Mayor and Council - Regular Meeting

Just wanted to say thank you everyone for being here. We are gonna begin our meeting with proclamations and recognitions and then we'll start our normal meeting at 6.30. So we appreciate everyone joining us for the celebration today. I'm gonna ask my colleagues to please join me at the podium as we do the recognitions and celebrations.

Good evening, everyone. It is my honor to read the Mattie Stepanek Peace Day Proclamation. And although while I never had the opportunity to meet Mattie, his spirit in terms of the love and care for this community runs very deep. Whereas, Matty J.T. Stepanek was an American poet, ambassador, and advocate for peace in our world. And whereas, at the age of three, Matty started to write poetry, which he referenced to his heart songs, enabling him to cope with a rare and fatal form of muscular dystrophy. a disease that also claimed the lives of his sister and two brothers. And now, therefore, the Mayor and Council of the City of Rockville, Maryland, do hereby proclaim July 17, 2026, as Maddie J.T. Stepanek Peace Day and encourage all members of the community to recognize the many contributions of Maddie J.T. Stepanek by thinking gently, speaking gently, and living gently, the model by which his courageous young man lived his life. And we have Dr. Jenny Stepanek here. Madam Mayor, I move the proclamation. We have Dr. Jenny Stepanek here to receive the proclamation. Absolutely.

We are wearing the Bumblebee feelers in honor of somebody that's going to be talking about community gardens, which is a part of peace also. So we're saying be peaceful. Do you want me to hold the mic for you?

I got it.

Thank you. I feel like step forward, people. So thank you, everybody. Thank you to the city, to the council for always supporting Maddie's foundation and celebrating Peace Day. For people who are not familiar. Peace Day is a celebration of my son, Matty Stepanek's life and legacy. It's on his birthday every single year. When Matty passed away back in 2004, he left this legacy of hope and peace. He taught us all about the important matters of not having to agree with our neighbors, but learning to be with our neighbors. He taught us about having inner purpose and finding what that is so that we know that we matter, so that we're not afraid to get along with other people and find out how they matter also and build these mosaics of humanity. And he reminded us about the important matters of play. of getting to know our neighbors around the block and around the world and just connecting. Because when we know our neighbors, we care more about our neighbors. And when we care about somebody, we fear them less. So there's less violence. There's more concern and compassion. That's what Maddie's Foundation does. Year-round, we offer programs, resources, materials. We have Mama Peace chats. We have Heart Song to Mosaic workshops. We have materials. We have peace certification. We're developing a virtual museum. We have master class sessions, podcast sessions, blog things. We have all kinds of things. I have all these people here that I do a lot of my facilitation with. We have some of my Mama Peace chats with the Main Street and UCR communities. But Peace Day, Peace Day is a day that we pause all those programs. We pause all the hard work year round and we bring those programs in a playful way to the city of Rockville. So when you come to Peace Day, there's peace stations with all kinds of maddie messages paired with arts and crafts to help you understand the message. There's entertainment. This year we have Ocho de Bastos. the Blarney Bench, the Zam Dancers. We have a cornhole tournament this year. Please sign up. We are looking for people and we're dropping the price a little bit. It's our fundraiser that supports our foundation, but we really need people to come and play cornhole for peace. But most of all, we're also having a toast to peace where we just, we connect with purpose for peace. We all know that peace matters. We all know that peace matters. But I think in today's world, a lot of people say, yeah, but what can I do? Look at my world. And what I'm saying, what this day says, is there's a lot we could do. Peace does not begin with the end of war. Peace begins with our choices and how we connect with our neighbors around the block and around the world. This year, Peace Day is going to be on July 11th. World of Beer, they close the street. It's inside, outside, big party with a purpose, bands, music, cornhole, everything from 2 to 5, Saturday, July 11th. Be there. And you can find out more information at maddiespeacefoundation.org. Thank you. I'm literally teaching a moral peace chat even as we speak. So we're leaving the role to it right now. Thank you.

