Wednesday, November 6, 2013

ROCKVILLE ELECTION RESULTS ANALYSIS

With the 2013 Rockville Mayor and Council election results in, we know who won. But why did they win, and what messages are the voters sending to government through their choices?

There are no exit polls, and we don't have much information about what parts of the city most actively turned out to vote. But we can draw some preliminary conclusions today:

1. Rockville voters prize comity over policy.

Just about all we heard about during the final weeks of the election was the Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance. And turnout at a public hearing on that issue was large, organized, and just about unanimously opposed to altering the APFO. But yesterday, voters elected only one candidate who aligns with that position, new mayor Bridget Newton. Is that a contradiction?

On paper, yes. But many in Rockville have been critical of the ongoing squabbling between factions during Mayor and Council meetings. A high profile example of diplomacy trumping policy is former mayor Jim Coyle.

Coyle, a highly-regarded leader in the city, was arguably one of the most effective speakers opposing the high-density, mixed-use draft Rockville Pike plan in 2011. But in the election, he endorsed Team Rockville, which favors more growth on the Pike than its independent challengers did. This is a contradiction. However, Coyle has been outspoken in his belief that the city worked better when it elected slates that had general agreement on broad issues. The results suggest a number of voters agreed with Coyle.

2. East Rockville may have been a factor.

East Rockville, like Twinbrook, has been taking the brunt of development side effects, and not getting a lot of attention from politicians. It is also an area seeing an increase in young professionals. Those two trends might be among several reasons Julie Palakovich Carr received the most votes. As she mentioned in the debates, residents of East Rockville are displeased about a number of issues. Displeased voters vote. Politically-engaged young professionals likely saw Palakovich Carr as someone like them: of a newer generation, but wanting to be actively involved in the city. And she was very effective in bringing up practical issues like crime and rat control in East Rockville during the debates.

3. Among voters who did their homework on the candidates, a majority favored denser, urban-style growth for Rockville.

Was it that pro-development voters turned out in greater numbers? There is a contradiction to that, in that they elected a mayor who does not favor that type of growth. But with a 3 vote majority carrying on all issues, Mayor-Elect Newton will face a challenge in stopping it. Palakovich Carr and Virginia Onley, in particular, expressed some reservations about the Rockville Pike Plan during the debates, suggesting they did not entirely share their Team Rockville colleagues' growth agenda. If they hold to that independent streak, there could be room for Newton to reach compromises on height, density and other provisions. But, if you are a developer, you have to be feeling fairly good about the election results this morning.

4. Start early, or form a slate.

The only thing more embarrassing than the low turnout was the lack of candidates running. Don Hadley and Claire Marcuccio felt compelled to enter the race late, knowing they were at a disadvantage, because they could not believe no one else besides Team Rockville was running. The fact that Hadley was just about 80 votes short of winning the fourth seat suggests that he would have won if he had had more time. He had not planned to run, of course, so it was not poor planning on his part. But it is a good example for any candidate who sat out this time, that someone favoring more responsible growth can win if they have sufficient time to make the case with voters.

And if slates remain in favor, it may be necessary to form them to win.

5. Voters want Newton to be a check on Team Rockville.

Newton does not have the votes to stop a 4-1 decision. But the mayor does have power to control the agenda, steer policy, and make appointment nominations. This means that, for example, Newton can continue to fill Planning Commission vacancies over the next two years with residents who share her principles on development and growth.

The ballot question results also speak to voters sending a nuanced message: Yes, we want you to have more time in office, but we want active, engaged voters to have their voices heard in off-year elections.

6. There's much we won't know until this council begins work November 18.

Is it really a 4-1 split? Will independent thoughts, and the message voters have sent about cooperation, allow for alliances to form on various issues? My guess would be that it's possible. Citizens will be the best judge, and will play an important role at Citizens Forum and during public hearings, in communicating their concerns and priorities to the new Mayor and Council. This has certainly been the most across-the-board qualified group of candidates to run - to a person - in my time following Rockville politics. So, it will be interesting to see how the dynamics play out over the next 2 years.

WOMEN TAKE OVER IN ROCKVILLE - ROCKVILLE ELECTION 2013

Complete 2013 Rockville Election results: Click here

During the recent federal government shutdown, some argued that electing more women to Congress would end its legislative gridlock. But can electing more women to the Rockville city council have the same effect on a body recently criticized for bickering between factions? The city is about to find out.

No public list of past councilmembers is available online, as best I can tell. But the next Mayor and Council certainly contains the highest number of women members (4) in my recollection, if not in the history of Rockville. Voters yesterday chose a woman (Bridget Newton) as mayor for the third consecutive time since Mayor Larry Giammo left office. And the top votegetter in the council race was a woman, as well (Julie Palakovich Carr).

