Economic Matters Committee - Regular Meeting

Right? Until seven. Good afternoon again, everybody, for the second Environmental Matters Committee meeting for July 9th. So for the record, I'm going to do roll call. We have Alderman Huntley. Present. Alderman Conte. Present. All right. And we did our other business at the last meeting. So for this one, just open up the business, which is going to legislative action on 01626. And then, so that item is open, and now I'm going to adjourn and allow Rules and City Government to adjourn. To open, I'm sorry.

I call this meeting to order, July 9th, 436 p.m. This is the Rules and City Government Committee. I'll start off with roll call. Is Alderman Frank Thorpe present?

Present.

All right. And we have Alderman Shannon Meyer. All right. And myself, Alderman Smith-Brown, Chair. We are going to move forward with the approval of the minutes agenda first, actually. Is there a motion to approve of the agenda?

So moved.

All right. There's a second here. All in favor of that? Aye. Thank you. Now, is there approval of the minutes from our meeting on June the 4th, 2026?

Mr. Chairman, I will make a motion to approve in a second, but I think there does need to be some cleaning up of the notes. There's some unbolded stuff that Frank did this and Keanu did that. But I move to approve the minutes after the cleaning up.

All right, so we have a motion on the floor to... Just leave it, postpone it. Okay, we'll postpone if there's a... I'll accept that as a motion to postpone if there's no... All in favor here, we have that. Thank you. Next we have on the agenda, Legislation 01626, Forest Conservation Program Amendments to Conform with State Law from our sponsor, Alderman Savage. So let's begin with this legislation. If you don't mind, Alderman Savage, sharing with us just an overview of this, where it came from, why is it so pressing, then we can dive into the detail and amendments.

Yeah, so to open it up, I'd just ask Mr. Adams to join us at the table here. Could you give us just an update, presentation on where this is coming from, this legislation?

I'm City Forester Brian Adams and so overall this isn't a big change to our current law. It'd be fairly easy to implement into our current process. Forest Conservation Act has been around since 1991 and it was enacted to try to stem the loss of forests in the state of Maryland. on properties 40,000 square feet or bigger. It requires you to inventory the site, identify sensitive areas, try to work around them. And if you have to remove stuff, you have to replant, remove trees, you have to replant them. And as the years went by, the state continued to lose forest, even with the law in place. So there's long been a push to make the policy, make the law more restrictive. Which brings us to the past couple years. There was a Senate bill and a House bill that were passed in 2023. Mr. Adams. Yep.

Apologies for interrupting, but I want to, in case people want to walk through as you're talking, there is a handout. that shows the changes. It should be the top one in your packet. which it goes through some of the changes that I think Mr. Adams is gonna walk through.

Oh yeah, yeah. I will say this document that was on top is a really good explanation summary of all the changes. I'm gonna just go through them in the order that they come through in the bill. The biggest change overall is just moving from a no net loss policy to a net gain. We want to actually see an increase in canopy in the state of Maryland. And they are gonna measure that every four years. So the majority of changes came out of the Senate bill. There's some new definitions. I won't get into the details, but there's a number of new definitions included. There are some new exemptions that have been added. exemptions to the law which includes tree farms orchards managed forests and also federal government facilities to employ at least 2500 people and then there was some altering of the current exemptions and that's the solar facilities are exempt from afforestation which means the creation of new forests and transit oriented development has a reduced mitigation rate And finally, the multifamily housing of 25 or more units is also a reduced reforestation rate. The state law is now moving to one-to-one replacement ratio, which the city was already doing with our last update maybe eight years ago. So each acre of forest removed has to be replaced with one acre. So we are already at that level and we actually retain a threshold at which if they clear below that we actually require a two to one mitigation. Big addition is the addition of urban areas as priority retention and protection areas. So now they are being treated the same as environmental areas like stream buffers, wetlands, and they're going to be priority for retention. So that'll mean there's some extra steps involved in clearing those. And that's based on, those areas are based on a map that has been developed by DNR. Another new requirement is that unforested riparian buffers have to be afforested or reforested, and that's an effort to enhance water quality. There are new notification requirements prior to the approval of a forest conservation plan for adjacent landowners. And if you are clearing a priority retention area, you have to allow for public comment as well. The department planning zoning now must provide a written justification for clearing of priority retention areas. This is a new requirement. And they've added some alternatives for meeting the reforestation, afforestation requirements, which include restoring degraded forests, planting green infrastructure, and We already use street trees as a way to meet our goals. So these alternatives are in place unless the DNR determines that we are still losing forest in which place they can take some of those options away. Just make sure I've covered everything. Yeah, like I said, the biggest increase is just the policy overall and that they're trying to now at the minimum maintain, but more actively increase forest land and canopy coverage in the state of Maryland. And as I said before, most of these are just small procedural changes to our current ordinance and shouldn't be a big lift for the city.

