It took only a few minutes before the weeknight Baltimore County Council hearing erupted into dramatics.

The county’s housing director, Terry Hickey, pitched the council on allocating more money to a Towson housing development in financial straits. He noted that the development team had a proven track record for delivering high-quality apartments, and warned that another steward of the land may not have the same interests.

It was enough to set off County Councilman Todd Crandell — and doom the request for more money.

“I’ve never been threatened like you’ve just threatened this council,” Crandell, a Republican who represents Dundalk and the southeastern portion of the county, told a visibly stunned Hickey. “Wrong path, my friend, wrong path.”

From there, the loan request’s prospects only grew dimmer.

Council members took turns berating the project, a 56-unit affordable housing complex known as Red Maple Place, that has evolved since its 2018 origins into one of the most controversial land use deals in the Baltimore area.

The site sits between East Joppa Road and East Pennsylvania Avenue, to the east of Fairmount Avenue in Towson. One parcel, a little more than an acre in size, would be developed, while the southern lot would be preserved as open land. The project would border Historic East Towson, a predominantly Black community founded by formerly enslaved people after the Civil War.

On Monday night, the seven-member council, unsurprisingly, unanimously voted down the additional $2 million loan, which would have increased Baltimore County’s commitment to $4.1 million from $2.1 million.

Developer Homes for America said multiple legal challenges brought by neighboring community members since 2020, and increasing construction costs in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, created an unforeseen $8 million gap. With the other $6 million raised, the developer asked the county to cover the balance so the project could start breaking ground.

But the denial throws the apartment building into even greater uncertainty.

The debate over Red Maple Place’s funding may have reverberations that extend beyond this project. Under the bright, fluorescent lights of the stately council chambers, it exposed the ongoing tension in Baltimore County and elsewhere about who wields power in discussions about housing.

Despite overwhelming evidence that thousands more homes are needed to offset soaring rent and mortgage costs across the nation, the Baltimore County Council is again signaling its intent to look the other way. Crandell, last week, questioned if there was even a crisis of affordability happening at all.

Crandell also suggested that the council bore no responsibility for helping the county meet the terms of the voluntary consent agreement it reached with the federal government in 2016 to build more affordable housing.

The deal stemmed from a lawsuit that argued the county had systematically concentrated where affordable housing was allowed, and it mandated that the county build 1,000 new units of reduced-price housing in a wider range of neighborhoods by 2027.

The pressure to adhere to the federal consent agreement wasn’t heavy enough to sway the rest of the council on Red Maple Place.

At last week’s hearing, County Councilman Izzy Patoka, a Democrat from Pikesville, questioned whether the county ought to be “subsidizing” the loss of open space, and whether an alternative to building expensive apartments existed.

Councilman Mike Ertel, a Democrat from the Towson area, took note of the project’s potential environmental implications and its price tag — the cost has ballooned to more than $30 million, according to the county.

And Perry Hall Republican Councilman David Marks, who once moved to legislate the project out of existence, noted that the council-appointed Board of Appeals opposed the project, too, and should have served as a buffer.

Several county residents also spoke against Red Maple Place, contending it never won community support and should not receive additional taxpayer funds.

“What I would like to see is we make a more thoughtful, conscious and sustainable decision,” said Nancy Goldring, president of the Northeast Towson Improvement Association Inc.

Goldring said she didn’t see the harm in “calling it a day” on Red Maple Place, arguing that the adjacent Historic East Towson had been “butchered” badly enough over the years. She said her opposition never centered on adding more affordability to the community, but on the parcel chosen to house it.

Adria Crutchfield, Executive Director of the Baltimore Regional Housing Partnership, an organization that contracts with the Housing Authority of Baltimore City to connect voucher recipients with housing, called opponents’ position a farce.

Crutchfield said BRHP’s clients typically search long and hard for housing in the county, and Red Maple Place could have absorbed some of the need. Instead, she said, residents have used environmental and preservation concerns as excuses to prevent a state- and county-regulated project from materializing.

“If you are a proponent for affordable housing, then you would not be speaking out against a proposal such as this,” Crutchfield said. “If not now, when? And if not here, where?”

During remarks, Homes for America’s Johnson said last week that the company never would have plowed forward with Red Maple Place if they didn’t feel they had neighborhood buy-in. The building has endured several changes over the years — including to its orientation and its color — that Johnson said were made to address community concerns.

The site had already been zoned to accommodate an apartment building when Homes for America set out to acquire it in 2018, and the team has argued that the addition of more homes in a neighborhood such as Towson would help connect more low-income households with jobs and opportunities and provide convenient housing for students and families.

Johnson also said Red Maple Place is far from the only housing project struggling with higher-than-expected costs, which she blamed largely on the pandemic’s economic consequences. She said Homes for America would be a conscientious and long-term steward of the property.

In a Monday night statement, Johnson said Homes for America remains committed to the vision, despite the “dramatic inflation” caused by years of legal delays, and would continue to seek additional funding. It’s not clear where it might come from: Maryland housing secretary Jake Day indicated last week that the state may not be able to offer additional help, saying there are “limits” to what the project should receive from state government.

Red Maple Place’s neighbors have long complained that the proposal added more density, disruption and environmental hazards than the area could withstand and unsuccessfully challenged the project in court.

Despite the fierce backlash from neighbors, lawmakers and environmental advocates, Red Maple Place won the support of former County Executive Johnny Olszewski Jr. and his council-appointed successor, Kathy Klausmeier.

But it wasn’t enough. County Councilman Julian Jones, a Democrat from Woodstock and a self-described pro-housing legislator, said Monday that county budget uncertainties caused by the federal government forced his hand.

“This is not a good time,” Jones, a Democrat, said before the vote. “I don’t think I’ll be supporting the loan, but clearly I support affordable housing.”

Correction: This article has been updated to correct the name of County Councilman Todd Crandell.