Tom Moore will be the sole male elected official in Rockville for this term of office.

ROCKVILLE ELECTION RESULTS: NEWTON, TEAM ROCKVILLE SLATE WIN

Rockville voters chose councilmember Bridget Newton as their new mayor tonight, and decisively backed the agenda of the Team Rockville slate, electing all 4 members to the city council. Only 40226 city voters chose to participate in voting Tuesday, marking a low 16% turnout.

Julie Palakovich Carr received the most council votes with 4308,  (18.7%), a strong showing that placed her ahead of fellow winners Virginia Onley, incumbent Tom Moore, and Beryl Feinberg.

Don Hadley finished only 88 votes behind Feinberg, and Claire Marcuccio Whitaker had the least votes.

MAYOR

√Newton 53.06% 3508 votes
  Pierzchala 46.68% 3086

COUNCIL

√Palakovich Carr 18.7% 4308
√Onley 17.60% 4063
√Moore 17.47% 4035
√Feinberg 16.01% 3698
  Hadley 15.63% 3610
  Whitaker 13.72% 3167

Expand Mayor & Council terms to 4 years?

√Yes 53.54% 3548
  No 42.98% 2848
  No opinion 3.49% 231

Hold Rockville elections in presidential election years?

  Yes 41.91% 2767
√No 53.47% 3530
  No opinion 4.62% 305

Expand council seats from 4 to 6?

  Yes 42.91% 2843
√No 50.49% 3345
  No opinion 6.60% 437

Rockville Nights will have analysis of the election results later today (it's officially Wednesday right now).

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

FORMER COUNTY SCHOOL BOARD MEMBER ENDORSES NEWTON, HADLEY, WHITAKER IN ROCKVILLE ELECTION

Former Montgomery County School Board member Laura Berthiaume has released a letter strongly endorsing Bridget Newton for mayor, and Don Hadley and Claire Marcuccio Whitaker for city council, in today's Rockville election.

Berthiaume also provides a detailed analysis she says proves that keeping the city's strong Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance (APFO) in place - as the three candidates she endorsed have promised to do - will not prevent schools from being built in the future.

Recent attempts to weaken the APFO have been presented to suggest the ordinance was responsible for Montgomery County Public Schools not adding school facilities in Rockville. Berthiaume's provided evidence demonstrates that the APFO was not to blame in any of those instances. Rather, other issues at the county level interfered, Berthiaume writes.

Instead, Berthiaume argues strongly for keeping the APFO guidelines in place to prevent even more overcrowding in Rockville public schools. She says that Rockville Pike development will add
4-6000 new units alone. By 2016, Julius West Middle School will have more students than many small colleges, she notes.

"Do you want to see our sole middle school handling 1,800 or more students by 2020?," Berthiaume asks fellow voters in her letter.  "Please ask yourselves that question as you go in to vote [today]."

"It seems to me that one set of candidates [Team Rockville slate] favors essentially unlimited residential construction along 355, no matter the impact on our schools, while three excellent candidates will protect our Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance (APFO) standards," she writes.

Her letter concludes:

"If you care about our children --or if you are just the sort of person who doesn't want to live in Crystal City - and never did - I ask you to please go out [today] and vote for Bridget Newton for Mayor, and Don Hadley and Claire Whitaker for Council."

Whitaker has also been endorsed by Montgomery County Councilmember Marc Elrich, Senator Jennie Forehand, and Gaithersburg Mayor Sidney Katz.

Monday, November 4, 2013

IN FINAL HOURS OF ROCKVILLE ELECTION, APFO REMAINS HOTTEST ISSUE

Fallout from a recent dust-up over Rockville's Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance (APFO) continues in the final hours of the 2013 Mayor and Council election.

An attempt to weaken the ordinance, which requires sufficient city infrastructure - schools and classroom space, fire and rescue resources, etc. - before development can proceed, drew a crowd of outraged residents to a contentious Public Hearing 35 days before the election. Now the disagreement over the future of the APFO standards has become the central issue in the city election.

As candidates visit homes and meet with voters across Rockville, two members of a committee that considered changes to the APFO in 2011 are urging voters to support the candidates they say will keep the current, higher APFO standards in place.

Tom Gibney, who served on the city's APFO Review Committee, says the award of an APFO waiver to the Silverwood development was a dangerous mistake, and strongly criticizes mayoral candidate Mark Pierzchala for his deciding vote on that matter, in a letter to the Gazette.

Gibney cites his committee's own review of the Silverwood case in his letter. The data that predicts 75-95% of residents will drive south on Route 355 in the morning suggests a dangerous situation for drivers and pedestrians in that area.

