Removal of development cap in downtown Bethesda

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

Lol, I got the message. I live 10 hours drive away.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

Do you have anything data-driven or factual to say to support your positions? I was literally and econ major in college and my dad is an actual developer, so this insult is comical. It seems that you just call people NIMBY's when you disagree with them rather than contributing anything of substance to this discussion.

People yell about "impact fees" to stop development, instead of advocating for changing the fees across the entire state. That alone is proof that they don't care about the fees, but the development itself.

DP. How often is state fee legislation ever made widely known? In any case, that usually creates the framework in which municipalities can operate their fee collections. It's the county action, here, that is where the rubber hits the road.

Plenty of folks care about the decimation of fees to the benefit of developers, especially when the fee reductions fail to have guardrails to ensure the public purpose (e.g., significant levels of affordable housing within a project) for which the exchange of those fees might be appropriate. This places burden on the rest of society to achieve necessary government funding levels or to forego government services for which they then cannot pay. The way it goes down, here, is largely government-sponsored privitazation of wealth with public assumption of cost/risk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

You seem to want to treat housing a public utility, privately owned and public subsidized and guaranteed. That being the case, why not go all the way and regulate price and profit?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

+1. The value of land includes the value of surrounding PUBLIC infrastructure. Why shouldn’t the government capture part of that value as taxes do it can keep building more infrastructure? Developers have persuaded the council to disinvest in infrastructure in favor of tax breaks for themselves, which is a shame.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

You really have no idea how outnumbered you are, do you? It's like a parody at this point.

Nothing is being "underfunded", doofus. There is a reason why people are leaving the state (and blue states in general) and it's anti-housing, anti-family people like you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

You really have no idea how outnumbered you are, do you? It's like a parody at this point.

Nothing is being "underfunded", doofus. There is a reason why people are leaving the state (and blue states in general) and it's anti-housing, anti-family people like you.

No, people are leaving blue states because blue states aren’t generating jobs.

Also, popular policies aren’t necessarily good policies. Take, for example, segregation. It was very popular at one time. Later not so much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

You really have no idea how outnumbered you are, do you? It's like a parody at this point.

Nothing is being "underfunded", doofus. There is a reason why people are leaving the state (and blue states in general) and it's anti-housing, anti-family people like you.

The combined conjecture & invective (you're outnumbered, "doofus," "anti-housing," "anti-family") in the post only underlines its lack of substance.

The desire to distract from the negative societal effects of that which Montgomery Planning and the County Council have been doing is clear. Those effects include continued underfunding of community need, providing profit to the few along the way. That definitely hurts families and, as the families occupying the housing it provides will suffer from the same decimation of public services, it doesn't look too good on the housing front, either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

You really have no idea how outnumbered you are, do you? It's like a parody at this point.

Nothing is being "underfunded", doofus. There is a reason why people are leaving the state (and blue states in general) and it's anti-housing, anti-family people like you.

Outnumbered by what metric?

I am very curious about this since the YIMBYs are just a giant sack of excuses when it comes to shows of support, which is why they’ll never agree to put any initiatives on a ballot. Please don’t reference GGW blog push polls.

I’d love to visit this fantasy land in which you reside.

[Anonymous]

The LAST thing bethesda needs is more apartment buildings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

You really have no idea how outnumbered you are, do you? It's like a parody at this point.

Nothing is being "underfunded", doofus. There is a reason why people are leaving the state (and blue states in general) and it's anti-housing, anti-family people like you.

Outnumbered by what metric?

I am very curious about this since the YIMBYs are just a giant sack of excuses when it comes to shows of support, which is why they’ll never agree to put any initiatives on a ballot. Please don’t reference GGW blog push polls.

I’d love to visit this fantasy land in which you reside.

In the YIMBY fantasy world, developers want to make less revenue per unit and always pass savings from government subsidies onto consumers. The housing market always responds to price signals in the YIMBY fantasy world. Also in the YIMBY fantasy world, people who move into new housing don’t consume any government services or need any new infrastructure.

In the real world, developers keep subsidies as profit and build only enough units to cover increased demand from rich people. New residents do in fact expect services and infrastructure and other taxpayers have to pay more to fund the subsidy that some developers got.

