Montgomery County Council Committee Meetings on Jan. 18 and Council Tour on Jan. 19, 2024

For Immediate Release: Wednesday, January 17, 2024

Committees will review changes to the Employees Retirement System, review a report examining the County’s Cable Fund and review the FY25-30 CIP and FY25 Capital Budgets for both Montgomery College and Montgomery County Public Schools

The Government Operations and Fiscal Policy (GO) Committee will meet on Thursday, Jan. 18 at 9:30 a.m. to review Expedited Bill 46-23, OPT/SLT Bargaining Units – Pension and Retirement Adjustments. In addition, the committee will review Office of Legislative Oversight (OLO) Report 2023-12, From Wayne’s World to YouTube: Communications Funding in an Era of Diminishing Cable Returns.

The members of the GO Committee include Chair and Council Vice President Kate Stewart, Council President Andrew Friedson and Councilmember Sidney Katz.

The Education and Culture (EC) Committee will meet at 1:30 p.m. to receive an overview of the Montgomery College Fiscal Year (FY) 25-30 Capital Improvements Program (CIP) and FY25 Capital Budget. In addition, the committee will receive an update on Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) enrollment and an overview of the MCPS FY25-30 CIP.

The members of the EC Committee include Chair Will Jawando and Councilmembers Gabe Albornoz and Kristin Mink.

On Friday, Jan. 19, the Council will participate in a bus tour of the area included in the Takoma Park Minor Master Plan Amendment . The plan makes recommendations to improve quality of life, guide future development and encourage improvements to the natural and built environments within the plan area. The Council will hold a public hearing on the Takoma Park Minor Master Plan Amendment on Thursday, Jan. 25 at 7 p.m. at Takoma Park Middle School. An overview of the tour can be found on the Council’s website .

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More detail on each agenda item is provided below.

Expedited Bill 46-23, OPT/SLT Bargaining Units – Pension and Retirement Adjustments

Review: The GO Committee will review Expedited Bill 46-23, OPT/SLT Bargaining Units – Pension and Retirement Adjustments. Expedited Bill 46-23 would extend from Jan. 4, 2024, to Aug. 7, 2024, the deadline for eligible County employees enrolled in Groups E and J of the Employees’ Retirement System to elect to purchase credited years of service with their existing Retirement Savings Plan or Guaranteed Retirement Income Plan balances.

Review: The GO Committee will review OLO Report 2023-12, From Wayne’s World to YouTube: Communications Funding in an Era of Diminishing Cable Returns . The report, which was requested by the Council, examines the structural soundness of the Cable Fund and the sufficiency of projected future year cable television revenues to continue to support government telecommunications and public information activities.

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Review: The EC Committee will review the projects included in Montgomery College’s Requested FY25-30 CIP and FY25 Capital Budget. Montgomery College requested more than $462 million in the six-year CIP. The request included three new or substantially expanded projects—the East County Campus, the Germantown Student Affairs Building Renovation – Phase 2 and the Rockville Theatre Arts Building Renovation, in addition to cost increases to several other existing projects.

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The County Executive recommended a more than $381 million CIP for Montgomery College in the recommendations released on Jan. 16. The recommendation includes more than $60 million for the East County Campus and does not include funding for the more than $72 million Rockville Theatre Arts Building Renovation due to affordability constraints. In addition, the recommendation takes $8.1 million in additional undesignated reductions through an affordability reconciliation project.

Review: The EC Committee will receive an update on MCPS enrollment and review the MCPS FY25-30 CIP. MCPS enrollment for the 2023-24 school year is 160,223 students. This represents a slight decline of 331 students (or -0.2 percent) from the 2022-23 official enrollment. Based on the preliminary enrollment totals for the 2023-24 school year, enrollment is declining this year at the elementary and middle school levels and growing slightly at the high school level. Notably, MCPS is seeing an increased in Free and Reduced Meals (FARMS) eligible students, which accounted for 43.8 percent of the student population during the 2022-23 school year.

The Board of Education’s Proposed FY25-30 CIP includes 36 projects. The request total is nearly $2 billion. This level of funding is $91.8 million (or 4.8 percent) higher than the FY23-28 amended CIP of $1.91 billion. The request includes three new projects at Mill Creek Towne Elementary School, James Hubert Blake High School and Paint Branch High School. In addition, the request includes five new Major Capital Projects at Eastern Middle School, Cold Spring Elementary School, Damascus Elementary School, Twinbrook Elementary School and Whetstone Elementary School.

The County Executive’s Recommended FY25-30 CIP has the same six-year total as the Amended FY23-28 CIP, which is $91.8 million lower than the board’s request. The recommended CIP for MCPS assumes undesignated cuts and deferrals with only technical changes to projects. The recommended CIP only includes macro level expenditure assumptions. The Council will need to specify these cuts and deferrals and find expenditure savings or revenue increases in the board’s proposed CIP to meet the County Executive’s spending assumptions.

The Committee meeting schedule may change from time to time. View the current Council and Committee agendas, Council staff reports and additional information on items scheduled for Council review on the Council website .

Council and committee meetings are streamed live on the Council’s web page via YouTube and on Facebook Live and can be watched on County Cable Montgomery on Xfinity/RCN 6 HD 996/1056, Fios 30, and on the CCM live stream .

Release ID: 24-016
Media Contact: 240-777-7805, 240-777-7808

For updates and link to press release, see here: http://www2.montgomerycountymd.gov/mcgportalapps/Press_Detail.aspx?Item_ID=44629