County Council Leadership

The powers of a legislator are to propose bills, amend bills, vote on bills and amendments, and if they can rally the support of their colleagues pass bills.

Thus one important way a legislator can show leadership, particularly if they were not the original drafter of the legislation, if the bill that is before them has problems is to amend that bill.

Tonight we saw the County Council show this type of leadership. They took County Bill 29 (CB-29) that came to them without a comprehensive community driven master planning process and they amended it to create a comprehensive community driven master planning process that each of Columbia's villages can undertake.

You can find the bill language and amendments here at the bottom of the page.

The following amendments passed:
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 14(in revised form), 15, 16, and 18

Amendment 14 passed, but the amendment itself was amended to add "and not overwhelm" so that the version of 14 that passed read: "If appropriate, secondary residential uses to support and enhance and not overwhelm other uses in the village center."

The following amendments failed:
12 and 13

The following amendment was withdrawn:
17

Sometimes the community requests lots of changes and it takes lots of amendments to get the bill to reflect what the community has been asking for. As I have told a number of people more amendments can be very good, if the amendments are enacting the changes county residents are asking for and if it improves the bill.

County Council members Jen Terrasa, Mary Kay Sigaty, and Calvin Ball listened to there constituents and made sure that there was a comprehensive master planning process in this bill. This is the legislative process working as it should.

Soon we will have the Downtown Rezoning Bill to deal with. It is very important that we keep clearly communicating with our elected officials what we want. In the case of CB-29, the testimony of Kings Contrivance, which proposed specific amendments to the bill proved very effective and nearly all of the changes they requested were incorporated into the bill. I strongly suggest that the testimony on all bills focuses in on specific amendments.

This is Leadership

Tonight County Councilwomen Jen Terrasa (D-3) and Mary Kay Sigaty (D-4) hosted a brainstorming session tonight with Village Board and Columbia Council members to brainstorm how a Master Planning process would work as part of village center redevelopment. After hearing two nights of testimony that included a lot of interest in the inclusion of a Master Plan, these two councilwomen took the lead to continue the discussion and to search for a solution on how the community imput they were recieving could be implemented. I have been very impressed by this constructive leadership and I look forward to seeing how the discussion continues and what actions they take to address the desire for a Master Plan process.

Here are so pictures of tonights meeting:


I spoke with Councilman Ball (D-2) earlier in the week and he is very engaged on this issue as well. It would have caused problems with the Open Meeting Act if three council people had attended this meeting, so his staff member attended.

Every village other than River Hill had representatives at the meeting and it was a very collaborative conversation.

CB-29 Testimony

Testimony for CB-29 continues this evening at 6pm. There were a lot of people interested in testifying.

I have submitted the following testimony in writing:

Amendments to CB-29:

1) Add the mins and maxes proposed by CA
2) Removed the Minor Redevelopment process
3) Page 2 lines 19-22 amend to allow Village Associations be able to petition for to change PDPs, CSPs, FDPs, and SDPs
4) Page 3 lines 1-3 add comply with open space zoning requirements
5) Page 3 lines 19-21 make notifications to ALL villages and CA
6) Page 4 line 11 make DPZ staff report address the village community response statement
7) Page 5 paragraph (4) add lighting
8) Page 5 section A add “including its relationship with other village centers”
9) Page 5 line 26 take out word “center”
10) Page 5 section B add at end “and surrounding community”
11) Page 6 section E add “that will be open to public use” (I would like stronger language “open to public use, community events, free speech, and political discourse”)
12) Page 6 add section I “How redevelopment complies with definition of village center in Section 103, Part 168
13) Page 6 add section J “How redevelopment complies with Village Master Plan”
14) Page 7 section D part 1 change “approve the” to “Adopt a set of”
15) Page 8 section F line 1 add “including Concept Plan”
16) Page 8 section F at end add “and all property owners within the Village Center and the Community Association the Village Center is within”
17) Support OB testimony paragraph 2 (voting rights in CA/Village Elections) and amend to address those concerns

And I will happily talk about CB-29 with any Council member. The above is a rough sketch of how I think CB-29 can be revised to achieve a process that encourages Master Planning that takes a comprehensive look at redevelopment rather than piecemeal development that violates the very concept of Columbia as a Planned Community.

County Council Meets Today to Hear Testimony on Village Center Revitalization Rezoning

The County Council will hear testimony on CB-29 the County Bill that changes the zoning processes on Village Center Revitalization today at 7:30 at the Board of Education building’s Board Room, 10910 Route 108, Ellicott City, MD 21042.

