Car stolen from Rockville apartment building parking garage

Montgomery County police responded to a report of a stolen car at an apartment complex in Rockville yesterday. The vehicle was taken from a parking garage in the unit block of Upper Rock Circle along Shady Grove Road, according to crime data.

Montgomery County Council proposes property tax increase

The Montgomery County Council has proposed a property tax increase for the fiscal year beginning this July, according to an required announcement published in local newspapers. If approved as is, property taxes would rise 4.7% in FY-2022. 

The Council has raised property taxes every year except FY-2015, when the average homeowner received a meager $12 savings, in an election year budget. FY-2017 had the highest tax increase on record; while officially 9%, due to ever-increasing assessments, it was effectively a 10 to 11% tax increase for many Montgomery County homeowners.

A property tax increase amidst the pandemic is raising eyebrows among taxpayers aware of the proposal, and in the business community. The County economy has been moribund for over a decade, according to federal government statistics, with Montgomery at rock bottom in the region by every relevant economic development measure from job creation to business growth.

E. Montgomery Avenue reopens along Regal Row in Rockville Town Center

E. Montgomery Avenue has reopened to traffic all the way along "Regal Row" in Rockville Town Center. A section of the roadway in front of World of Beer was temporarily closed during the pandemic. Regal Cinemas is scheduled to reopen there later this month.

Montgomery County activists celebrate failure of "racist" cemetery bill in Maryland House

Macedonia Baptist Church on River Road
in Bethesda, where some past members are buried
in the nearby Moses African Cemetery

The Bethesda African Cemetery Coalition celebrated a win in Annapolis Wednesday, as the Maryland House of Delegates declined to bring a controversial cemetery preservation bill to a vote as the 2021 session ended the previous day. HB 1099 was designed to provide funding for a statewide study of African-American burial grounds, and allow specific stakeholders to apply for a separate state grant for the purpose of preserving and commemorating a black cemetery. It had support from many established preservation groups in the state, and initially appeared likely to pass when the session began.

Moses African Cemetery in Bethesda is a prominent example of a black cemetery that was erased from the map in the mid-20th century. The grave markers were bulldozed or removed when the cemetery came into the possession of new landowners. In the late 1960s, the cemetery and many gravesites were further desecrated during the construction of the Westwood Tower apartments. Witnesses at the time have recounted that many remains within the footprint of the building were illegally relocated elsewhere on the property in a mass grave. Remaining graves were paved over for a parking lot for the building.

Such stories are common at African-American burial grounds across Montgomery County, Maryland and the nation. Sadly, many of these stories do not even come to light as development literally paves over the past. 

Even the historic African-American community that existed around Moses cemetery until the 1960s had been erased from County history, until I researched and brought it to light during the BETCO/Hoyt Property redevelopment hearings at the Planning Board in 2011. At the time, I warned the Planning Board, the County Council and the National Capital Planning Commission that there would likely be a cemetery related to that community that had been hidden in the area, and many historical artifacts to be located. 

Those government bodies did not listen. In 2014, the cemetery location was finally pinpointed, thanks to citizens who were contemporary witnesses to it, just as an out-of-state developer prepared to construct a new building and parking garage atop it. Those plans have been temporarily halted, but only thanks to years of effort and protest by cemetery advocates. But no further action has been taken by any branch or level of government to investigate, restore or commemorate the lost community, cemetery and the illegal desecration there.

The BACC, which is now leading efforts to restore and commemorate Moses cemetery, opposed HB 1099 because it "would have paid white preservation groups and their chosen consultants to entrench white supremacist control of historic Black burial grounds and sow division among their descendant communities, all while the desecration of Black burial grounds and cemeteries like Moses continued unabated." Declaring the bill "racist," BACC organized opposition and testimony against the bill as it moved through the legislative process this winter and spring.

When the bill was not brought to a vote Tuesday, the BACC celebrated the successful effort. "Defeating the bill seemed impossible in the face of its support from powerful politicians, developers, and white preservation establishment, bolstered by a calculated media misinformation campaign, but this grassroots mobilization turned delegates against it and killed the bill," the BACC said in a press release yesterday. "H.B. 1099 would have passed without this action, which demonstrates again that the people will always win."

One active front on the Moses cemetery battle is the construction of a self-storage facility on land directly adjacent to the cemetery's property line behind the McDonald's on River Road. That work recently resumed. Concern that remains may have been buried or illegally reburied beyond the cemetery boundaries led cemetery advocates to oppose construction of the facility prior to a thorough archaeological study of the self storage site. 

Montgomery County overruled that request. The County has been so strongly opposed to any archaeological investigation of the cemetery itself, that it not only blocked every attempt to achieve an independent survey, but even acquired a part of the cemetery to prevent any further investigation though private landowners who might cooperate in such efforts.

The self storage developer has retained a credentialed archaeologist, who has determined no remains or funerary objects were encountered during excavation of that site so far. BACC has dismissed that assessment as biased, and continues to hold protests near the construction site. Another protest is scheduled for Wednesday, May 12, 2021 at 5:00 PM at 5204 River Road.

Saints Valley opens at Rockville Town Square

Saints Valley, a pop-up shop, has opened at Rockville Town Square. It has been here before, and recently ended a run at Bethesda Row. Saints Valley specializes in handmade jewelry and clothing, as well as prints, bags and other textile products.

Thai Chef Street Food coming to Rockville

Thai Chef Street Food is coming to Rockville Town Square in late summer 2021, property owner Federal Realty announced yesterday. While the development has struggled in many respects, Asian restaurants have generally been successful there, as Rockville has continued to emerge as the near-equal to Annandale as the region's top choice for Asian cuisine. Now the winning formula for the city and Federal Realty expands with the arrival of Thai Chef, which has an existing location at Dupont Circle.

What sets Thai Chef apart from all the other Thai restaurants around? “We believe that if you haven't had Thai street food, you haven't had Thai food,” Thai Chef's Chalisa Fitts, said Monday. “We look forward to getting to know the community and showcasing our Thai favorites such as Moo-phing, BBQ pork on skewers and Catfish Dry Curry, fried catfish filet sautéed with spicy curry paste, Thai eggplant, wild finger root, kaffir lime, peppercorn and fresh basil, as well as our handcrafted specialty cocktails.”  

“Street food has become a fan favorite over the years for many people and Thai Chef’s twist on the genre is a unique and welcome addition to the Rockville Town Square neighborhood,”  Federal Realty Director of Asset Management - Mixed Use Dan Corwin said yesterday. Thai Chef's menu is said to feature entrees you would expect to find from street vendors in Bangkok. But as you can see from the rendering above, the atmosphere will be more refined than a street cart experience.

Images courtesy Federal Realty/Thai Chef

Rockville Senior Center time capsule to be exhumed this month

A time capsule buried 26 years ago at the Rockville Senior Center will be unearthed and opened on Thursday, May 13, 2021 at 5:00 PM. The odd-number anniversary wasn't the original plan in 1995; the pandemic forced the unearthing to be delayed for a year. In another nod to the "new abnormal," the time capsule exhumation will be streamed live on the internet. Register for the free Zoom viewing online. 

What objects were donated to be buried in the time capsule? Tune in to find out, and return to the year when Die Hard with a Vengeance and Batman Forever played in theaters, and Radiohead's The Bends and The Smashing Pumpkins' Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness were being snapped up at Tower Records on Rockville Pike!