The hearing appears to go on for about 3 hours.During the hearing the Planning Board staff made a presentation, MCPS made a presentation, and numerous neighbors and interested parties gave impassioned public comment about the MCPS site plans for this new middle school.
The public comment concerns included the forest that would be destroyed, student safety concerns, visual impact of massive retaining walls, and the detriment to the neighborhood of this school construction plan. During the hearing, Planning Board members were quiet with only a few brief questions. Some Planning Board members never spoke during the hearing.
The hearing was contentious as MCPS staff and Planning Board staff have apparently been arguing about the requirements of the Forest Conservation law as it applies to this site for the last 9 months. At the end of the hearing, the Planning Board staff voted to throw the plans back to their staff with the guidance to work out the differences with MCPS and come up with a plan that will satisfy the Forest Conservation law.
Immediately after the Planning Board vote, Planning Board member Marye Wells-Harley announced, "My team is losing. 70 to 75..."
At the hearing, Mr. Richard (Craig) Shuman, Jr., Director, Division of Construction, Montgomery County Public Schools, said:
ReplyDelete"We're talking about trying to thread a needle here, and fitting ten pounds of sugar in a five-pound sack, with this project."
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DeleteAt least this is in a public forum versus a closed door. Kind of surprising actually. Baby steps.
ReplyDeleteMore frustrating than MCPS acknowledging in their testimony that the site is inappropriate ("fitting ten pounds of sugar in a five pound sack") is that they continue to insist on spending $52M+ of taxpayer money to try to shoehorn an inadequate school into a site that is half of the MCPS standard. Students will attend a mediocre school that doesn't deliver safe or equal facilities and programs as Westland. But, hey, it's only taxpayer money, and who cares as long as developers can continue to build in the lower county. At least kids in the western half of BCC cluster will still have a high quality school that does meet MCPS standards.
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ReplyDelete