Mr. Adams, and just a few, Before I turn this back over to the floor, a few other things. Housekeeping, one item. We have a fairly firm stop end time of 5.30. I'm sure that the studio would like us to try to end by then. So I may try to speak up at times to keep us moving. Second thing is to clarify process for our discussion, what I would propose is that we take up the base legislation first before we get into the amendments. And I'm saying that partly because the underlying legislation, as Mr. Adams and the law office can confirm, we're quite deliberate with making sure that the underlying legislation is simply conforming in intention as far as meeting the state requirements. The amendments constitutes some new items, but they're mostly long lines of adjusting our code to make it work for the state, but also to make sure we preserve some of the improvements that we've made over the past nine years on the council, but also before that with when the current mayor was on the council. We'll get into that when the amendments come up. So with that, I guess, any questions for Mr. Adams on the underlying legislation, the intent or content? Give people a moment because I know it's a lot of information.

You can both call on me if you want. So I'm looking at the part about the expanded mitigation menu. This is really just a context question. I understand this doesn't dramatically change it. For forest mitigation banking, do impacts in the city have to be offset within the city or somebody, yes? Okay, thank you. That was my only question.

We actually currently don't have any mitigation banks just because we're tight on space. So we usually try to mitigate on site.

How often is the fee in lieu used?

Barely.

Really? Okay.

You know, with the addition of the street trees, it's made a huge difference for the urban area because they're able to get their mature credit in square footage. So they plant, you know, so that's made a big difference. And that really on our projects is usually how a lot of the reforestation is met.

We set that fee in lieu as part of the regular city fee schedule. Yeah. Okay.

Interesting.

Yeah, I just know it's very easy for those fees to get out of whack with what the market would be. And so it's kind of orthogonal to this, but just something to pay attention to. So thank you.

Yeah, just to piggyback back on that a bit, some of the things we've changed over the years was the fee in lieu, because in past practice, there used to be a provision called the break even point, which essentially allowed the developer to, it's what prevents us from getting the no net loss. We basically got rid of that provision, but at the same time, we realized the developers weren't having to do any kind of mitigation because of this break even point. We got rid of that. When we got rid of that, bump up the fee to make sure they did the mitigation and not just pay the fee in lieu. And so we gave them a lot of options on the mitigation and priority order. And it sounds like it's been working pretty well. They can even do things like maintain existing forest, but they get less credit. And like you said, street trees, all kinds of things. So yeah, there's a lot of history to that.

when we talk about the hello thank you um when we talk about trees that are planted street trees what have you is there a process in place where we check up on those trees over a period of time i've seen many of times where we'll plant a tree and then the tree dies in in the next months or so because it's not taken care of it's too much sun not enough water what have you so how do we measure the ones that are actually living and the ones that may die sooner than we would like

Yeah, great question. So there's two separate tracks. So for development projects, we have a bond landscape bond that the developer puts down, covers the cost of all the landscaping that's installed. And then there's a inspection period for each year for two years. following to ensure that everything has survived and so up until two years from the project install date you can come back to them and say you've got to replace these trees and then extend the bond for another year to ensure they survive with forest conservation projects that's even longer there's actually a five-year maintenance agreement for forest conservation projects and then finally for city planted trees street trees There's always mortality when we plant trees, especially street trees in an urban environment. And it's not until the last couple years that we started to develop a really good maintenance and follow-up plan because our budget didn't allow for it in the past. So we are at a point now where trees that we are planting as street trees are also being watered and continue to be maintained for two to three years.

Any other questions from the committee on the underlying legislation? Committees, sorry. All right, if people are ready to move on to amendments then. So to walk through, if I may, co-chair, I don't know what to call you, but we have... In the packet you have, there is a flow chart, but I'd suggest holding off on that for a minute and turn to the next page, which lists all the amendments. And it starts at amendment two, simply because there was a one that we realized wasn't needed any longer, so it jumps right to two. And this one is on the stream buffer definition, and the state actually adopted our stricter standards as far as the buffer the buffer distances. And so no change there, but there was a suggestion from the Office of Law to add some criteria for the director as far as when it might make sense to expand those buffers. And so these are provisions that talk about slopes of 15% or greater, highly erodible soils, and a few other things. These are all things that are existently listed in the Forest Conservation Act or our city code, but that's kind of where that's coming from. So this is just to make the new criteria a bit easier on staff and legally sound. I don't know if there's anything the law office wants to add to that.

