Virtual Town Hall Meeting from Thursday, April 12, 2018
County Executive Good afternoon! Can you believe the weather we're going to have today and for the next couple of days? Let's get started so we can get out and enjoy it, shall we?
Susan from
Silver Spring
Dear Mr. Leggett, My husband and I are concerned about traffic safety and the condition of roads in the Wordside neighborhood. Safety on Dale Dr. is a concern. In addition, the condition of streets such as Columbia Blvd. is embarrassing—we have lived here for 30 years and watched continuing deterioration, and short term patching, and never actual street paving.
County Executive Thanks for your question. In fact, the neighborhood that includes Columbia Boulevard is next up for resurfacing this spring once the weather breaks. Please take a look at the map I have attached below:
Sansra from
Silver Spring
I submitted Q's earlier. Can we do something re smoking in and around senior housing. We have to pass smokers outside to get into my bldg. Think we need specific legislation as it's not taken seriously.
County Executive Thank you for your question. The Montgomery County Board of Health Regulation 17-210, effective August 12, 2011, bans smoking in common indoor areas of multi-unit residential dwellings and smoking within 25 feet of a playground area on privately owned property that has a primary purpose of serving residents of more than one dwelling unit. I am not sure that either of these covers your situation. You may want to approach your landlord to ask them to address this issue.
Ryan from
Silver Spring
Using what definition of "democratic" can you possibly argue it is acceptable to hide details of our own taxpayer money–a LOTS of it–from citizens?
County Executive Thank you for your question. I presume your question concerns the County’s effort to become the site for Amazon’s second world headquarters, bringing 50,000 high-paying jobs and significantly adding to our tax base. As you may know, we are competing with 19 other jurisdictions. In addition, Amazon has asked that we sign a non-disclosure agreement. None of this is uncommon for economic development projects. Once we are chosen and have negotiated an agreement, such an agreement will be wholly transparent. We will have public hearings and the County Council will decide whether or not such an agreement is in the public interest. As you know, Montgomery County is one of the most transparent jurisdictions in the nation. Virtually everything we do is publicly available; and most of it can be found online.
Elizabeth from
Silver Spring
I live in a heavily populated area of Silver Spring and was horrified when the County Council approved the 50 yard Safety Zone reduction for hunting in the county this Fall. We have hunting in our neighborhood. Our area was considered to be too populated for managed hunting. But is considered okay for hunting? I would prefer to see non-lethal methods of deer management used in our area. How would I accomplish this?
County Executive Thank you for your question. Last year the County Council changed the County law to comply with Maryland State law, which allows bow-hunting of deer outside a 50-yard safety zone. This was deemed necessary to strengthen the County’s efforts to control the deer population and, thus, protect lives and property. It supplements non-lethal methods. According to the Police, there have been no reports of adverse effects in County safety zones, aside from bow hunters occasionally falling out of trees.
Concerned County Resident/Empl from
Up County
Mr. Leggett,
Many county employees were delayed step increases (pay raises that correlate to length of service) during the recession. Years later, many in county government are making much less then the pay scales indicate (approx. $550 less a month in my case). Is there any intent to fix this? Thank you.
County Executive Thank you for your question and for your service to County government. Managing the County finances through the great recession required sacrifices from taxpayers in the form of higher property taxes, reduced services in many areas, and financial sacrifices from county employees. Many difficult choices were made including eliminating COLAs and step increases. I recommended funding in my budget, three years ago, to add back one of the lost step increases. I regret that the County Council decided not to appropriate the funds for this.
Every County employee's salary is within the pay scale for their respective positions.
I have consistently recommended step increases and COLA increases in recent years. Thank you again for your service.
Bob from
Up County
Recently $28M in CIP funding for a long-planned, high-priority widening project for Goshen Road was reallocated. Might this funding be retained in the Up County and be used to partially fund the completion of the Mid-County Highway on the Master Plan Route? I understand that additional funding may be possible by connecting the Mid-County Highway to the ICC with a small toll charged on the segment between the ICC and Shady Grove Road.