Thank you, we have a couple of proclamations that don't have recipients, but we wanted to make sure we spread awareness about the issues. So June 15th through 21st is Men's Health Week. I said that right, Men's Health Week. And it's an important time to ensure that people are getting their checkups and taking care of their health. Whereas despite advances in medical technology and research, men's life expectancy continues to average five years less than women, with men of Native American and African American ethnic backgrounds having the lowest life expectancy overall. And educating the public about the importance of a healthy lifestyle and early detection of male health issues will assist in reducing the number of deaths caused by detectable and preventable diseases. Now, therefore, the mayor and council of the city of Rockville, Maryland, do hereby proclaim June 15th through 21st, 2026 as Men's Health Week and encourage the Rockville community to increase their efforts to understand the importance of a healthy lifestyle, regular exercise, and getting medical checkups for men and their families. I'll read the next proclamation, and then I'll ask my colleagues to help me move these. Whereas World Refugee Day is an annual commemoration adopted by the United Nations in 2000, to honor and raise awareness of refugees, and the more than 122.6 million displaced people have been forced from their homes worldwide, more than at any time in recorded history, including over 30 million refugees around the world. And now, therefore, the Mayor and Council of the City of Rockville proclaim June 20, 2026 as World Refugee Day, and June 15 through 21, as World Refugee Week. Can one of my colleagues please move these proclamations? Council Member Valeri, do we have a second? Council Member Fulton seconds. All those in favor, please raise your hand and say aye. It is unanimous. I think it is apropos that we read this next proclamation and thinking about world refugees who are often have to move, refugees who have to move from their homes due to violence, and we have Peace Day, we also recognize Gun Violence Awareness Day. I want to just note that in 2024, Maryland experienced 671 firearm fatalities, including homicides, suicides and unintentional shootings. There are about 7 million children living in homes with unsecured guns. That's not okay. And we can do better. And I will read the proclamation. Whereas while homicides and gun violence are down significantly in Maryland compared to nationwide, guns are still the leading cause of death among children and teens every year. And we still need to work to eliminate gun violence and gun homicides across the country. Now, therefore, the Mayor and Council of the City of Rockville declare June 5th, 2026 as Gun Violence Awareness Day, June 5th through 7th as Gun Violence Awareness Weekend, and June 2026 as National Gun Violence Awareness Month. and encourage all residents to support their local communities' efforts to prevent tragic effects of gun violence and to honor and value human lives. I want to welcome Moms Demand Action to the podium. I will say I had a chance to engage with them in Annapolis Day where state laws are being passed. And I just want to thank you for your tireless advocacy. I also want to thank Rockville City Police Department because Rockville has been leading in the area to help get guns off of our streets. We have removed about 1,000 guns and melted them. Thank you for your work. And I will, yeah, I will do that. Thank you. So I just wanted to honor and appreciate the work that they are doing. Who can help?

You did the move.

Do we have a second?

Council Member Miles seconds. All right, so I want to welcome Maria Piccola, who is from the Maryland chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America and other chapters. Do you want to share a few words? We're going to take a quick vote, sorry. We're all unanimous, correct?

Thank you. All right.

There we go.