No, you've captured it very well. Thank you.

Questions on that one? Yes, that was number two. I think for the sake of the, I'm trying to think how we want to do this, we can either move these individually as committees or we could do at the end all at once.

Is there a preference from, we go through them all, and then come back and vote?

Okay.

Because I believe, currently we're in, because we're currently in a rules and city government meeting, so what we have to do, we're opening up the floor for if you don't mind presenting each of these amendments, and then we may have to vote if we do decide to vote, or just, you know, we can adjourn and then y'all have, you know what I mean? But we're not having two meetings at the same exact time, because we kind of have to vote, and you all can't vote, correct?

You guys just cannot vote together.

Yeah, we can kind of do however we want. We just have to have our votes separate.

Marvelous. So yes, can we go over all the amendments? That'd be great.

That's fine with me.

Thank you.

Okay, so that was number two. No other questions on that one. Move on to three. Number three, a bit of a correction. Yes, actually, Mr. Adams, do you wanna speak to this one? I did misstate, you wanna correct me on this one as you.

Yeah, originally for the report, every year we provide an annual report to DNR about the projects that we've approved over the past year. And it used to be due on March 1st. As part of this legislation, a couple years ago, they changed that date to August 31st, I guess, to align with the fiscal year better. So rather than the calendar year, they went to a fiscal year. So that's just changing our date from March 1st to August 31st. And that's for all jurisdictions in the state of Maryland.

Any questions on that one? I do. I think you just answered my question, but I want to confirm. This annual report goes from July 1st to June 30th? So you have July and August to complete the report? Correct. Okay. That's aggressive and fantastic. Thank you. Questions?

All right, moving on to number four. This one I think may be a little more complicated, but this is where the flow chart comes up. So the appeal process, and again, I'll turn the Office of Law to some point on this one, but through some excellent research by their office, which I'll get into a little bit, but basically the state bill, set a requirement because of some case law, which I'll ask the Office of Law to speak a little bit to, but which establishes that there needs to be a point of there needs to be a point where the Forest Conservation Plan can be appealed, an appealable decision, and that they have 30 days to do so. And so this amendment tries to accomplish that goal while keeping our own city processes intact. So if you look at the existing process, And you'll see on the flow chart where a department currently makes the determination that a plan is complete and correct. And the problem with that is there's no real appealable decision point, approval point. So currently it goes through with the grading permit review or it goes to the planning commission. And so depending on which body it goes to, it goes to a different appeal body. If it goes through a grading permit process, then it goes to the Building Board of Appeals. So keep in mind we have the Building Board of Appeals, which is Chapter 17, and then we have the Zoning Board of Appeals, we just call the Board of Appeals, which is in Chapter 21. So this has it go to Chapter 17. Planning Commission, people can appeal that. If they wanted to appeal the Forest Conservation Plan, though, they would have to appeal the entire application and it would go to the Circuit Court. And so there are a couple problems with this current setup, which I think Office of Law pointed out, which we're trying to fix with this, the proposed flow would be that there is a clear, which comes out of the case law, that there is a clear, appealable decision on the Forest Conservation Plan. And that basically once that appeal window passes, there's no second bite of the apple as far as internally. So that would go to either the Planning Commission and and they would still, so I guess I should say before it goes to the Planning Commission, there would be an opportunity for an appeal. I believe, I'm not misstating this, but there'd be an opportunity to appeal, but it would have to go to Circuit Court. That's following the typical Planning Commission process. If it doesn't have to go to the Planning Commission, it goes to the grading permit and it would then have to, if it's appealed, it would go to the Board of Appeals just for the Forest Conservation Act portion. I don't think I'm explaining this super well. Office of Law, I don't know if you want to, anything you want to add, clarify for me, perhaps the case law that led into some of this?