County Executive Thank you for your question. When the Council made a proposal to defer funding for Goshen Road, it did not move any of the funding into the M-83 project. However it did shift the funding to another road project in the UpCounty - Observation Drive. I am unaware of any proposal to provide additional funding to M-83 by connecting it to the ICC and utilizing toll money.
David from
Silver Spring
I have lived here in Wheaton on Julep Avenue for over thirty years. It seems the 10400 block is always on the bottom of the list for any kind of repair work or preventive maintainance, especially snow removal. You see this part of Julep Avenue is a dead end, not a cul-de-sac. That's probably the reason it takes so long to get anything done.
Last spring all the trees were removed because they were dead or on the way out. I can vaguely remember when the trees were planted. That's because this house is where my parents raised my sister and myself. But all these stumps are sticking up where the trees once stood. Any plans to finish the job?
The issue at the present time is the condition of the street. TERRIBLE ! I can remember the road was resurfaced once with that slurry mix the County used. Inwood Avenue from Dennis Avenue to University Blvd has been repaved and the 10300 block of Julep Avenue has been repaved. Quite a few other streets surrounding us have also had the job done Right when repaved. This street is full of Pot Holes. Some the County has poorly patched, just to be called again in 6 to 8 months to do it again. WHY can't we get the street repaired the correctly, not just patched here an there.
I/we look forward to hearing from your office. Thank you for taking the time to read this question.
David A. Robinson.
County Executive Thank you for your question. Although Julep Avenue is currently not scheduled for full resurfacing in fiscal years 2018 or 2019, I have asked my Department of Transportation to reassess whether resources could be identified to move your street up in its repaving schedule. We will reevaluate the timing of the snow-removal process in your neighborhood. Regarding stump-removal, the County is currently facing a severe backlog due to budgetary challenges; but we are aggressively working to reduce the backlog.
Thank you again for your question.
Kiran from
Bethesda-Chevy Chase
Two weeks before the reopening of the Bethesda Library, the County announced that it will be named in honor of Connie Morella. I don't think anyone would object to naming a library after our wonderful former Congresswoman, but what is the process for naming County buildings after people? Is there any opportunity for public input and comment before a building is named after someone? And who makes the final decision on naming a building? Is there any effort to ensure that these actions reflect the County's values of diversity and inclusion?
County Executive Thank you for your question. It is very satisfying to me to be able to name the refreshed Bethesda Library for Connie Morella. She has served our County and country with distinction. There is a formal, administrative procedure that guides the naming of public facilities for individuals. It is managed by a hearing officer in my office. The process calls for the creation of an advisory group of County staff and residents to make naming recommendations to the County Executive. The final decision is made by the County Executive. Thank you again for writing.
GLORIA JACKSON from
Silver Spring
WHY IS THE DROP PROGRAM NOT OFFERED TO THE NON SWORN PERSONNEL IN PUBLIC SAFETY? SWORN POLICE AND FIRE
PERSONNEL ARE NOT THE ONLY ONES WHERE THERE IS PROFESSIONAL AND INSTITUTIONAL KNOWLEDGE THAT NEEDS TO BE CONVEYED TO THE NEXT GENERATION.
County Executive Thank you for your question. I agree that the roles and functions of
all County employees are critical to the proper functioning of County Government. However, in the public safety departments, the staffing of police beats, fire trucks, etc. are not discretionary and must occur. Therefore, predictability in staffing levels is more important than in other County functions where temporary fixes may be an option. The DROP Program offers the public safety managers greater staffing predictability to ensure recruit classes are appropriately scheduled and staffed. Since recruit classes are generally the only way to fill these positions, the predictability that the DROP Program provides is essential.
Alex from
Silver Spring
With all that we know about privatization and the deleterious effects of pinning a profit motive to our most basic needs, do you think it's ***democratic*** to privatize needs like our storm water management and the Silver Spring Urban District? Shouldn't everyday, working class people of MoCo get their fair say when it comes to these decisions?