He says all of the Silverwood vehicles will have to use the sole means of egress from the apartment complex - a driveway onto 355. The problem, Gibney writes, is that - in order to reach the southbound lanes of 355, drivers will have to first dash across 3 of the highway's northbound lanes. Then, they will have to make a U-turn via a brief signal at Ridgemont Avenue. Gibney warns that this could result in "accidents and fatalities."

If Silverwood is an example of the "smart growth" Pierzchala and the Team Rockville slate are promising, Gibney concludes, "he does not deserve to be Mayor."

Gibney says he is supporting Bridget Newton for mayor, because she opposed the waiver for Silverwood as a councilmember.

A second member of the APFO Review Committee, Sean Hart, is also speaking out. In an email circulating on community listservs, and obtained by Rockville Nights, Hart expresses concern that some Rockville candidates "want to remove key components of the APFO," to permit far more development and growth in the city than is currently allowed. "Rockville is severely over capacity for schools, and as we all know, driving around town can be very slow," notes Hart.

Hart writes that his own analysis of the data while serving on the APFO committee suggests that working closely with the state and county to ensure needed infrastructure gets funded and built would be a better approach than weakening the APFO.

To foster that approach, he urges his fellow citizens to only vote for the 3 candidates who have been outspoken in their support of maintaining the current APFO standards: Newton for mayor, and Don Hadley and Claire Marcuccio Whitaker for city council.

"It is my belief that voting for [those] 3 (and only [those] 3) candidates for Mayor and Council will help us continue to take an appropriate approach to growth in the city," Hart concludes. Voting for only 3 candidates on the ballot, rather than the maximum possible 5 (1 mayoral+4 council seats), is allowed when voting in Rockville.

There are now less than 24 hours before city residents begin voting.

Friday, November 1, 2013

ROCKVILLE HISTORIC DISTRICT COMMISSIONER CRITICIZES PINK BANK DECISION (PHOTO)

Jessica Reynolds, a member of the Rockville Historic District Commission, is speaking out on the recent 3-2 decision by the Mayor and Council to allow demolition of a historic bank building at 255 N. Washington Street.

In a letter published in this week's Gazette, Reynolds accused city leaders of preserving only those buildings with "architectural styles that meet their own tastes." The decision to not allow a historic designation process for the "Pink Bank" "has implications for how the public's voice will be heard in Rockville in the future," she wrote.

The building's distinctive design, Reynolds argued, not only serves as an important reminder of the city's blunder of demolishing its original, historic town center during the 60s, but also reinforces a sense of place in a time of what she has previously called "cookie cutter" buildings.

Reynolds predicted that the modern town center itself will be replaced again in only 30 years.

The HDC had recommended the city allow a historic designation process to begin for the structure. Supporters of demolition argued that historic designation had already been dismissed previously (however, according to preservationists, the building only recently has qualified by age for designation), and pointed to the developer's years of planning - and work with residents in the adjacent West End - as arguments for allowing the new development to proceed. Mayor Phyllis Marcuccio added that she strongly supported property rights by landowners in the city, and therefore was voting on principle to allow demolition.

Thursday, October 31, 2013

ROCKVILLE CANDIDATES DEBATE ELECTION ISSUES AT ROCKVILLE SENIOR CENTER (PHOTOS)

On Tuesday, October 29, all candidates for Rockville Mayor and Council participated in a debate sponsored by the Rockville Senior Citizens Commission, at the Rockville Senior Center.

The senior center itself is a reminder of the issues at hand in this election. Like several other public sites in Rockville (the Rockville Swim Center and Montgomery College, to name a few) the Senior Center property is designed to give the impression that one is surrounded by woods. What percentage of voters identify with Rockville as a suburban town, and how many want it to take on an urban feel?

The city's Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance remains a hot button issue, as does the issue of debt load vs. easy financing of public projects.

Mayoral candidates Bridget Newton and Mark Pierzchala went first.

Both cited their accomplishments in their current terms as city councilmembers. They again clashed on the merits of the Fireside apartments deal.

On the APFO, Pierzchala made very clear that he wants it weakened, calling it "insufficient" for the city's current needs. He also promised to visit every group or organization in Rockville "within a year of being Mayor." "I am the budget guy," he said.

Newton countered: "Mark might be the 'Budget Guy,' but I am the fiscal conservative." Perhaps alluding to contentious exchanges between citizens and councilmembers at recent public hearings, she said "respecting every person is how we do things in Rockville."

In the council debate, most questions related in some way to Rockville's senior population.

1. WHAT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE FOR ROCKVILLE SENIORS?

Virginia Onley said federal cutbacks, tough economic times and healthcare costs.

Julie Palakovich Carr said it was the ability to stay in one's home.

Don Hadley concurred that remaining at home as long as possible, and the general quality of life, were the largest issues.

Councilmember Tom Moore noted that Social Security will be a worry. He said that senior programs are important because they "do more than anything else we do" to impact and improve seniors' lives.