Yeah, I think that case law is kind of helpful context. So there was a case before the Maryland Supreme Court where Chesapeake Bay Foundation did not like the forest conservation plan that was approved for a development, and so instead of waiting until the final development plans were all approved they just went ahead and appealed the forest conservation plan by itself because it was going to be a number more months until the local government approved the whole plan set and the developer objected to that and said you you can't appeal the forest conservation plan independently you're supposed to wait until the whole project plan, such as the site plan or the subdivision plan are approved. And so that went up on appeal and the Maryland Supreme Court, which it was a split decision, but the majority said, no, CBF is right. They can appeal the forest conservation plan independently. It's not like a small sub plan of the larger approval. It's its own approval itself, subject to appeal. And the dissent said, that's not right. There's nothing in the state code that says that it's a separate, appealable decision. And so the General Assembly addressed that by adding something to this SB 526 that said, in no uncertain terms, that there's a right to judicial review of a forest conservation plan approval but the general assembly didn't delve into all the details of precisely what would constitute that final approval and nor did the maryland supreme court case and so that's where in this amendment four we try to drill down a little bit to get to the idea that the Forest Conservation Plan can be appealed by itself. You could just appeal that if you wanted to, but we're still tracking, we're still basically, because in Annapolis, the Forest Conservation Plan can still be revised by, for instance, the Planning Commission. That Forest Conservation Plan isn't really final until the Planning Commission has said, if it's a Planning Commission track, you know, we approve this whole package. And so we're kind of accomplishing both things there by saying through this amendment that there's a distinct appeal right from a forest conservation plan approval, but we're also recognizing that in Annapolis, that isn't going to occur until in the planning commission track, for instance, the final plan, subdivision plan, or what have you, is approved. Same concept with a grading plan, but in that case, it's the Department of Planning and Zoning that's making the approval. And what Alderman Savage mentioned that we were going through and trying to square was you have different sections in the code talk about where do you appeal something and how long is that, do you have to do that appeal? And so we're trying to get some consistency with these appeals of the forest conservation plans approvals. So that's why we're sticking with the idea that if it's a planning commission track, you appeal directly to the circuit court at that point. And that's still going to be the case. You could, if you wanted to just appeal the forest conservation plan approval to the circuit court at that point, you could, or your appeal could cover both the forest conservation plan and the whole subdivision approval. The same idea, but when it's a department approval instead of the planning commission, the amendment proposes that that go to the Board of Appeals before you go to Circuit Court. And the reason for that is that when the department approves it, that's more of an administrative approval And we want to try to give people the opportunity to take an appeal of that within our own governmental system before it goes to circuit court. Whereas with the Planning Commission, they're really a decider of last resort on the types of applications that come before them. And that's why you could go straight to circuit court from the Planning Commission. So I realize that it's sort of complicated, but we're trying to give effect to the new requirement or the new rights in state law that expressly recognize the right to appeal a forest conservation plan while also recognizing that that's gonna occur within a a sequence that we have for uh development approvals and maybe unlike some other jurisdictions you can still amend or the forest conservation plan still might be amended up until that final department or planning commission approval is given

With that being said, though, I think you guys are right on the topic here. For anyone who may be wondering, as a developer coming into town and they're about to build a property, what have you, on their land, can you tell us or give us a time scope of leading us up to a forest conservation plan and what that means? What's the process of a forest conservation plan? Who develops it and all this? Could we get that?

We can refer that to- Thank you.

Mr. Travis?

Yes, please.

Yeah. When a developer is looking at a site that meets this requirement of 40,000 square feet or greater and there's no exemption, they basically hire a professional You have to be a qualified professional by the DNR, there's requirements, and you're hired to do a delineation. It's called a forest stand delineation of the property and categorize the sensitive areas, the forest stand, very detailed inventory of the site. And that is supposed to lead into the planning process for how they develop the site. That leads to the development, and then there's the forest conservation plan comes out of that process of the development. They decide what's gonna stay, what can they keep, what needs to be replaced, and they develop a plan that comes in with the grading permit or the development plans. And so it is a long process. The forest and delineation is early in the process. So it could be months from the time they do a delineation until we actually see a plan coming in. And we review, the forest and delineation comes to us for review, and then they also will submit a preliminary forest conservation plan once they've developed that with their site plan.

Are there any other questions on Amendment 4? Alderman Howling.

So what I'm trying to understand is the, and the answer might be that this is irrelevant, but what I'm trying to understand is how these processes impact whether a project gets stayed or not, right? We passed this legislation last year, or maybe it was early the year before, that said rather than every project, every time it gets appealed, automatically gets stayed, we let the Circuit Court make the determination on whether a project gets stayed or not. And so I'm trying to understand, in these cases, if it gets appealed to the Circuit Court, and for that matter, if it gets appealed to the Board of Appeals or the Planning Commission, is it automatically stayed? Maybe Alderman Savage is the one with the answer.

So we changed this maybe two years ago, three years ago.

I think it was like late 24.

Yeah, so what it was changed to is that appeals on to internal city bodies, like Board of Appeals or Building Board of Appeals, those would have a stay. So for example, if the grading, in this case, if the grading permit is appealed, there would be a stay until that appeal's settled. If it gets appealed to the Circuit Court, since that's really not our body, I believe we left the discretion to Planning and Zoning. is if there's something that, but typically, as far as if it's a significant forest clearing or not, but I'd have to look at the code.