County Executive Thank you for your question. In fact there has been no “privatization” of stormwater management. All of the stormwater construction work (as is true of all our construction in the County) is already being done by private contractors. The County does not build nor maintain stormwater management facilities. We oversee, authorize, and ensure compliance with environmental regulations; and that does not change. Under our new contracting method, the permittee will always be the County, so the responsibility to ensure the permit requirements will remain with the County. This allows companies that do this work as their primary and only function to assume the risk for costs and completion. It’s called performance-based contracting. DEP can then be left to do what it does best: regulate, monitor and inspect. We are simply removing the layers of contracts that bog down and complicate the work. We continue to look for greater efficiencies and effectiveness especially in light of the fact that our Water-Quality Protection Charge is now over $100, which is a significant increase from the original $8 fee from the year 2000. The stormwater management program, as it currently exists, is unsustainable. There is an article in the Bethesda Beat magazine that provides a fairly good analysis of the challenges and the direction that we are moving in this program.
Sally Bosken from
Bethesda-Chevy Chase
Thank you so much for supporting the public libraries in Montgomery County. I rely on the library for books and information. Will you be adding Sunday hours to more libraries?
County Executive Thank you for your question and for your support of the public libraries. Because of the fiscal challenges the County is facing today, I was not able to add additional weekend hours to the libraries for next fiscal year. However, over the past few years I have recommended increases to the public libraries of 40%. These increases included increased weekend and evening hours as well as other improvements. We have been able to restore funding levels to our libraries to pre-recession levels. In addition, through the capital budget, I have recommended major renovations to several libraries and brand new libraries in Silver Spring and Wheaton. Thank you again for your question.
Amy from
Up County
Thank you Mr. Leggett for his service to our community. However, I have been most distressed at the complete overdevelopment of Montgomery County. While I appreciate that Olney has grown from a sleepy town, it is now overrun with speeding traffic from massive developments that have taken up every bit of available green space and which have impacted roads beyond any capacity. It takes 15 minutes to get out of Olney now. One can barely be a pedestrian or bike rider without fearing for our safety, and we can't even sell homes because there is constantly so much new inventory on the market. Why is there no curb to the development in areas like Olney so they can retain some semblance of the family-friendly community many of us moved here for? What can be done NOW to put a moratorium on development in areas like this upcountry?
County Executive Thank you for your question. All development must comply with adopted Master Plans that have been recommended by our Planning Commission and then adopted by our County Council. The Master Plan process typically takes several years from inception to adoption and includes significant opportunities for input by community members, including input from a citizen advisory committee and multiple public hearings. The Olney Master Plan was adopted by the Council in 2005, and therefore any development that takes place must be consistent with that Plan until a new plan is developed, which usually happens every 20-25 years.
Also, to address speeding in the Olney area, we have placed a number of speed cameras to slow down traffic near the town center and near schools. If you have specific areas where you believe speeding is a problem, our police can work with you to do targeted enforcement.
Michael Wiley from
Rockville
MCPS once a pinnacle of public schooling in the country has major issues including high profile security issues, overcrowding (and ongoing expected student growth), delayed capital projects and overall budget issues. How does MCPS overcome it's recent and ongoing issues and regain it's leadership in public schooling and how will you help ensure that happens?
County Executive Thank you for your question. I have great confidence in the continued high quality of the educational system in Montgomery County. While there are always challenges in a system of the size of MCPS, the Superintendent and Board of Education are managing the system effectively, and it remains a world-class system that is the envy of many in our country. My recommended operating budget for the coming fiscal year provides them with the Board’s full request. The school system has been provided with the vast majority of their budget requests for all of the years that I have been County Executive. Despite challenging fiscal conditions, since the FY07 Operating Budget, the County has provided MCPS with increases totaling $349.7 million, while per pupil expenditures have grown by 18.3 percent since FY08. In addition, within the capital budget,13 new school facilities have been added. An additional 21,043 classroom seats have been added through classroom additions as well, helping to accommodate the swelling school population and the changing needs of our school community. The County has invested well over $246.2 million in new technology for our student population over the last 12 years, ensuring they have the modern tools necessary to learn and compete in our technology-driven world.
As a college professor, who was among the first in my family to attend college, I understand very well the importance of a sound education to the success of individuals and have been committed to providing the school system with the resources to provide each and every child in Montgomery County with a quality education.
County Executive Thank you for joining me today. I cannot wait until our next session!