I can’t imagine that the developers trying to build projects that don’t qualify for the new office conversion subsidy are very happy about the new subsidy because their tax bills will probably go up by at least three percent within five years to pay for this. That kind of tax increase can make a project no longer viable. It’s even worse for the developers who own older buildings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

You really have no idea how outnumbered you are, do you? It's like a parody at this point.

Nothing is being "underfunded", doofus. There is a reason why people are leaving the state (and blue states in general) and it's anti-housing, anti-family people like you.

No, people are leaving blue states because blue states aren’t generating jobs.

Also, popular policies aren’t necessarily good policies. Take, for example, segregation. It was very popular at one time. Later not so much.

Jesus Christ. DCUM: "More housing is like slavery".

You are beyond parody.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

You really have no idea how outnumbered you are, do you? It's like a parody at this point.

Nothing is being "underfunded", doofus. There is a reason why people are leaving the state (and blue states in general) and it's anti-housing, anti-family people like you.

Outnumbered by what metric?

I am very curious about this since the YIMBYs are just a giant sack of excuses when it comes to shows of support, which is why they’ll never agree to put any initiatives on a ballot. Please don’t reference GGW blog push polls.

I’d love to visit this fantasy land in which you reside.

Well, let's see. Elected reps and leaders in the state are pushing for more housing. Who elects these people?

Use your brain folks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

You really have no idea how outnumbered you are, do you? It's like a parody at this point.

Nothing is being "underfunded", doofus. There is a reason why people are leaving the state (and blue states in general) and it's anti-housing, anti-family people like you.

No, people are leaving blue states because blue states aren’t generating jobs.

Also, popular policies aren’t necessarily good policies. Take, for example, segregation. It was very popular at one time. Later not so much.

Jesus Christ. DCUM: "More housing is like slavery".

You are beyond parody.

No, popular ideas = good ideas has repeatedly failed as a basis for making policy. More proof you can’t be a YIMBY if you can think critically.

You are beyond parody.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I'm getting the distinct impression here that the person who has the most planning interest/experience on this thread is really out of touch and doesn't seem to have a position other than calling all the other posters' ideas and opinions wrong.

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Planning as a whole is a profession that’s as a whole completely out of touch.

Planning may be a profession that is completely out of touch. I don't know, I am not a planner.

I am a homeowner, though, in fact a longtime homeowner, and I know for certain that longtime homeowners who refuse to acknowledge the existence of a housing crisis are completely out of touch.

“Homeowner” = you own a 1BD condo in downtown Silver Spring.

No, actually, I have owned a detached single family house in Montgomery County for over two decades.

Your response says a lot about your opinions, though. Because a person who owns the one-bedroom condo they live in, whether in downtown Silver Spring or elsewhere, actually is just as much a homeowner as any other homeowner, not more, not less.

When I was a renter I cared about services and infrastructure so I’m not sure why we need to distinguish residents in this way. When I was deciding where to live I also cared about services and infrastructure. I’m not sure how disinvesting in infrastructure benefits current or future residents but it sure does save money for developers so I guess we should roll with it?

The question is not, do renters care about services and infrastructure?

The question is, what are renters' priorities?

The question is, "What are residents' priorities?"

So far, we have a reasonable handle on infrastructure and services being important when considering changes to development.

Well, yes. But all we are hearing about, at least on DCUM, are the priorities of some (not even all) homeowners. And those priorities seem to be: no new housing where I live.

That's a rather unnuanced and strawman-ish way of characterizing:

"I want my community to have good infrastructure and services, and would not want to see additional development in a manner that fails to ensure that these are not degraded."

And yet we still seem to have nothing that supports the phantom narrative of this not being the priority from the bulk of area residents, whether homeowners or renters.

Summary: I am the homeowner of a house, and I prefer not to have multi-unit housing my neighborhood, because I believe multi-unit housing in my neighborhood would degrade my neighborhood.

Which is fine, you get to have the preferences you have. Similarly, other people get to have other preferences. I think it's a basic part of adult cognition to recognize that people who are not you might have preferences that are different from yours.

Here we have, again, an entirely misrepresentative restatement of another's position. As mentioned, the position is that any development should not come at the cost of lesser/more overtaxed services/infrastructure for area residents. There has been more than one respondent noting that position in one way or another.