Mayor Ashton and members of the Rockville City Council, on behalf of the 4,000-plus Montgomery County Moms Demand Action volunteers, I want to thank you for issuing this proclamation today to recognize the Wear Orange movement. Moms Demand Action is nonpartisan, a volunteer-based organization, and we, including my friend Leslie Katz and I, are part of a wider network called Everytown for Gun Safety, which includes Students Demand Action, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, and Everytown Survivor Network, which includes the Survivors that your proclamation honors today. We are the largest gun violence prevention organization in the country with over 11 million supporters. And we work at the federal, state, and local level engaging in advocacy, legislative action, support for community partners that work with many of the people who are most impacted by gun violence. We engage in school safety and public education and electoral action. We deeply appreciate your commitment to elevate the cause of gun violence prevention and to give voice to those who have been personally affected by this horrible problem we face every day in our communities. This past year was another difficult year in Montgomery County, where we were confronted with unacceptable levels of gun violence. And sadly, even with firearm-related incidents, in our schools, including at Wooten High School and Blake High School. I know I share your concerns about this, and I know we all worry about the future of our children and also for the future of those young people who make the wrong choice and then have their lives destroyed by it. Speaking out about gun violence, as you have done today, issuing this Wear Orange Proclamation is a first and important step that we can take. As Montgomery County residents, parents, and students, we want to express our appreciation to you for your leadership in elevating the cause of reducing gun violence and for this proclamation that recognizes and supports those among us who've been affected most directly. So let's work together to make gun violence, especially in schools, a thing of the past in Montgomery County. And thank you again for recognizing we're orange. Thank you, Mayor.

I'll just make one final point, because we did have, you spoke about gun violence in schools, and I mentioned the leading cause of death for young people. Just noting that it's not just those who are directly impacted, but in the case of Wooten, over 1,000 students and teachers were impacted, and I just want to thank you for the work that you're doing, and we'll all strive to be better to make sure we're making sure that our schools are safe and our community is safe.

Thank you.

So at the beginning of every one of our meetings, we say, pledge allegiance to the flag. One meeting a year, we get to proclaim Flag Day. And I have the honor of doing that today. It's a hard act to follow after gun violence, but I'll get it together. Whereas, by resolution of the Second Continental Congress, dated June 14, 1777, the first official flag of the United States was adopted. and by act of Congress dated August 3, 1949, June 14th of each year, was designated as National Flag Day. Now, therefore, the Mayor and Council of the City of Rockville, Maryland, do hereby proclaim June 14th, 2026, as Flag Day, and also celebrate the 250th anniversary of America, and we urge the Rockville community to pause at 7 p.m. on this date, June 14th, for the annual pause for the pledge and recite with all Americans the Pledge of Allegiance to our flag and to our nation. Madam Mayor, I move the proclamation. And I believe we have some members of the American Legion Post 86 Color Guard to come say a few words. Tim Graber, welcome.

Thank you, Madam Mayor and Council Members. I accept this proclamation on behalf of American Legion Post 86. I'm an Army veteran and a member of Post 86, and I'm also in the American Legion Color Guard. We have another member over here as part of the Color Guard with me as well. To me, the flag is a symbol of freedom, sacrifice, and unity. As well, it's an expression of patriotism. It stands for courage of those who fought for liberty from the Revolutionary War through our current wars and conflicts. And it also demonstrates the resolve Americans have demonstrated throughout history. That courage and resolve was demonstrated by the flag still being raised in September of 1814 at Fort McHenry, It was demonstrated during February 1945 when the flag was raised in Iwo Jima during World War II. It was demonstrated in July 1969 when the flag was planted on the moon. And it was also demonstrated in New York City when the flag was raised in the aftermath of the 2001 World Trade Center attack. To me, the flag also reminds us of the cost of freedom and the service to our nation when it is draped over caskets at military funerals and funerals of veterans. The flag represents unity and respect when it is honored through saluting and putting your hand over your heart during the President's Allegiance and during the National Anthem. So this is what Flag Day means to me and why it's important to continue to recognize Flag Day on June 14th. Thank you.

You can, you can if you want.

All right.

He wants it for the picture thing. Alex, over here.

All right. There you go. Oh, my God. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, it is my privilege and my honor to present the proclamation in honor of Juneteenth, a holiday that is probably one of the newest federal holidays, and thank goodness is still a federal holiday as of last time I checked. Whereas in August 1619, the first recorded enslaved Africans arrived in Jamestown, Virginia after enduring the brutal journey known as the Middle Passage. And whereas on June 19th, 1865, Major General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas and announced general order number three, informing enslaved African Americans in Texas that they were free. marking a defining moment in American history. Now, therefore, the Mayor and Council of the City of Rockville, Maryland do hereby proclaim June 19th, 2026 as Juneteenth in the City of Rockville and encourage all employees, residents, and visitors to commemorate this important day through reflection, learning, celebration, and renewed commitment to freedom, justice, dignity, and unity for all. Madam Mayor, I move the proclamation. Aye. And I believe we have Jean Booth, our wonderful JEDI coordinator, Justice, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, to accept it. So thank you, Ms. Booth.

