates on our website and to follow us on Twitter and Facebook for all the latest updates, as well as information on how to watch the testimony live as it happens. We will be posting links to the livestream on our social channels.