The Scott administration has halted the process to sell the Sisson Street Citizen Drop-Off Center to a private developer, an effort that sparked an intense public backlash.

“We cancelled the RFP,” Otis Rolley, president of the Baltimore Development Corporation, informed the Sisson Street Task Force at a virtual meeting last night.

Rolley pledged that “we will not rush any decisions” on the fate of the property until after the task force makes it recommendations to Mayor Brandon Scott.

He also apologized for the quasi-public agency’s failure to appear at the previous task force meeting, saying it was the result of “a miscommunication” and “hiccup”  in an office that he is reorganizing.

• BDC bows out of Sisson Street Task Force meeting, prompting an outburst by its chair (12/9/25)

It was BDC’s Request for Proposals from groups interested in redeveloping the Sisson Street parcel that led to a bid by Seawall Development to acquire the land for a possible grocery store and other retail.

BDC refused – and still refuses – to name the bidder, saying it is proprietary information. But Seawall partner Thibault Manekin spread news of the company’s interest in buying the site at community meetings.

Last August, the Scott administration announced it would introduce legislation to sell the land and move the residential trash center to 2801 Falls Road, a storage yard owned by Potts & Callahan.

The decision was met by near universal opposition because the Sisson Street site is highly popular among area residents and the Potts & Callahan property was located in a partial flood plain along a scenic stretch of the Jones Falls Valley.

To counter the public blowback, Mayor Brandon Scott announced the formation of the 13-member task force to recommend to him whether to keep, sell or move the drop-off center. The group is chaired by Councilwoman Odette Ramos and includes council members James Torrence and Jermaine Jones.

Few Alternatives

Last night Ramos suggested that the group is finding very few alternative sites, raising the possibility that the Sisson Street facility will either remain in place or be shut down.

According to the Department of Public Works, the facility needs a $15 million “refresh” and would still not operate at an optimal level. Asked how much an alternative site would cost, DPW Deputy Director Alan Robinson said an estimate is not possible until an actual site is determined.

One promising site – 400 West North Avenue below the Jones Falls Expressway – is now off the list because “the land has been sold to Amtrak,” Ramos said last night.

The possibility grows that the facility will either stay in place or be closed.

The former railroad yard, listed as partially owned by Harborplace developer P. David Bramble, will be used by Amtrak as a staging area for its West Baltimore Tunnel project.

Councilman Torrence previously announced that the site is near a Black community, which automatically disqualifies it from a potential location under Mayor Scott’s criteria.

Another possible location, at Monument Street and Edison Highway in East Baltimore, has been removed because the city is planning “an awesome, exciting development there,” according to Ramos.

This leaves a 4.5-acre site at 25th Street and Huntingdon Avenue, owned by Seawall and used as an MTA bus depot, and a privately owned parcel on Fallsway and High Street not far from City Hall.

Neither parcel was mentioned last night as several members of the task force sought to find ways to downsize or close the Sisson Street location. (No public testimony was allowed outside of invited guests.)

Samantha Horn, an officer at the Greater Remington Improvement Association (GRIA), wondered whether satellite drop-off centers could handle the citizen trash now collected at Sisson Street. There also was a suggestion of “portable” centers, basically dumpsters placed in neighborhoods on a regular schedule, to handle the waste.

Matthew Williams, owner of Mount Royal Soaps, said the Remington Merchants Association strongly favored converting the Sisson Street property into a walkable, mixed-use development, saying his community should be “a destination, not a dump.”

Benn Ray, president of the Hampden Village Merchants Association, said his members “run trash or recycling down to Sisson Street all the time.”

Accusing GRIA of having undue influence on the task force, Ray said, “We are unanimous. We want to keep this asset at Sisson Street or in the neighborhood. And not to move it to a Black neighborhood.”

• For The Brew’s detailed coverage of the trash facility controversy.