Thank you very much. All right.

So thank you, Mayor Ashton and Council Members, for this proclamation recognizing Juneteenth. As a community, we commemorate the end of enslavement in the United States. We honor the resilience, contributions, and enduring legacy of African Americans. May this day inspire us to continue building a community where freedom, opportunity, and belonging are available to all. This is, in fact, our ongoing commitment. I want to invite everyone to join us in celebrating Juneteenth this year on June 20th at Black Rock Center for the Arts. And it's from 1 o'clock to 10 p.m. So there's lots of activities, and we hope to see you all there. Thank you very much.

It is my honor to read the proclamation for Caribbean American Heritage Month, whereas the commemoration of Caribbean American Heritage Month was initiated in 2004 by Ms. Claire Nelson, PhD, and adopted by the U.S. House of Representatives in 2005 to recognize the significance of Caribbean people and their descendants on the history and culture of the United States. And whereas, since the declaration, the White House has issued an annual proclamation recognizing June as Caribbean American Heritage Month. And now, therefore, the Mayor and Council of the City of Rockville, Maryland, do hereby proclaim June 2026 as Caribbean American Heritage Month in the City of Rockville and urge all the residents of our city to honor these cultural and historic bonds and be reminded that America's greatness lies in our diversity. Madam Mayor, I move the proclamation. And I believe we have several recipients of this proclamation.

Greetings, I'm Althea Gray-McKenzie, and it's a pleasure to be here today thanking Mayor Ashton and the city council members, the good people of the city of Rockville, and all of those who made it possible for this day to happen. I want to say I'm here with Jillian D'Souza, and if I've said your name incorrect, please correct me. Thank you. And wanted to share that it's a pleasure to be here for the third time, and we wanted to make sure that we had a representative from the community as well to receive this proclamation. Just to share that I wear many hats, and I'm a chair for the Library Advisory Committee of Aspen Hill Library, as well as being a board member with the library system. This has enabled me and others to help to have I would say 21 expressions of Caribbean culture and heritage alongside summer reading for 11 years. So even though we're about 7%, 6% to 7% of the foreign born in the community, We have done so much to bring extra life and love and energy to all of Montgomery County. I'm a 35-year resident, as well as my families here. My daughter, Ariana, my husband, John, my grandson, Zaire, and I wanted to share that There are so many incredible members of the community who have made their mark. My daughter and I are awardees for the Maryland State Arts Council's Folklife Apprenticeship, and that documentary is coming out soon, as well as being part of, I would say, an invitation to support the Juneteenth events for the last three years for the city of Rockville at the Square. And I believe the Square this year will have in the summer series, our summer concert series on Juneteenth in the evening, our business community as far as black business owners and a wonderful concert, so I hope you come on out. And I did reach out to the, Caribbean Chamber of Commerce so they can share who should also receive this wonderful recognition. And I'd like to say that Jillian has been in the Rockville area for 25 years as the owner and founder of Caribbean Caterers. And she's also a dear friend. So I would like her to come up, say a few words.

Thank you so much Athea and thank you Madam Mayor and the entire council members. It has been my privilege ever since I migrated here to the United States in 1987 to be a Montgomery County resident and I opened my business in 2004, 25 years ago this year in Rockville, Maryland. So I am squarely Rockville, Montgomery County, all for the last 40 years of my life. My grandson is over here taking pictures as well. And I'm also a product of Montgomery County, just graduated from college. It has, having a business here in Montgomery County has been a great pleasure for me. I have friends who have businesses all throughout the country, and yes, Montgomery County has some problems, but it has been a great journey for me as a business owner to have lasted 25 years through 9-11 and the sniper and everything else that has happened in Montgomery County. It has been a great journey and I am proud to be a Rockville business owner. So thank you very much, city of Rockville. Thank you.