Development of multi-unit housing in a way that does not degrade levels of service or infrastructure for existing residents would be a considerably different proposition. It seems that, for some reason, there is an objection by those pushing density to such reasonable conditions.

However, those objections are illustrated not with a clear position, critiquable reasoning or evidence to support the vague allusion to the "other preferences" mentioned, but with logical fallacies of rhetoric such as these strawman mischaracterizations.

Hey guess what? This is 2025 and we live in America. We actually know how to build sewers and roads and infrastructure. Believe it or not. You pay some company, they come out and build stuff. Then it's done. And it works.

You NIMBYs seem to think companies or the state can't do that. Why? Do you know how the world works?

But they don't. Look at development that leads to overcrowded schools and suddenly there's no money to increase school staffing let alone expand the actual schools or build more.

There are numerous schools under construction/modernization/expansion right now.

NIMBYs gonna NIMBY

Expecting the county to responsibly manage school enrollment and county finances is not being a “NIMBY” that is just common sense. It costs the county - a minimum of $55,500 per student to build new school capacity. The impact fee per high rise “infill” development unit is only $3,739. But high rise developments generate .an average of .168 students, so they cost the county a minimum of $9,324 units when additional school capacity is needed. Development impact fees are only covering 40% of this amount.

We literally have built this entire state and have been able to figure it out. "Impact" fees are not supposed to cover literally everything. If they were, we'd be doing similar things for SFHs or additions to homes.

No argument. Honestly I think you are a parody account due to your tenuous grasp of basic econ and development.

DP. They do assess impact from SFH development. At a higher rate, too, due to higher formulaic student generation rates.

And what has been figured out in building the entire state is that politicians can line pockets of doners by overburdening existing residents and underfunding infrastructure as long as they can replace lost votes there with those coming from new residents. Those new residents may come with different priorities or with lower infrastructure concerns for the short term, whether that is because they have lower expectations, are unaware of conditions as they move here or are relying on a reputation of the area that reflects a bygone era rather than ground truth.

In other words, "I got mine, young people and familes, GTFO".

From which developer-donor playbook did you draw that uninformative retort?

A developer built your house, genius.

You can tell how out-of-touch someone is when they start spouting off the "evil developer" trope. Spoken like a true "I got mine" homeowner who wants the deck stacked against everyone else.

Hint: developers aren't the ones making unjust profits right now. Do a bit of research before you make a fool of yourself.

It's likely that an obstetrician delivered you. Does that make it OK for obstetricians to pay lobbyists to influence lawmakers to limit medical liability so that their expenses are lower amd their profit higher?

The rest is a red herring, aiming to deflect from the obviousness in this case of developers (and certain others) profiting at community expense.

The insinuation that SFHs don't get assessed impact tax the way that multi-family was wrong. They actually get assessed more because of the presumed higher student generation rate.

Beyond that, the formulation for property tax on multi-family rental ensures that large corporate owners of such pay far less than owners of comparable condo units, even though the costs to the community in providing services is equivalent.

Your whole idea that new housing is a "community expense" is laughable, selfish, and unfair. The people living in those new buildings certainly wouldn't think so. (And they outnumber you selfish NIMBYs ten-to-one)

Your deliberate misrepresentation of disdain for developers profiting at community expense as suggesting that new housing is a community expense makes your position clear as a shill. You bring nothing to the table for discussion.

The people living in newer buildings are current residents. Many would not like to see their roads, schools, etc., underfunded or their effective tax burden rise to facilitate building more for others when the cases based on charity and efficiency in doing so are so lacking in the measures being pushed through.

You really have no idea how outnumbered you are, do you? It's like a parody at this point.

Nothing is being "underfunded", doofus. There is a reason why people are leaving the state (and blue states in general) and it's anti-housing, anti-family people like you.

Outnumbered by what metric?

I am very curious about this since the YIMBYs are just a giant sack of excuses when it comes to shows of support, which is why they’ll never agree to put any initiatives on a ballot. Please don’t reference GGW blog push polls.

I’d love to visit this fantasy land in which you reside.

Well, let's see. Elected reps and leaders in the state are pushing for more housing. Who elects these people?

Use your brain folks.

Keep telling yourself that. I guess that’s why you’ve been SO wildly successful

Look at all this housing! Lmao!

Maybe it’s all on its way but it’s just taking a while because it’s taking the bus.