Beryl Feinberg said "linkage" of seniors to available services would be critical, as well as affordable housing.

Claire Marcuccio Whitaker hoped the city could have a program to train volunteers to work with seniors, and offer a senior rewards program on purchases made in the city.

2. IF THE SENIOR CENTER LOSES FEDERAL FUNDING FOR ITS ENGLISH AND CITIZENSHIP COURSES, SHOULD THE CITY FUND THEM DIRECTLY?

Feinberg: Yes.

Whitaker called for a better online system to alert residents to Senior Center events "in multiple languages."

Onley advocated for "mandatory English classes."

Moore: "Absolutely."

Carr: "Definitely."

Hadley said the question assumed no other private grant money was available, and that he would want to pursue that option before using taxpayer funds.

3. GROWTH ON ROCKVILLE PIKE AND CITYWIDE,  AND ITS IMPACT ON SENIORS

Hadley said 5-6 stories were more than enough to allow growth and economic development. He said seniors should be able to stay involved with city activities, not be placed in isolation. "I don't relish being sent off to the farm," he noted. He also argued that there was no justification to give developers so many incentives to build.

Whitaker said the Pike Plan is a developer-driven document, and said that the "leaders of Rockville should take charge - we should develop our own Rockville Pike Plan." When she added that "we could tell the developers what to do," not the other way around, an audience member shouted, "Hear, hear!" in agreement.

Palakovich Carr said mixed-use development, wide sidewalks, and new retail would be advantageous for seniors. She called for a balanced approach and transit-oriented development. On the APFO, she echoed Pierzchala, saying the city must be "realistic evaluating if those laws are working properly." The current APFO will stop Phase II of the Town Center if it is not changed, she argued.

Onley said the APFO should be a "guide tool, not an instrument that we put to bed and come back to in five years." She said the city should do what's best for itself, "not what we see in other jurisdictions." If pedestrian safety is not the top priority on the new Pike, "it's just gonna be like it is today," she warned.

Moore cited the inability of the Rockville Volunteer Fire Department to sell its property under the current APFO restrictions. He predicted the APFO would cause Town Center Phase II to "die on the vine."

"I don't think Town Center II is going to die on the vine," countered Whitaker. "That's a pretty Draconian statement," she added. Whitaker argued that Town Center II is actually in line with the original plan, and that the number of units in the future Duball, Brightview and Kettler buildings will already have exceeded the residential units called for in the master plan.She said she views Brightview's low density, senior residents, and children's playground as positive additions to Town Center.

Feinberg said she favors the Pike Plan, and more dining and "gathering places." She said she is concerned about a potential lack of handicapped parking, and parking that is behind or under buildings, rather than accessible to the businesses' front doors.

5. DEBT

"I don't know what our debt is," Onley said. Whitaker used the opportunity to illustrate that she did know the figure, and argued the city should have used its recent surplus to pay down debt. She again cited Gaithersburg's $0 debt, and $65 million in the bank, as a model for Rockville.

Moore diagreed, citing a 5¢ Gaithersburg tax increase. He and Feinberg both said the city's debt was well below the recommended limits.

Carr noted the city's AAA bond rating, and said "there are times when it makes sense to borrow."

Hadley said obligations have to be taken seriously, pointing to a new legal change that could put the city on the hook for $22 million for an employee retirement short fund.

THE FINAL DAYS

Their are no polls to tell us who's ahead. And, if county elections are an indicator, voters don't seem too concerned about debt and fiscal matters. This election may end up turning on the APFO and development issues.

My thought is, it was a mistake to try to change the APFO in the weeks prior to the election. That stirred up a unneccessary hornet's nest of response among residents, which could be a tremendous weakness for the Team Rockville slate of Pierzchala, Moore, Onley, Palakovich Carr and Feinberg, if turnout is 17% again.

The reason is, there is a large public opposition to weakening the APFO, amply demonstrated at the recent public hearing on the matter.

Newton, Hadley and Whitaker have clearly indicated they want to take a lower-density, more suburban-scale approach to future development. That gives them an electoral base. And one that is energized, as a result of the APFO dispute, and the Pike Plan that citizens overwhelmingly have opposed in public testimony, but keeps lumbering forward anyway toward approval.

The flip side of that is: What is the constituency in Rockville for high-density urbanization of the city, more traffic and more crowded schools? Are there actually significant groups of voters who want tall buildings looming over their homes?

"You can count on me to resist uncontrolled, mindless growth," Whitaker promised in her closing statement. To people stuck in traffic every day, Hadley's observations that "we're busting our belt with schools and traffic" are compelling ones that resonate in reality.

But without polls or intense media coverage, we simply have to wait until Tuesday night to find out which concept of Rockville's future voters want.