You can sign up to testify on the County Council website.

Councilwoman Terrasa Reviews Village Center Revitalization Bill with the Kings Contrivance Village Board and Representatives of Owen Brown

On Thursday night Councilwoman Terrasa met with the Kings Contrivance Village Board and went line by line through CB-29, the County Bill on Village Center Redevelopment.


Also joining the discussion were the Owen Brown Village Board Chair Andy Stack and Vice Chair Summer Romack.


Councilwoman Terrasa brought with her copies of all the sections of the Zoning Regulations referred to in CB-29, an important component of reviewing any piece of legislation. She also brought examples of Preliminary Development Plans, Comprehensive Sketch Plans, Final Development Plans, Site Development Plans, and Document Site Plans for the board to see which has the levels of detail that it would need to assess proposed Village Center revitalization plans. She also brought copies of the report produced by Barbara Kellner at the Columbia Archives on the history and purpose of Village Centers. (The Columbia Archives completed this report upon my request when I was chairing the Planning and Strategy Committee on the Columbia Council and I am very glad to see it being used as we move forward on this very important matter.)


As a result of how prepared Councilwoman Terrasa and members of the Kings Contrivance and Owen Brown Village Boards were and hard work and great note taking of Jen Terrasa's assistant Mary Clay and intern Alison and Kings Contrivance Village Manager Anne Brinker, this meeting was the most productive and constructive meeting of I have attended in a long time.

Councilwoman Terrasa brought with her a comprehensive understanding of issue, clearly showing that she had followed the issue closely and delved into every aspect of this important piece of legislation. Her clear dedication to the Rouse vision and the importance of the Village Center within that vision was apparent throughout the discussion. She was searching for constructive solutions to amend the current legislation to ensure the legislation would result in well-planned Village Centers that could evolve while staying true to the Rouse vision. As a voter I think I have never been prouder of one of my representatives. She is well on her way to upholding my faith and trust in her.

Village Center Zoning Reaches Its Final Step Before Approval

Zoning Regulation Amendment 102 (ZRA 102) that will change the process of approving changes to Columbia's Village Centers was filed with the County Council and becomes County Bill 29 (CB 29). The County Council will hear testimony on CB 29 on Monday, June 15th at 7:30pm and then will amend it (if they want to) and then vote on it. Go take a look and also review the Planning Boards report on ZRA 102. You may remember that the Planning Board ended up voting 2-2 on ZRA 102 and their report is a pretty interesting read.

So if you are interested in the process by which changes will be made to the Village Centers come out and testify on June 15th. The County Council is currently holding their hearings at the Board of Education in the Board Room at 10910 Route 108, Ellicott City, MD 21042.

One of the key questions is should Village Centers have Master Plans that guide the development of Village Centers? And without a Village Center Master Plan how do you move forward as a community that is planned as Columbia prides itself on being?

Consignment Shop Coming to Kings Contrivance

Greenberries Company, a high-end consignment shop of women’s and children’s clothing will be opening soon in the Kings Contrivance Village Center. It is scheduled to open on or about May 16th. It will be taking over the space formerly home to State Farm Insurance.

Responsible Development

Wednesday night at the Kings Contrivance Village Board meeting I saw a presentation by Wegman's. The Wegman's proposal includes Wegman's paying for significant road improvements in that area where they are planning on building at the corner of Snowden River Parkway and McGaw Road. If more developers demonstrated this willingness to mitigate the traffic problems they create we would not be having such a problem with downtown Columbia redevelopment.

Though I have significant concerns about the impact Wegman's will have on the Village Centers I gained a lot of respect for Wegman's handling of the traffic situation. I suggest that to prepare for Wegman's arrival villages need to quickly develop a plan to evolve their Village Centers to survive Wegman's arrival. I have written on my suggestion on how Village Centers can evolve to meet the modern economy here.

It Is Really Happening

I know many in Kings Contrivance had begun to doubt if our grocery store was really going to get replaced. Here are some of our local elected officials starting the process of knocking down the old Safeway so that the new Harris Teeter can be built.

From left to right: Barbara Seely (Village Board Chair), Jen Terrasa (County Council), Guy Guzzone (House of Delegates), and Ken Ulman (County Executive).

I know all of these elected officials have worked very hard to get the new grocery store in as soon as possible. As a Kings Contrivance resident I want to thank all of them for their hard work and persistence.