I think you're right. I'll pull up that legislation, but I think that was the compromise we ended on, because in general, I liked the idea of saying the court should be the one to determine it, but for trees in particular, we said, you know, this is something where there could be an irreparable impact. Let's also give the planning and zoning director the option. I'll try looking it up, but that makes sense to me.

Do you recall, Mr. Adams?

And realistically, the forest conservation plan is early enough in the process relative to the other permits you would need. I think getting a stay on that is not necessarily going to hold up your whole project because you're still working on other permits. Does that make sense to you, Mr. Adams?

Yeah, I mean, you can still continue with the review process of the other permits. your other plans, right? The other associated grading or building permits, whatever other approvals you need.

Just looking up the So this is something actually we might need to tweak in the legislation since you brought that up, just to point out to the Office of Law, we might need to make that a committee amendment. But if you look at page seven of the legislation as introduced, line 13 is the stays section. Just that we'll need to, I guess we'll need a corrective amendment, assuming some of these pass. Number seven, that would change the Building Board of Appeals to the Board of Appeals throughout the entire piece of the legislation. And so then it would state that then this entire provision would carry over as intended, which would say that, let's see, I'm reading through this. so that no cutting of the force would be allowed during the appeal window, so that 30 days. And then if there is an appeal filed to, in this case, if we change it to the Board of Appeals, then there would be a stay until the appeal is resolved. After the Board of Appeals would issue their decision, it says the department may require a stay pending if there's, they may require a stay if there's a petition filed to the circuit court. And so to your point, it's not a requirement. And it just goes on further to say that the noting of an appeal does not stay, it doesn't prevent staff from continuing the review. Because I think to something you alluded to, they can still continue doing the rest of the grading permit review or the site design, whatever it is, while the appeal might be pending in the process.

Okay, I think where I'm at with this is that it doesn't really impact your amendment for, but that I'm not totally comfortable with. The language on stays in the underlying legislation. The idea that we're gonna say, even once we give you your permit, we're gonna wait around for 30 days is kind of crazy to me. We just gave you the permit, why do you have to wait 30 days? If somebody files an appeal, maybe we have a stay, but if we're just waiting for somebody to maybe possibly file an appeal, why are we all sitting around?

Because, I mean, my point with that would be it can take, as somebody who's been on both sides, involved in both sides, it could take time to put together an appeal. And you don't know until a permit's actually issued what you're potentially appealing. You have to, I mean, community groups would have to track down an attorney. That takes a lot of time, putting together reports for the, and it would be, Again, assuming if there is some validity to the appeal, we would hate to have the trees be removed in those interim. So my counter to that would be 30 days is a short amount of time when you're looking at the overall time it takes to actually build a project.

Yeah, and that's where I'm trying to understand if this is the limiting step. 30 days might be no problem if at the same time you're getting issued this, you're also getting, you're waiting on something that's going to take 60 days. But if that's the case, then there's no need to include this. And so, yeah, I mean, I'm fine to support the amendment, but I might want to work on something else on this portion about states.

Fair enough. Happy to work with you on that. Anything else on Amendment 4? Okay, hearing nothing else, moving on to amendment five. This is notice of plan approval. So again, this is not a requirement coming from the state, which is why it's an amendment, but it basically just makes sure that the notification of the final approval is posted. Again, because I think it's, somebody who's obviously been involved in like watershed groups and whatnot i think it's people tend to read the paper every day they don't necessarily go to the city website to check a permit status every day some do but most people don't and so that's why i thought it'd be good to include some kind of requirement where the which we do on other portions of the development process just require that the applicant put something in the paper that says um you know forest conservation plan for East Port Lofts, I'll pick on them because they've not been enforced, was approved so that people at least know and see that that decision was made.

Alderman Thorpe. So, and the legislation may require this, but we have had cases in Ward 8 where trees were removed without neighbors knowing. And there's a requirement in the code when you want to do something to a bulkhead that you have to actually send a letter to the neighbors. And while I like to think that people read newspapers, as you said, I think that puts the burden on the neighbor to watch as compared to putting the burden on the applicant to send a letter through the Postal Service. It's a requirement, we could talk about whether email should replace that or whatever, but that puts the burden on the applicant to inform the people who are mostly impacted by it. And I would suggest we may want to include that kind of requirement.

Can I add that the addition of the comment or notice in the state legislation sort of covers that, and it's that at least 20 days before approval of the final forest conservation plan, you have to notify all adjacent landowners. that there's going to be a forest conservation approval on this property.

Be it mail or email?

