It’s crunch time in the Maryland General Assembly. And that means it’s time for all you who care about controlling the sprawl that is devouring our cherished Chesapeake forests and farms to step up and shout out to your lawmakers.
Let them know it’s critical that they vote in favor of the Smart Growth accountability bill (House Bill 295 as amended and its companion Senate Bill 878.) Let your representatives hear how much you care about saving our wetlands from the rivers of blacktop that are driving our natural world into the ditch.
Don’t know who your state delegates and senators are? Bay Daily to the rescue! Just go to this website, type in your address, and it will show you who your state lawmakers are. Click on your representative's name, and it will show his or her email address. WRITE AN EMAIL TODAY! (Sorry readers in other states, today is a Maryland-centric news day...We'll talk about your state legislative battles soon).
Here’s the breaking news. Yesterday, the Maryland House of Delegates Environmental Matters Committee voted 10-8 in favor of a crucial amendment to a growth control bill. The measure would strengthen Maryland’s toothless Smart Growth Act of 1997 by requiring accountability of local governments. The bill would direct local governments to limit sprawl by working towards the goal of having 80 percent of all future growth in designated growth areas, including towns and cities. The bill would also allow the Maryland Department of the Environment to deny or amend permits for large development projects in counties that allow construction to spread out chaotically over fields and forests.
The amendment, sponsored by Del. Stephen Lafferty (D-42), was attached to a bill by Gov. Martin O’Malley that would require local governments to measure indicators of growth patterns in their jurisdictions.
After that successful amendment vote, the whole House Environmental Matters Committee endorsed the combined bill by a vote of 13 to 9 (with one abstention) and sent it to the House. Now, the full House of Delegates might vote on the combined bill tomorrow (Friday, March 27). Meanwhile, a vote by the Senate Education, Health and Environmental Affairs Committee could come soon. Stay tuned.
Adding the smart growth accountability amendment to the governor’s bill could mean a tough fight, because the combined bill is much stronger on fighting sprawl than the governor’s bill alone. And the Maryland Association of Counties opposes the accountability bill, because it wants all authority over land-use decisions to remain at the local level, instead of focusing efforts towards a statewide goal.
Unfortunately, many local governments – left on their own – haven’t been able to control sprawl.
Since 1997, the Maryland Smart Growth Act has urged local governments to focus their development into concentrated growth areas. But many jurisdictions have made little or no progress in doing this. And often local governments go in exactly the opposite direction by approving development that devours huge tracts of natural areas. Such growth costs taxpayers more in road construction and maintenance, school bus transportation and other costs. It also increases stormwater runoff pollution, which creates low-oxygen “dead zones” in the Chesapeake Bay.
So now that it's crunch time, give your fingers a workout and hammer out an email to your state legislator today.
If you need more motivation, stop and imagine. Think about how mad you are whenever you see endless stripmalls and bland subdivisions gobbling up the fields and forests and streams you loved as a kid. Then channel that anger into a productive direction, and urge your representative to vote in favor of intelligent management of sprawl.
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