Nancy Floreen's hypocrisy
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Anonymous
There is some nuance to that result: https://wtop.com/montgomery-county/2016/05/westbard-sector-plan-approved-for-bethesda/ ...Residents who opposed the Westbard sector plan for Bethesda are furious because the Montgomery County Council voted _9 to 0_ to adopt the proposal as part of the county’s master plan. Bethesda resident Patricia Kolesar calls the plan “a density dump” and said the addition of up to 1,200 townhouses and apartments in the area — bounded by River Road and Massachusetts Avenue — will swamp the schools and surrounding communities. The homes would be built over the next 20 to 30 years... Councilman Roger Berliner, who represents Bethesda, referenced the amount of heat he’s taken for supporting the project. His office alone has gotten up to 3,000 emails, some of which, a council staffer said, were nasty and personally insulting... Westbard opponent Kolesar, who spent the entire council session holding up a banner that read in part “Save Westbard,” said Berliner — and the entire council — should face political payback for their votes in favor of the development... Not everyone in the community is upset with the plan. In an email to WTOP, Phyllis Edelman, who is the president of the Springfield Civic Association, says, “There are benefits to the plan that all communities surrounding Westbard will enjoy — an updated shopping area, more trees and green space and provided the funding can be found, a renovated Willett Branch stream that flows through the heart of the sector. In addition, the plan includes a minimum of 15 percent affordable housing to be built with a few of the developers including significantly more than this 15 percent.” http://bethesdamagazine.com/Bethesda-Beat/Web-2016/County-Council-Approves-Controversial-Westbard-Sector-Plan/ Council member Marc Elrich, who heavily criticized the Planning Board’s recommendations for the plan, even getting into a heated exchange with a Planning Board commissioner after a February public hearing, said Tuesday that, “I don’t see any point at this point of voting against this.” Elrich, who was the lone council member to vote against sector plans prescribing more development for Chevy Chase Lake and the Long Branch section of Silver Spring, complimented Berliner’s push to cut the allowed density from what was proposed by the Planning Board. But he pushed back on the notion suggested by Berliner and council member Hans Riemer that the increased affordable housing requirements in the plan were something to celebrate. “People on the other side shouldn’t oversell doom and gloom and we shouldn’t oversell the brilliance of our plan,” Elrich said. “It is, I believe going to be better than what is there now, certainly for the shopping center.” http://www.bethesdamagazine.com/Bethesda-Beat/Web-2016/As-Westbard-Plan-Hits-Council-Marc-Elrich-Says-Affordable-Housing-Promises-Are-Excuses-For-Overdevelopment/ "...With few people remaining in the council’s hearing room in Rockville, council member Marc Elrich and Planning Board Commissioner Natali Fani-Gonzalez got into a heated exchange about the plan’s promises for additional affordable housing. Earlier Tuesday, during the council’s regular session, Elrich made clear he thinks the affordable housing ideas in the Planning Board-approved plan are a guise to allow for overdevelopment... “You’re going to say no to HOC?” Fani-Gonzalez responded. She was referring to the county’s Housing Opportunities Commission, which is hoping to build a new affordable housing structure on a parking lot behind its existing Westbard Avenue apartment building. “I’m not gonna say no to HOC,” Elrich said. A resident listening to the conversation jumped in, asking Fani-Gonzalez how much affordable housing the Planning Board expected to establish in downtown Bethesda. The Planning Board is currently working through a sector plan for that area. “We haven’t talked about that yet,” Fani-Gonzalez responded. “Virtually nothing,” said Elrich, indicating the Planning Board wouldn't require more than the existing minimum 12.5 percent affordable housing rate. “You get 12.5 percent everywhere, that’s what you all do.” County law requires at least 12.5 percent of units in all new multi-family residential projects must be affordable housing. “Don’t mess with affordable housing,” Fani-Gonzalez said as she began walking away. “That’s all I’m telling you.” Elrich, who long has been an outspoken skeptic of new development in the county, then explained his concerns in more detail to a reporter. “It’s a joke. In the first place, it’s no guarantee that you get the housing to the workforce,” Elrich said. Two speakers at the public hearing said they supported the affordable housing goals of the plan because they would give employees of the area’s retail and grocery stores an opportunity to live near where they work... But Elrich raised doubts about whether the development that could be allowed by the plan would provide enough affordable housing and questioned why the Planning Board would encourage the development of affordable housing away from a major transit station... “I’d also point out that when you guys are preaching [transit-oriented development], those rare moments when you used to be, you were talking about the criticality of locating working force housing near transit so they don’t have to be far away from transit,” Elrich told Anderson and Planning Department Director Gwen Wright Tuesday afternoon during the council session. “Now, you’re talking about locating working families in a place where there is no transit,” Elrich continued. “You guys sell one story when you’re selling one project and then you morph the story when you’re selling another project. …You’re singling out for major redevelopment a place that isn’t an activity center and that isn’t served by transit.” Elrich said he’ll spend “as much time” as possible attending work sessions on the Westbard plan to be held by the council’s Planning, Housing and Economic Development Committee." https://archive.org/details/County_Councilmember_Marc_Elrich_on_Westbard_Sector_Plan All relevant, though I would highlight this: 1:22 ...And so I think the answer is not to go to a plebiscite system, but I do think the answer is, we have to move back to Citizen's Advisory Committees, that have votes, that have discussions- as tedious and as painful as that may be for people who see the future so clearly, but they don't want to be bothered by people who may not see it the way they see it- we need to go through that process. And if we go through that process... I've never known programs that came out of Montgomery County that had no growth. It never happened that residents stood up and said, "Nothing's happening here." Things always happen here. And the county changed, and it got a reputation, a positive reputation, for the kind of changes it was able to embrace. So my response to the people who are unhappy is, I'm going to work very hard, and I hope... I know some of our colleagues have some misgivings about where we've gone, and that we can redirect the board to do planning in a way that's more inclusive to the community. Not just, more meetings and charades. But like, actually be allowed to vote on something... What a novel concept... Elrich could not oppose an otherwise unanimous vote. But he is trying to do something about the situation, not just going along and making it all seem like some grand thing. He's being realistic about the situation. |
Anonymous
Also keep in mind, it was Floreen who had previously served on the MoCo Planning Board for 8 years, later chaired the county council's Planning Committee, and had a prime role in the final version of the Westbard Plan. Elrich was pushing back on it's excesses and criticizing it's intentions, while making the proposition of changing how such decisions are made, which would be more in line with what the residents of Bethesda desire. |
Anonymous
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Nancy just published her new website: http://www.nancyfloreen.com/
Go Nancy Go! |
Anonymous
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Bunch of platitudes on her Web site. No substance. Here's Marc Elrich's site: https://www.marcelrich.org/
I've met Marc Elrich several times. He has been mischaracterized and misrepresented. He will be a fine county executive who won't give everything away to developers. Nancy Floreen would. |
Anonymous
| Nancy Floreen is as much to blame for the mess of MoCo as anyone and the idea she's running as an independent is just laughsble to me. |