It's mail. Okay. Yeah. This amendment sort of goes beyond that and makes an announcement to everyone, not just the neighbors. So there is a requirement now to notify all adjacent landowners.

And this does include a notification, written notice to the budding and adjacent property owners. Are you done, Alderman Thorpe?

Well, I mean, I'm good, but that's not what it says here. This amendment written notice to abutting and adjacent property owners. So there's somewhere a disagreement.

I guess the question, Mr. Adams, is there, do you know where the state, where we worked in that state?

It's on page 12. It says retention, clearing, justification. Is that what you're referring to? It says notice and public comment. Notice and comment before approval. At least 20 days before approval of a forest conservation plan. Yep. The department shall. And that's what it says, A, provide notice that is consistent with department notice requirements to all property owners.

abutting and adjacent to the boundary of the subject property of any proposed clearing of a priority retention area as described in blank blank blank blank um i'm good if we work through that so it seems thank you it seems to me like what we just heard is this is not necessary right that there is already a requirement for notification Did I hear you correct, Mr.? You don't have to weigh in on is this necessary or not, but can you help me understand? It sounded like you just said there's already a requirement for notification separate from this.

I think the difference is that what the state added is just 20 days before the approval, it goes to all adjacent and abutting property owners, whereas this amendment includes the notification in the paper, which would go out to a broader audience.

And when it says upon the approval, that's after the approval takes place? Yeah, there is a difference there. So that's the difference. This is before and that's after. So why am I not noticing people the same way before that?

Yeah, before seems like it should be the time you need. Once it's approved, who cares?

It's beautiful out there.

You can go look it up if you want. To Alderman Thorpe's point, like... I think the burden should be on the paper.

You have to buy the paper. It costs money.

I'm saying if somebody wants to be nosy about what's going on on somebody else's property, the burden should be on them rather than on people who are trying to do stuff on their own property. It sounds like we already have that requirement in here once. We don't need to add it in a second time after the plan is finalized and everything's already set, right?

Yeah, I see your point. I guess it hinges on one of the comments in here because it does, with the language from the state, it says, provide notice that is consistent with department notice requirements to all property owners abutting and adjacent. So one of the questions would be, what are the department notice requirements?

Wow.

I believe, I believe this was brought up in a discussion with the DNR, and they said, you know, what is your typical way of notifying neighbors? It's usually going to be by letter. But they didn't clarify exactly what they wanted to see.

Okay. So for the sake of... So I guess the only difference would be who we want to get notified. One would be DNRs is just adjacent property owners. unless there's a requirement in the code to get it posted in the paper already, which I guess we'll have to check, but versus the amendment that would have at least be in the paper. I think there's already a requirement in our code to put it on the website. So again, I'm not, Are there any other questions on this? Because we need to move on to the next one, if there's anything else burning on this amendment.

Just for clarification, were you saying that the question of the paper and all, that that's not enough and that we should send the mail out to people so that the burden isn't on them to have to get the paper? What were you saying there, just for clarification?

I think the newspaper is great and the broader notification that we're talking about is great, but I think the adjacent properties, abutting properties, the requirement to, should be on, the burden should be on the applicant to inform them. Not the whole city or the whole board or whatever. I would be, if there was a way to go broader for, the immediate notification then adjacent and abutting i don't know if there's a legal way to do that but there's some properties that there might only be two p two properties abutting but it'd be of major interest to a lot of people um so i don't know if there's a way to go broader than that i think one way to to clarify would be to since the state is requiring the 20 days before approval

to the abutting and adjacent property owners, we could clarify that that should be by mail. And then in this amendment, you could remove the notice to a budding adjacent property nurse, because that would be redundant, and just make it the website and the newspaper to get the general, the broader announcement word out.

I'm gonna ask Ms. Reuter to make that change for me, but yes.

But can we also agree, we should not write in our code that things need to be advertised in the newspaper. This is 2026 here, right? It could go on the website, and a heck of a lot more people are gonna see it than if it's in the newspaper.

I'm going to fight that very hard. Because you want to cut down more trees, Alderman Savage? What's that? You want to cut down more trees? Well, I also believe very strongly about history and the record. Papers are called the record for a reason. They're searchable. They're in our archives permanently. But we need to move on. So is there anything else burning on this one?

i would just agree with you wholeheartedly because uh maybe you want to get rid of the word printed but to be in the newspaper because that does say print and online so so i i would hate to go away from it for legal record but today when you say a newspaper it's printed and online so it should cover exactly what you're talking about

I just think where there are opportunities to make things easier on folks, we should do it rather than trying to make it as hard as possible. Like if nobody's gonna read the newspaper, why are we making people do something extra?

