By Tim Craig
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, April 13, 2006
Montgomery County's delegation to the Maryland General Assembly secured tens of millions of additional dollars in state aid for county schools, but failed to win passage of a bill to stiffen penalties on sloppy developers.
The 2006 session of the Maryland legislature ended Monday, and Montgomery legislators say they won their fair share of state funds for education, land preservation, transportation and the arts.
"We certainly hit the jackpot on school construction," said Del. Charles E. Barkley (D), the chair of the Montgomery County House Delegation, noting that the county will get $40 million in fiscal 2007 to help repair and modernize schools, about $10 million more than it got this year.
The county delegation -- composed of eight senators and 24 delegates -- also agreed on several local bills.
If the bills are signed by Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R), hunters in northern Montgomery would be allowed to kill deer on certain Sundays during hunting season, which is currently illegal except in a few rural counties.
The delegation also approved a law prohibiting individuals under 18 from standing on a median or next to a highway while soliciting money from motorists.
But county legislators failed to agree on several other controversial issues, including an attempt to amend the state constitution so that more signatures would be needed to place a referendum on the ballot.
Currently, about 10,000 signatures are needed to place a question on the county's ballot. Barkley wanted to raise that threshold to at least 25,000. Civic activists opposed the plan, saying it would be undemocratic.
County senators blocked Barkley's proposal.
A proposal by Sen. Sharon M. Grosfeld (D) to slow the rate of rental-unit conversions to for-sale condominiums never made it out of committee.
Del. William A. Bronrott's (D) proposal to increase the amount of fines that can be levied by the Montgomery County Planning Board also died in committee.
After last year's discovery that hundreds of homes in Clarksburg Town Center were built too tall or too close to the street, Bronrott drafted a bill that would allow the Planning Board to fine developers up to $500,000 for each violation or $1,000 a day per violation, whichever is higher.
The board can now levy fines as high as $500 per violation, with each day of the violation counting as a separate offense.
Bronrott also wanted to give the Planning Board the power to subpoena witnesses, because it was unable to compel testimony during its investigation into the Clarksburg dispute
Montgomery County's House and Senate delegations approved the bill, but the Prince George's County Senate delegation didn't vote on it. Because the county Planning Board is part of the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission, which also includes the Prince George's County Planning Board, both counties' delegations had to approve Bronrott's bill before the full House and Senate could consider it.
"The only holdup was in the Prince George's delegation," Bronrott said.
County legislators were excited about their efforts this year to bring more state aid to the county, even though they didn't get everything they wanted.
After being elected in 2002, Ehrlich scaled back funding for school construction to help close a multibillion-dollar budget deficit.
In fiscal 2005, for example, Montgomery received $9 million for school construction projects.
County Executive Douglas M. Duncan (D) asked for $125 million this year, but Barkley said that was never a realistic goal.
"To go from $30 million to $40 million [for school construction] was a big jump for us," Barkley said.
State assistance to the county school system's operating budget, which is used to pay teachers, purchase supplies and implement initiatives such as all-day kindergarten, will also increase by 12 percent next year, to $341 million.
Still, county legislators believe they were also entitled to an additional $17 million under the so-called Thornton plan.
The Thornton plan was landmark legislation for public school financing approved by the General Assembly in 2002. It included a provision to give extra money to wealthier jurisdictions, including Montgomery and Prince George's counties, to make up for geographic differences in the cost of education.
Ehrlich, however, has tied the release of that money to the passage of slot-machine legislation. Neither Ehrlich nor Democratic leaders aggressively pushed this year for slots legislation, which failed during the past three sessions.
But Ehrlich increased funding for Program Open Space, which buys parkland. Montgomery is slated to get $24 million in Program Open Space funds, three times more than this year's amount.
The state's improving budget outlook also means Montgomery College, county libraries and transportation initiatives will see additional aid next year.
And although Ehrlich didn't include it in his initial budget proposal, county legislators were able to find $550,000 in state aid for the Music Center at Strathmore.
"We took back some pretty good money, so I think this year is a winner for Montgomery," said Del. Carol S. Petzold (D), the vice chair of the county's House delegation.
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