Do Something: The week of March 18, 2024

Weekly, Regional Policy Director Dan Reed and DC Policy Director Alex Baca will share with you an action you can take in the immediate future that has the potential, sometimes great and sometimes small, to increase the number of homes in our region, decrease the trips people take by car, make all of it safer, and not screw people over in the process. This week: recall petitions and budget drama in DC; big wins in Maryland and a big disappointment for Moore Housing; the joy of naps; and Alex and Dan are both having happy hours.

If you have any questions, email dreed@ggwash.org about Maryland and Virginia Do Somethings, and abaca@ggwash.org about Washington, DC, Do Somethings—or, about whatever you want to talk about.

DC

This Sunday, I’ll be staffing our happy hour at Grand Duchess in Adams Morgan from 3:00 - 5:00 pm. This is the standing “Mid-City/Near Northwest/Rock Creek West” happy hour that we do every other month, in close proximity to—but not strictly about!—those planning areas. I encourage you to come through. It’s always a good time.

If you live in Ward 1, like me, or Ward 6, like some of my colleagues, you may have heard tell of, or seen with your own eyes, recall petitions for your councilmember. It’d be best if the petitioners do not gather enough signatures. Don’t sign them. If you don’t live in Ward 1 or Ward 6, tell your friends who do live there not to sign them. Volunteer for or donate to Brianne Nadeau and Charles Allen’s counterefforts. We endorse declining to sign. (More information at the bottom of this post about how we make endorsement decisions.)

Mayor Bowser’s proposed FY25 budget was supposed to come out on March 20, but it’s delayed because of a spat between the executive and the Office of the Chief Financial Officer over our primary rainy-day fund. The District’s independent CFO, which controls our financial operations, is an outgrowth of the control board, established by the federal government in 1995 to oversee the District’s budget after our debt climbed to $722 million. The control board ceased operations in 2001, but its presence still lurks about: I’ve worked in and around local-government stuff for about 15 years, and in that time there’s never not been a pervasive sense that the control board could come back if we slip up just a little bit.

Alex Koma’s explainer of the contemporary budget drama for Washington City Paper is a good one, because it gets into how the control-board era is not so far gone that it doesn’t influence how our decisionmakers think about things now. I am, for what it’s worth, rooting for the mayor over the CFO, and agree with DC Council Chairman Phil Mendelson, who told City Paper, “I think [the CFO is] wrong…[you’re] now talking about almost $1.2 billion dollars in cuts. And that creates a lot of damage.” In addition to minding the budget gap, it seems like we should be seriously considering how to raise revenue.

I am, optimistically, going to keep the budget training I have planned for Monday, April 1, via Zoom, on that date. If you’re interested, sign up, because I’d like people to come, and because I’d also like to be able to let you know directly if I do end up rescheduling it.

Lastly, the Friendship Heights Alliance is running a survey through the end of March. There are some questions about public space and transportation that GGWash readers who live and work in Friendship Heights should weigh in on. —AB

Maryland

First: We’re having a happy hour next Thursday, March 28 from 6:00 to 8:00 pm at Denizens Brewing Company (4550 Van Buren Street) in Riverdale Park! I specifically picked it because it’s convenient to a large chunk of Maryland and DC, so please come wherever you are! There’s a lot to celebrate, including all of our wins this session (see below)—and it’s almost my birthday! You can RSVP here.

About those Ws: Monday was Crossover Day in the Maryland General Assembly, which means the House or Senate needs to pass any bills before them so they can “cross over” to the other chamber for review. Several of the 39 (!) bills we’ve supported this year have passed the House, the Senate, or both. Here are some of the highlights, movie montage style, so queue up Eye of the Tiger while reading this:

• HB 107/SB 943, the Better Bus Service Act of 2024, which allows automated traffic enforcement in bus lanes
• HB 428/SB 370, which creates a rental assistance fund that’s distributed through public schools
• HB 7, the Housing Innovation Pilot Program Act of 2024 which creates a fund for mixed-income, publicly-owned housing developments
• HB 38, which eliminates parking requirements near transit in Baltimore, echoing a Montgomery County bill that we worked on last year
• HB 131, which requires the state’s biggest counties to track housing production
• HB 424, which eliminates extra public hearing requirements for affordable housing developments in Montgomery County
• HB 823, the Melanie Nicholle Diaz Fire Safety Act, which creates new fire protections for older apartment buildings that lack sprinklers
• HB 1070, which requires Maryland’s toll authority to figure out the best way to raise tolls…
• as well as two of Governor Moore’s housing bills, HB 599, which creates new tenant protections, and HB 693, which creates a new financing source for affordable housing.

You helped make this happen by writing your legislators or submitting testimony in favor of these bills. Thank you!