Okay, let's not, I have more people who read the paper than go online in my ward. I have a lot of seniors, but let's move on because we have to, we have to get to the next amendment. So amendment six is the next one. And this is, so this one, I try to explain this best I can. Basically, the new state law took effect July 1st. So that means right now, until we get this passed, this if somebody comes in with an application they're subject to the state program problem is we have changed this again with the current mayor when he was alderman even for the past nine ten years to make improvements on the state legislation but the problem is we lose all that with the state we have no basically we lose our conservation threshold we lose our fee in lieu we lose the mitigation priorities that we've set aside, all those things we lose because right now we're undergoing the state. So even if this passes on whenever our next last meeting in July, if somebody submits in this window, they could make the legal argument that they're subject to the laws at the time of application, which would be into state laws. And so in order to avoid that ambiguity, what I'm proposing is to add this section at the end of the legislation. We've taken this approach in the past that basically just says that anything approved on the interim this past 30 days is going to have to, that this legislation applies to anything that doesn't have final approval. And so if they've submitted, they're gonna have to comply with the new law, which is going to be our new law updated with the state code. So yeah, that's basically it. Oh, yes, City Attorney.

Yeah, just one thing that I think we need to take a look at. I wholeheartedly agree with the idea of including this in here. The final clause in here where it says accept that this ordinance does not apply to any application that is vested under Maryland law, including an application vested under the Maryland Housing Certainty Act. i do maybe want us to look at that issue i i understand the intent of the language but and for those who aren't aware the maryland housing certainty act is going to come into effect i believe in october and the goal of that is to basically say we want developers to have some certainty when they get approvals, they are then vested early rather than Maryland right now is a late vesting jurisdiction. So we're gonna let them vest under current law for I think it's five years, but we just wanna make sure that, I wouldn't want this language in here to mean that somehow this ordinance isn't going to apply to projects that vest under the maryland housing certainty act because we clearly intend that this new ordinance will apply to all those but the i think your point alderman savage here is well taken and that we want to make sure that if you don't cur if you don't have a forest conservation plan that's been finally approved um this is going this law is going to apply to you

Yeah, I think we're aligned on this. I'm happy to reword this, but are there questions about this underlying intention with this amendment?

I was not raising my hand. Sorry, I was scratching my neck.

I know, I was waiting for you.

No, no, I just have issue with newspapers.

All right, if there are no questions on this, then I... Mr. Chair, for rules, what do you think about proceeding with some of the votes?

We weren't gonna vote on much, maybe a couple of amendments, the ones that are more straightforward, such as Amendment 3, which is the timeline, the annual reporting timeline. That made sense to me. If you felt that that was okay, unless, Alderman Thornton, if you had a motion on any of these amendments, I mean, I would open the floor for that. I just, I think at our next meeting is when we wanted to officiate everything.

I would be, willing, if my fellow member of the Rules Committee would be willing, to put together a motion that says the Rules Committee recommends approval of all these amendments. I don't know that I need any further discussion.

I just wanted to give Alderman Shandemeyer an opportunity to look at over this meeting, since he'll be at our next meeting most likely, just in case he had questions or thoughts. I just didn't want to exclude him from that conversation. that's mainly why i'm saying that too also give us more opportunity to look over it but yes if that's all right are we going to postpone these amendments until our next meeting okay so uh let's if you're okay with that alderman thorpe make a motion for amendment two let's start at the top amendment two we can make a motion to give a positive or favorable recommendation for amendment two

Amendment two?

Yes, starting with Amendment two.

I can do that, but I'm gonna repeat myself five times.

Oh, you wanna do them all?

Frank, make the motion to approve Amendment two.

Right. Does anybody? I'm gonna hold out on Amendment four, if that's okay. That's a little lengthier. as well as Amendment 5, but Alderman Shannon is not here to see that, so Alderman Thorpe, if you can move maybe two, three, and a six, I'd be comfortable with that.

Okay, I move that the Rules Committee recommend approval of Amendments 2, 3, and 6.

All right, so there's a second for a favorable recommendation for Amendment 2, 3, and 6. All in favor? Aye. Thank you.

Mr. Chair, before you conclude, can I just suggest one of the reasons for doing the joint meeting was to make sure we limit staff time. So I think before you adjourn, make clear if you're going to need staff at the next meeting to continue any dialogue on these amendments.

