Montgomery County Council Committee Meetings on July 17, 2023
For Immediate Release: Friday, July 14, 2023
Committees will review the Rustic Roads Functional Master Plan and legislation covering the use of fuel energy tax funds by Montgomery County’s Green Bank; briefing will be held about Montgomery Planning’s Segregation Mapping Project
The Transportation and Environment (TE) Committee will meet on Monday, July 17 at 9:30 a.m. to review Bill 30-23, Streets & Roads – Rustic Roads Advisory Committee, the Rustic Roads Master Plan and Bill 28-23, Taxation – Fuel Energy Tax – Green Bank.
The members of the TE Committee include Chair Evan Glass and Councilmembers Marilyn Balcombe and Kate Stewart.
The Planning, Housing and Parks (PHP) Committee will meet at 1:30 p.m. to receive a briefing on the Segregation Mapping Project, which is being produced by a multidisciplinary team from the Planning Department’s Historic Preservation Office and the Geographic Information Systems Division.
The members of the PHP Committee include Chair Andrew Friedson and Councilmembers Natali Fani-González and Will Jawando.
More detail on each agenda item is provided below.
Advertisement
Bill 30-23, Streets & Roads – Rustic Roads Advisory Committee
Review: The TE Committee will review Bill 30-23, Streets & Roads – Rustic Roads Advisory Committee. Bill 30-23 would enact recommendations from the Rustic Roads Functional Master Plan Update regarding the composition and duties of the Rustic Roads Advisory Committee.
The lead sponsor is the Council president at the request of the Planning Board.
Advertisement
Review: The TE Committee will review the Rustic Roads Functional Master Plan. Earlier this year, the Planning Board transmitted its final draft update to the Rustic Roads Functional Master Plan. Although the plan has been amended several times as part of individual area master plans, this is the first comprehensive update since 1996. The direct effect of this final draft is to reclassify several roads to be Rustic or Exceptional Rustic Roads and, in a few cases, declassifying them, which has implications regarding their maintenance and potential reconstruction as governed by the Montgomery County Code and an associated executive regulation.
Advertisement
The plan also includes 39 other recommendations related to the composition and purposes of the Rustic Roads Advisory Committee, the executive regulation and Department of Transportation policies regarding maintenance, rustic road program awareness, historic preservation, traffic calming, the Dedicated But Unmaintained (DBU) Policy, Bikeway Master Plan, Vision Zero and historic preservation.
Bill 28-23, Taxation – Fuel Energy Tax – Green Bank
Review: The TE Committee will review Bill 28-23, Taxation – Fuel Energy Tax – Green Bank. The legislation would restrict the use of fuel energy tax funds by the Montgomery County’s Green Bank to only support activities that promote the investment in clean energy technologies and to provide financing for clean energy technologies, including renewable energy and energy efficiency projects and not resiliency activities. The purpose of the bill is to make it clear that despite the Green Bank’s authority to expand the scope of its activities to include resiliency, the 10 percent appropriation must remain dedicated to the original intent of the appropriation, which is investment in clean energy.
Briefing: The PHP Committee will receive a briefing on the Segregation Mapping Project. Various types of legal housing discrimination existed in the U.S. in the first three-quarters of the 20th century, each of which contributed to the disproportionately and persistently low rates of homeownership and housing wealth among Black Americans, which persist today. To understand how the private and public sectors channeled racial population growth and influenced the spatial development of Montgomery County, a multidisciplinary team from the Planning Department’s Historic Preservation office and Geographic Information Systems division built a mapping tool to illustrate discriminatory housing practices, historical patterns of segregation and Black homeownership in the Down County Planning Area. A working draft of the online mapping tool is available on the Planning Department’s website .
The committee will receive an update on the project, provide feedback and discuss potential topics for a second phase of the study.
Release ID: 23-240
Media Contact: 240-777-7926, 240-777-7884
For updates and link to press release, see here: http://www2.montgomerycountymd.gov/mcgportalapps/Press_Detail.aspx?Item_ID=43718