I just want to say thank you so much, Jillian. I want to say one more thing. There are actually two other events that are happening. One tomorrow, which is the Caribbean Advisory, American Advisory Group. They have their proclamation ceremony that will happen in the executive office building, which is their lunchroom area, which is the bottom level. Please go at 6 o'clock. I will be there, and I'm hoping that you all enjoy with me all the wonderful food. And Lorianne Sayles, council member for Montgomery County, will have her proclamation on June 9th. So hope to see you. Lots of good food, lots of entertainment, enjoyment, and thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening. Thank you for your patience in tolerating and running a few minutes behind, checking in on family in the hospital. And I'm glad to be here this evening with you all. Again, at some point we're going to do this outside because the weather's too nice. I have the privilege of reading the Pride Month proclamation, and it goes whereas the riots at the Stonewall Inn in Manhattan, New York, in June 1969 are recognized as the beginning of the modern-day LGBTQIA, also known as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, civil rights movement. And now, therefore, the mayor and council of the city of Rockville proclaim June 26, June 20, June 2026 as LGBTQ Pride Month. And I should have begun this. I'll go ahead and move the proclamation and talk about our event this weekend. But with that, Madam Mayor, I move the proclamation. All right. It's my understanding, city manager, correct me if I'm wrong, we have a pride event this Saturday. Sunday, I apologize. Time and date. I'm sorry, the time? Two to six? Two to five in Town Square. So please join us if you're able. And I'm unsure, do we have somebody?

Oh, I'm so sorry.

I saw you walking in the back. Yeah, from the Human Rights Commission. Good evening. Thanks for coming out.

Yeah, so the Human Rights Commission graciously accepts this proclamation in honor of Pride Month. While Pride is celebrated for just one month, it should serve as a reminder to everyone here who identifies as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning that the city of Rockville doesn't merely accept you for who you are. We have been, are, and will continue to be a community that embraces and celebrates you. This proclamation is a testament to the city's commitment that every individual, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity, deserves to live freely, authentically, and without fear. In this past month, we had a community member reach out to the commission after experiencing a hate crime outside of our city limits, just outside of our city limits in North Bethesda. And we were able to help her file a police report and connect her with further resources. Many of those resources are the nonprofit organizations and government agencies we host along Gibbs Street during Rockville Pride while the music is playing in the square and drag story time is happening in the library. As we come together during this joyous celebration, let us reaffirm our dedication to creating a community where love triumphs over hate, where equality prevails over discrimination, and where every person feels safe and welcomed. On behalf of the Human Rights Commission, we extend an invitation to join us, you are correct, on Sunday, June 7th, 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. in Rockville Town Center. And if anyone wants to show up and help us put up decorations beforehand, we still welcome volunteers. It's SSL hour eligible. And, of course, we extend our heartfelt gratitude to the city of Rockville for this proclamation and for its steadfast support of the LGBTQ plus community. And finally, we thank the mayor and council for celebrating with us here today. Thank you so much.

Oh, yes.

Bring it on.

Cool. Wait, can you take a photo of me, please? Yeah, okay. Thank you. Yay. I see Vincent. Take a look.