Yes, our next official meeting, because this was a special meeting, is I believe July, at the end of July, I think the 20... 23rd at noon so that's our official meeting this is a special meeting that's when we'll be able to hopefully he can zoom in and if not then we'll i just want to give opportunity for me maybe give some feedback and thoughts from alderman chandemeyer um but that's our official meeting where we can finalize everything that's what we were thinking

Can I just ask a question? So I'm super inclusive here. So nothing I'm about to say, am I looking to leave out any Alderman and specifically Alderman Shannon Meyer, but are you saying we're gonna bring back the staff and, or are you just saying that we're gonna have an opportunity for the three of us

to discuss oh yeah at that point we wouldn't necessarily you wouldn't necessarily have to come unless we have questions we can email you or something but we've i think got the majority of the questions and thoughts today unless you had any left over um so no that would be a meeting where we're literally going to go through the remaining amendments and the actual legislation and just move forward on it

Yeah, I'm fine with that. I just don't want to bring back the city attorney and the deputy city manager and Brian and all that.

That is our official meeting, the 23rd. So whoever normally would come would come. It wouldn't be additional staff time because that's the meeting we usually have.

I think if we can make a final decision today, that would be ideal. for everybody, including.

Environment can, right?

Environment can still, but again, but if somebody still has to come to the next rules meeting, including us, that kind of defeats the purpose of doing this today.

You don't have to do that. That's not what it's about. Our next rules meeting, we have multiple things on agenda, and it'll include this. And it's just giving a little more time for the larger amendments. And if we have questions, we'll email, but there's no need for anyone else to come back and answer any questions we've asked. I'm just giving us a little more time. I'm not going to rush through everything all in one day. I'm not going to do that.

We're given this heavy time.

Yeah, so the amendments were two days ago. I received those, I believe, two days ago, if that's not incorrect. Two of them are extremely extensive. The other three, which we just passed a little more straightforward, our next meeting, we'll finalize everything. I think we'll still be in time to add it to our agenda for our council meeting at the end of July, if that's correct. We'll have time to do so. And then we can move forward on making sure we get this enacted by state law standards.

Just to confirm, our meeting is the 23rd? Yes. And the City Council meeting is the 20?

27.

27, so that's enough time. Okay.

Yeah, we've talked about it. That's why I'm saying this.

Okay.

Do we have to adjourn in order for them to vote?

Yeah, you have to vote on the legislation as

So we're postponing, can we not postpone, we're moving to postpone the main legislation? Because we can't, I mean, the other amendments aren't yet incorporated.

Which ones are left, which ones to act on?

Five and four, four and five. Five and four were not acted on? Yeah, we didn't act on those two.

Okay, but that raises my question. Maybe four is the most substantive, but that is also where we really need the Office of Law. Again, for the sake of time, I'm just wondering, you say you wanna dig into that a bit more. I'm just worried that's gonna bring staff back again.

So who are we gonna have at our next meeting? Are we not gonna have anyone here on the 23rd?

Again, that was the point of today is to make sure we didn't have to do that. I would probably be here anyway.

No, that's not so. The 23rd meeting we had originally planned and it was staying no matter what. I mean, that's our monthly meeting, the 23rd.

Not for this particular legislation.

Oh, but this will be added to finalize, to move forward on the other amendments. You don't necessarily have to be, it's okay if you're not able to be here. There's no worry. We're going to get through it. We'll ask the questions ahead of time and we'll just move it along. I'm just saying for these two amendments alongside the main piece of legislation, we shouldn't rush on that just immediately as if that meeting will still give us enough time to add it to the agenda.

Your point on four is, four was not controversial, right? I was the one who asked questions about it and then I determined that they were not actually related to the amendment.

Well, let's let them conclude because we need to conclude for the studio. So have you concluded your actions for rules? You guys didn't make a motion?

So for the legislation, can we move to postpone the final legislation? And if not, we just won't do anything. Okay, no action on that. Thank you. Do I have to? Okay, we're moving to adjourn this. Yes, we're moving to adjourn this meeting? So moved. All right, I'll second that. Okay, no objection, thank you. Blessings.

All right, and then re-adjourning environmental matters for our vote on this legislation. Is there a motion from the floor to move any of the amendments?

Alderman Savage, I would, Chairman Savage, I'd like to make a motion to move amendments two, three, four, and six to favorably, to move them. Yeah, I'm moving those amendments. Is there a second to that?

Second.

All those in favor of recommending 01626 with amendments two, three, four, and six, please say aye. Aye. Our motion carries, thank you. And we'll just deal with five on the floor is fine. All right, I think that concludes. environmental matters thank you i'm going to is there oh yes so ultimately no you need to make a recommendation on the entire legislation we just did we've grouped it all into one i didn't hear that okay yeah thank you and um yeah motion to adjourn is there a second packet all right all those favor please say aye aye motion carries thank you means adjourned have a good evening