Use the form on the right to contact us.
You can edit the text in this area, and change where the contact form on the right submits to, by entering edit mode using the modes on the bottom right.
If the board approves this plan as it is, it can compel those who review the land-swap and alternative compliance petition to approve the requests since the department of planning and zoning (DPZ) recommended approval assuming the approval of those requests. This creates a bias toward a certain outcome.
Read MoreWe need to ensure stronger adequate public facilities ordinance standards (APFO) are adopted and better moderate and low income housing policies are implemented such that the county begins rolling back what the current standards have begun to create - two Howard Counties. One where lower income families live and another where high income families live.
We need to consider the impacts of housing projects on potential economic integration before we approve these projects, and we cannot allow our school districts to be divided by income.
Read MoreFARM profiles among the data-set provided by MPIA 2018-004, the AAC Draft report released Aug. 8, 2017, and the FARM number from the HCPSS School System Profile are compared. The results summarized from the provided MPIA dataset were nearly 5 percentage points lower than those for the 2017 system-wide profile. Furthermore, the percentage FARM students across the district summarized as a weighted mean from the AAC Draft FARM Report (23.6%) was even higher than the school-system profile.
Read MoreI am happy to share that I have received my first big endorsement from an organization that has been working tirelessly to support progressive candidates across the country.
Run for Something "recruit[s] and support[s] talented, passionate young people who will advocate for progressive values now and for the next 30 years, with the ultimate goal of building a progressive bench."
Read MoreThe Howard County Public School System Board of Education has proposed school attendance area adjustments (redistricting) to take effect in the 2018-2019 school year.
The school attendance area standards are set by Board Policy 6010. Section IV.3 of the standards addresses the preservation of diversity by different measures of the sending and receiving schools.
One measure is "The socioeconomic composition of the school population as measured by participation in the federal [free and reduced meals] FARMS program."
While the proposed redistricting plan does not increase or decrease the standard deviation in percentage FARM across schools, and only affects a few schools. A granular look suggests that the proposed redistricting will not achieve the stated goal of improving economic integration.
Read MoreOver the last few days, I heard the plea of parents' for help in comparing school impact fees across Maryland counties and how Howard County's schools stack up by state standards. My analysis concludes in clear and certain terms that tax payers in Howard County are subsidizing the profits of developers.
Impact fees should be tied to the size of the land available for development, the cost of developing public facilities, and demand. Currently, there is a market distortion that is created because of the low impact fees. This does not necessarily mean that higher impact fees mean higher home prices. The low impact fees are just creating opportunities for the developer to pocket more of the profits that it would have paid to mitigate overcrowding.
Read MoreThe stake holders are not being forthcoming and are hoping to evasively get this project approved. The process is not transparent. They want county money to subsidize their development and it is not obvious if all the Council Members realize this. The TIF bill will be in front of the next council. If elected, I will not vote for it under any circumstances. There is a train stop is 2,500 ft away and there is absolutely no need for another one.
Read MoreWe need to stop approvals of any new development that can impact any public facilities. The post-measures redistricting open/close chart is basically a green-light for additional development. We need to incorporate the lessons learned from the current redistricting experience in the new APFO.
The proposed special taxing district in North Laurel (CR111-2017) will result in 1,000 residential units. Assuming an average of 0.5 kids per household, this will mean up to 500 students. Current Board of Education standard for elementary school capacity is 788.
The TOD seems more like a Trojan horse to bring in more development than to alleviate transportation problems. It boggles the mind to say “we need a TOD because we want to make transit easier, but to do that, we will add more residential units that will contribute to additional congestion.” Fast-paced development constrains resources and leads to poor quality of life; unless the attendant costs are mitigated. I do not support CR111-2017 and the TIF.
Read MoreThe size, scope, and pace of the proposals before the County Council in conjunction with the redistricting effort is troubling. The redistricting effort is essentially a consequence of the rapid growth and densification of the county. Nothing about these proposals suggests that we will not revisit the same problems two to three years from now. We need an integrated analysis of all the proposals before we move forward on future residential development that lead to strain our infrastructure.
Read MoreAs someone who lives in a district surrounded by a large swath of M1/M2 zoned area, the health and safety risk to District 3 residents concerns me and every effort should be made to strengthen existing regulations to protect the health and safety of residents living near existing M1/M2 zoned regions. If the County Executive is confident that no commercial mulching will take place then he should have no problem with the proposals made in ZRA 160.
Read MoreI believe that this is a pivotal moment in human history. What we do now will reverberate for decades to come. The quality of our schools, whether we care for the vulnerable and speak for the powerless, how we treat each other regardless of our differences, how we deal with the issue of climate change, these are all the most challenging issues of our time.
Read MoreWe know the pernicious effects of money in politics. Well-intentioned candidates are forced to focus on raising money to cover expensive campaigns by spending time with interest groups instead of talking to their constituents. Even though once a candidate for office gets elected, his or her salary is paid by the constituents, we expect them to come up with thousands of dollars or in cases of federal elections millions on their own to be in a position to serve us. This is a skewed incentive system that we can begin to correct with this bill.
Read More