And before I get to my next proclamation, I would be remiss if I did not note that the founding, the kickoff of the LGBTQ movement was begun at Stonewall by a black trans woman, Marsha P. Johnson, and want to say her name and the importance of her contributions. It is now my privilege to present the proclamation recognizing and honoring the Americans with Disabilities Act, also known as the ADA. At the time that the ADA was signed into law, our country was in a very different place. It was shepherded through by a Democratic senator, signed into law by a Republican president. I hope that one day we can get back to that spirit of cooperation and collaboration. Whereas individuals with disabilities have long faced mistreatment, discrimination, indignities, and exclusion. And whereas the Americans with Disabilities Act, a landmark civil rights law prohibiting discrimination against people with disabilities in employment, transportation, public accommodations, communications, and state and local government programs, was signed into law by President George H.W. Bush on July 26, 1990. Now, therefore, the Mayor and Council of the City of Rockville, Maryland do hereby proclaim July 26, 2026 as the 36th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act and encourage all residents to recognize the importance of this landmark legislation and the ongoing work to advance accessibility, equity, and inclusion for people with disabilities. Madam Mayor, I move the proclamation. And here with us this evening is someone I got to know through our equity work in the Rockville Pedestrian Advocacy Committee, and that is Vincent Szabo. I'm also, I'll take this moment to also note that we will have a ADA accessible and everyone accessible podium shortly, I do hope.

Thank you, Madam Mayor and Council, for allowing me to accept this proclamation. Let me assure you, my remarks will be short. I'm getting a little nervous now. Okay. Well, now I'm going to have to lift the cat out of the bag for those of you who don't know me. I am low vision, but as you can see, I'm quite well functioning. And what I'd like to point out is that many disabilities are unnoticeable. and that is either to take care of them. They're either kept unnoticeable by design or by choice. In the case of by design, it's primarily medical devices which address various disabilities. In my case, I know very well about insulin pumps, and those things have progressed from being half the size of my forearm to something that's small enough to fit in the palm of your hand. Now, by choice is a little different because many disabled people, and I have to admit I was in the group as well, that you don't make mention of your disability for fear of the stigma that will come up. You are either broken or unable, and in the worst case scenarios, people think you are less of a human being. One of the intents of the ADA was to help level the playing field in society for disabled people. And in March 1990, the Capitol Crawl illustrated this dramatically when dozens of disabled people, many movement impaired and their supporters, went to the Capitol got out of their wheelchairs and assistive devices, and literally crawled up the Capitol steps to make the point. That was March 12, 1990. On July 26, the ADA was signed. Now one quick little anecdote just be just about done in 2018 my sister and my niece and her fiance came down for a visit and we went downtown and Did all the usual things monuments but not one of the places we went to was the National Archives and Primarily one of the things that her my nieces fiance wanted to see the copy of the Constitution We when we were at the National Archives we online and the attendant with due diligence, allowed X number of people to go in at a time, and unfortunately, at one point, he stopped me and put the rope across, and that group was there, ready to go, and my sister and niece and her husband were concerned that I was gonna be left behind. But I just waved them on, knowing that, full well, I was going to eventually meet up with them. Two or three minutes later, another, a different attendant came up to the velvet rope, unhooked it, and said, and I was walking with Cain then, and she said, come in, sir, you can walk up the ramp. But I said, well, wait a minute, I'm with those people over there. And she motioned them to join me, and she said, I'll just walk up the ramp and walk right in. That is a good example of the ADA in action. Now, finally, I'd like to thank the city of Rockville and especially the RPAC committee, which I belong to, for the attention that they give to the needs of disabled people.

Thank you.

So here in the city of Rockville, we truly pride ourselves in our park system, not just for what we can provide from the recreation department and all the different events, but the many dozens and dozens of different areas throughout the city that you can partake and you can enjoy with your family as a walk, as a stroll, or participating in the many Rockville events, which is why it's my honor to present the proclamation for Parks and Recreation Month. Whereas the U.S. House of Representatives has designated July as Parks and Recreation Month, as parks and recreation are an integral part of communities throughout this country, including Rockville, Maryland. Now, therefore, the Mayor and Council of Rockville do hereby proclaim July 2026. Is it July or is it June? What? Okay, all right, July of 2026, as Park and Recreation Month, I urge everyone to take full advantage of our beautiful parks and recreation facilities and amenities now and throughout the year. Madam Mayor, I move the proclamation. Thank you, do we have a second? All those in favor, please raise your hand. Aye. And now I believe we have Jack Theroff from the Recreation Park Advisory Board to come here and say a few words.