We were hopeful about the Governor’s third bill, the Housing Expansion and Affordability Act (HB 538), which would require that cities and counties allow larger and denser developments within one mile of rail transit stations and on nonprofit-owned land if they included deeply affordable homes. GGWash advocated for making the affordability requirements more flexible, because that could actually get more affordable housing built. Yesterday, the House Land Use and Ethics Subcommittee voted to do just that, which is fantastic news. They also made several other amendments…

• adding language from HB 3, which further streamlines the permitting process for affordable housing on nonprofit-owned land.
• reducing the areas covered by the bill from a one-mile radius of transit stations to three-quarters of a mile from a transit station, an unfortunate but understandable compromise
• removing areas near transit zoned for single-family homes, meaning the bill would no longer require localities to allow “middle housing” developments like duplexes and townhomes in those places

It was infuriating to watch subcommittee members talk about “protecting single-family neighborhoods” to justify that last amendment. Maryland has over 100 rail stations, a transit network that is in many ways shaped by exclusion: the communities it passes through without stopping in; the stations neighbors fight in vain to close lest the wrong people come; and the places where the train has brought higher property values and restrictive zoning ensures only the affluent or those who bought in 30 years ago can stay there. Allowing more apartments in the handful of places where Maryland counties already allow apartments is simply not enough to fix the legacy of segregation, decades of underbuilding, and double-digit home price increases.

Of course, it seemed unfathomable that anyone would come for single-family zoning when I first heard rumors last summer that Governor Moore would introduce a big housing package. In eight months we went from that to the Governor quoting our poll to support his zoning reform bill in the Baltimore Sun. That anything will pass is a win worth celebrating, yet seeing this bill get watered down still feels like a gut punch.

Thursday afternoon, the Environment and Transportation Committee will likely vote to move this amended bill to the House floor, where most agree it’ll pass. (Update: the committee voted in favor of the amended bill, and the House will review it Tuesday, March 26.) Then the bill heads to the Senate, who will have a chance to turn things around. And they should, because the poll we commissioned last month makes it clear: Maryland voters think housing is a major concern, they think prices are getting worse, they think local governments are doing a bad job on housing, they want the state to step in, and they’re fine with allowing more homes near transit and allowing more kinds of homes in single-family zones.

Most people don’t mind and just want someone to fix the problem. It’s too easy for decision makers to forget that.

If you have a few minutes today, can you contact your delegates? Here’s our testimony, which you can pull from.

• Find your delegates and email them to say: “I’m a resident in your district, and I support the Housing Expansion and Affordability Act (House Bill 538). We need to take big steps to address our housing shortage and rising housing costs. Please do not weaken this bill by excluding single-family zones near transit.” Bcc me at dreed [at] ggwash [dot] org so I know you sent it.

In the meantime: Sunday night I met with the Lazarus Fellows, a group of students at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School who design and carry out a public service project over summer break. A few years ago I mentored two students who led a year-long campaign to make their school more inclusive for minority and immigrant students. Their sponsor, former Montgomery County Councilmember and baseball enthusiast Bruce Adams, asked me to talk about how I started a neighborhood blog as a teenager and turned that into a career. Afterwards one student asked me something like “You’ve done so much in your life: what’s next?”

And I said: I’ve spent the past several weeks working evenings and weekends and driving to and from Annapolis, and I am tired and stressed out. So I’m going to take a nap. I’m going to go on long walks with my dog and dig up my backyard. I’m going to hang out with my friends and go to shows. Before I do anything else I’m going to take care of myself. I constantly refer to this ancient Jewish saying: “It is *not* your obligation to finish the work, and neither are you free to desist from it.” That’s probably the best advice I can give you.

Many of us probably remember a moment from our teens when we looked at the adults in the room mucking around–relatives, teachers, you name it–and said, “Why are they doing this to themselves? When I’m older, I’m going to be different.” I think a lot about how I can do better as an adult than the adults I saw growing up. Encouraging young people to take naps so they don’t burn out from the hustle seems like a good start.–DR

Virginia

Related: last spring I had the privilege of speaking to the Youth Journalism Initiative, a program where Arlington high school students learn to make podcasts and videos that tell stories about their community. We ran an amazing, professional-quality podcast from one of their students about Plan Langston Boulevard last fall, and I was looking forward to doing more of that! Unfortunately, that’s in doubt as their sponsor, Arlington Independent Media–the county’s public access cable and radio network–is in serious turmoil due to funding and leadership issues. I don’t know all the details, and I don’t want to assume. But sometimes we adults need to take a step back and breathe. I am really bummed for the kids right now.–DR

Your support of GGWash enables us, Dan and Alex, to do our jobs. Our jobs are knowing how development and planning works in DC, Maryland, and Virginia. If it’s appropriate to take action to advance our goals, which we hope you share, we can let you know what will have the most impact, and how to do it well. You can make a financial contribution to GGWash here.

(Disclosure: GGWash board member Jayson Harpster is the husband of Councilmember Brianne Nadeau and was not involved in this endorsement, per the process outlined in “GGWash’s process for our 2024 DC primary endorsements.” DC elections committee members are the sole individuals responsible for determining GGWash’s endorsements in 2024. No other staff, board members, or volunteers determine our endorsement decisions.)