Do Something: The week of February 5, 2024

GovernmentGGWash PolicyBy Dan Reed (Regional Policy Director), Alex Baca (DC Policy Director), Adriana Vance (Former Policy intern) February 7, 2024

Photo by Dan Reed.

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.

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. This week: bus and bike lanes on Columbia Road; protecting park funding and trans health care in Maryland; accessory apartments advance in Virginia; and thoughts from our policy intern Adriana Vance about how the Virginia General Assembly works (or doesn’t).

DC

Draft plans for the District Department of Transportation’s bus-priority team’s Columbia Road project have dropped. I’m personally stoked about the draft schematics, which include a bus-priority lane and a protected bike lane.

I’m on Columbia Road most days of my life, and have traveled there by all conventional modes. Typically, I bike or walk there but, every time I drive to Adams Morgan, I am able to park directly in front of my preferred Columbia Road destinations—truly, really just the solidcore—which is an absurd thing that should not be possible on something that is, per moveDC, a bus, bike, and freight priority corridor. (Speaking of moveDC, DDOT just released its first-ever moveDC annual report. Make of it what you will.)

On February 1, DDOT sent ANC 1C a notice of intent, required when it’s planning to modify traffic or parking requirements. Definitely give it a read for details on the bus lane and PBL plans, which will be enabled by really quite drastic changes to parking. I very much appreciate that the NOI, on page 3, makes no bones about this:

“DDOT is proposing significant revisions of the parking regulations on Columbia Rd, particularly in the commercial segments of the roadway. There are currently about 186 parking spaces on Columbia Road NW and in order to build the PBL and the bus lane on the corridor, that will be reduced to 110, a 40 percent reduction. In order to make the most of the remaining parking, proposed revisions to parking regulations will aim to shift the curbside use away from long-term storage and toward more short-term uses.”

I love to see it, but I would not be surprised if some businesses along Columbia Road register their discontent. So send some affirmations to kevin.harrison@dc.gov that DDOT is absolutely doing the right thing here, especially if you live on or near Columbia Road, visit Columbia Road, or take the bus or bike on Columbia Road. If you live in ANC 1C, reach out to the commission to say thanks—it’s been super-supportive of this project.

Also in transportation, the DC chapter of Families for Safe Streets is celebrating its fifth anniversary, and has open an engagement survey that both marks the occasion and correctly notes that the District has failed to bend the curve of reducing traffic-related deaths. I’m very, very grateful to DC-FSS for its work in organizing survivors of traffic violence, family members who have lost a relative to traffic violence, and those who consider themselves allies in assailing traffic violence—which I think encompasses most, if not all, GGWash readers. I’ve been hit by a driver on my bike, and I’ve lost friends to drivers’ hands. It is, as a result, sometimes tremendously hard to do my job, which necessarily involves advocating for a District—and really, a world—in which no one dies or is injured by a driver, but I know I don’t have to do it alone. Please do fill out DC-FSS’ survey if its work resonates with you. —AB

Maryland

It’s budget season in Montgomery County right now, and while we aren’t following it super closely this year (that can change in the future with your help!!!) one major issue I’m extremely concerned about is funding for parks. Montgomery County has the region’s largest park system, and even if you don’t live here, you’ve probably spent time in one of our 420 parks. But County Executive Marc Elrich has proposed a significantly smaller budget–$24 million less than the $319 million Montgomery Parks requested. The cuts would imperil nearly 50 projects, including playgrounds, public restrooms, replacing aging trail bridges, building new trails, and restoring creeks.

Parks isn’t the only department that’s getting less money than they asked for, as Montgomery County Public Schools and Montgomery College are on the chopping block too. Marc says cuts are necessary because Montgomery County doesn’t do things as well as Northern Virginia, which does not reflect well on the county’s leadership? It’s the County Council’s job to pass the final budget, and if you like parks, you should let them know this week, as the Council is holding public hearings. You can email the entire council using this link, and all you have to say is: “Please support the full Parks budget request.”

Meanwhile, in Annapolis, where I’m currently laying out this post in a committee hearing room in the House Office Building while waiting to testify: Governor Moore’s Moore Housing proposals have public hearings Tuesday, February 20, less than two weeks from now. Next week, I’ll share more on how you can get involved. In the meantime, you *can* submit testimony on SB 333, sponsored by Baltimore County senator Shelly Hettleman, which tweaks Maryland’s policy for using public land to build affordable homes to ensure those homes are built in places where people want to live. Here’s our testimony.

Hettleman, along with Senators Clarence Lam and Jeff Waldstreicher, is also sponsoring SB 119, which protects trans people who access gender-affirming health care treatments in Maryland. While this is outside our normal wheelhouse, we have a vision of creating a more inclusive and equitable region, and that means making sure trans people are safe here. There are a lot of trans people in my life who simply would not be here today without treatments like hormone replacement therapy.

Queer and trans people are already drawn to this area for community and safety, but as other states restrict access to gender-affirming health care, people are literally fleeing to Maryland. SB 119 and its House companion HB 691 would protect people seeking treatment here from prosecution by another state. This bill builds a similar law last year for reproductive rights, which are similarly at risk in other states, and on the Trans Health Equity Act, which expanded Medicaid coverage for gender-affirming health care. SB 119 has a hearing in the Senate Finance Committee next Thursday, February 15.

Finally, a bill we’re absolutely not taking a position on but it demands sharing! HB 298 is the MOVE GET OUT THE WAY ACT, which would require that drivers on every road in Maryland use the left lane only for passing. If you’re of a certain age, those words immediately take you back to the sweaty floor of the Blake High School cafeteria for the 2002 Homecoming dance, or an Iraq War protest, I guess. (TIL the song is actually about Ludacris’ frustration with slow drivers in the left lane.) Of course the sponsor, Anne Arundel County delegate Rachel Munoz, graduated high school in 2005, the same year as me. Millennials: this is what happens when you put us in charge! The Senate version of this bill, SB 768, is simply called the “Highway Left Lane Safety Act,” reflecting that the sponsor came of age before the 2000s.

If you feel moved (get it????) by these bills, here’s when you can submit testimony:

For all of these bills, just follow these 9 sort of easy steps. All you have to say is “I think [SUCH AND SUCH BILL] is good, and the [COMMITTEE IT’S IN] should give it a favorable report.”–DR

Virginia

The whirlwind that is the Virginia General Assembly continues with the bills we’re supporting as part of the Commonwealth Housing Coalition, a group of 19 organizations across Virginia (including our friends the YIMBYs of Northern Virginia) coming together to push pro-housing bills this session. SB 195, which would require the state to figure out how to legalize single-stair apartment buildings, passed the Senate unanimously. Now the House version, HB 368, goes to the General Law Housing Subcommittee for review Thursday. If those members vote yes, they’ll send it to the General Law Committee, and if they approve it, then it goes to the House floor for a vote.

Meanwhile, the accessory apartments bill, HB 900, was about to get pushed back to 2025, like the Yes In God’s Back Yard bill introduced earlier in the session. But yesterday, the Senate’s Local Government committee voted to send the Senate version of that bill, SB 304, to the floor for a vote Thursday or Friday. If the Senate passes it, it’s back to the House, but with much better chances of passing.

If you’d like to Do Something about these bills, here’s what you need to do by Thursday, February 8:

When you’ve done all of that, email andrew [at] yimbyaction [dot] org and cc me at dreed [at] ggwash [dot] org.

And if you’d like to dig deeper into the Virginia General Assembly: check out this guide for finding bills, tracking them, and sending testimony from our intern Adriana Vance, who grew up and currently lives in Alexandria. Adriana shared her experiences of learning how this all works with Alex and I, and gave her permission to share them below.–DR

I was surprised at how difficult it was to navigate the general assembly website and its legislative tracking tool. I also think it’s strange that their “Lobbyist-in-a-Box,” a publicly provided tracking tool, costs $600 if you want to track more than 5 bills at a time. Even if it’s a state of the art tracking system (it, like, really isn’t), people shouldn’t be charged for using it. I don’t think general assembly websites need to be super well-designed, but they should at least be easy and not confusing to navigate. I found a more helpful site to look up VA legislation, the Virginia Public Access Project, which is cool and also free.

Besides the difficulties navigating the site, two months is just not enough time for any legislature to vote on all of the bills that need to be passed for the year (in odd years, the General Assembly only convenes for half of that time!!). This format is quite different from my previous experience with the state legislature in Michigan, which runs year-round. I interned for a State Senator in college, and since it was his full time job, he met with constituents often, held district meetings, and obviously worked on legislation all year. I think the two month timeline is generally a shame, and that public servants should be paid (aka incentivized) to work for their constituents year-round. They are also basically never able to get everything done in time, and have to call special sessions to pass necessary bills, usually related to the budget. Why is this a side job??

The combination of the difficulties of navigating the various websites, learning the rules about how/when to testify or submit public comments, and the sheer speed with which legislators have to run through the over 1,000 bills up for consideration, serve as a deterrent for people who want to participate in the process. It makes me question the value of testifying and submitting public comments. I wonder how often a bill is delayed or amended due to public input when the legislators are already so pressed for time.–AV

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.