Thank you, Mayor Ashton and council members. And before addressing Recreation and Parks, just thank you for an amazingly beautiful and meaningful set of proclamations this afternoon that make me feel very lucky to have grown up here. and very glad that this is where we're raising our family to be part of this just incredible community. So thank you for that. Speaking of my children, they were supposed to come up with me to make this a more visibly appealing and interesting set of remarks, but they said no because it's beautiful out and they're at the park and at the Rockville Swim Fitness Center, which I think is appropriate. I also want to say an amazing thank you to the staff for the city of Rockville and the Recreation and Parks Department. There is an incredible amount that goes on in the month of May to run up to hometown holidays to get everything ready for all of the camps and the thousands of kids who will be going through those camps, all the work at the Swim and Fitness Center. I got a little bit too much sun yesterday, timing that swim meet, hundreds of kids, some of the best swimmers in the area, all swimming, and also people who are just learning to swim, all at the Swim and Fitness Center. And as walking home from that event, I saw at Welsh Park, the basketball courts packed with people, the futsal courts packed, the tennis courts and the new pickleball court all being heavily used. It's all to say that there are a lot of things that make Rockville special. Our parks and recreation programs are one place where we can all come together. and play, be healthy from the youngest to the oldest, and really appreciate this recognition and all the work that the city staff do and that our leadership does to make this such a strong system for the city. Thank you.

Thank you to everyone who joined us today. A lot of opportunities to celebrate inclusion, but also to address important issues that are facing our city and our country. And we thank you for being with us in that. And I hope you have felt seen, you've learned something new, and please join the events that we've shared. We're going to take a brief break, and then we'll be back just around.

For no changes to the agenda for this evening.

Thank you very much. We'll now move to the City Manager's Report. Mr. Mihalik.

Mayor Ashton, members of city council, ladies and gentlemen, good evening. I just want to spend most of my time just thanking city staff for all the hard work over the past couple of weeks, dealing with a lot of events and a lot of really strange weather going back and forth. We had the public works equipment show a couple weeks ago Thursday. If you remember, it was in the 90s, but we had a really good turnout, a lot of equipment out there, a lot of really happy employees showing off their equipment. And even happier little children and all the equipment as well. So that was wonderful. 2 days later, it was pouring down rain for the whole weekend long for hometown holidays. But yeah, we had a really great turnout and I appreciate the work of our wreck and parks department. Our police department and our public works department for those folks who brave the weather on Saturday when it was dreary. We actually had a good time. It really did. So. I hope people enjoy that, and it really goes to show that it's rain or shine out there, so we're happy with that. It's going to get hot again, the other side of this pendulum at the end of this week, and thank goodness we have the interactive fountain all set up and ready to go at Town Square, and we also have the Maryville Park splash pad for people to enjoy and to cool off. And as has been mentioned multiple times, I hope people will join us for our Pride event this Sunday, June 7th, again, 2 to 5 p.m. in the Square in Town Center. That's all I have, Mayor. Thank you so much.

Thank you. I just also want to thank staff for all the work they did from the non-profit symposium to the public works event to hometown holidays and the Memorial Day parade and ceremony that we did. Thank you to all of Rockville for joining us. I also want to note... We appreciate staff allowing the Rockville Rotary to place flags that were put for Memorial Day. They did a virtual event due to the rain, but just wanted to honor and appreciate that. Mr. Mihalik, I also know that you talked about the heats coming up. And so we have the summer kickoff event that's this Friday. And I believe folks have to register for that. But we encourage you to come out on Friday. I believe it's around 8 o'clock. So it's an evening event. And members of the mayor and council will be jumping into the pool. So please join us. Thank you for mentioning the other important events that are coming up. We'll now move on to community forums. This is the time for us to listen and to hear the concerns and feedback as well as to share ideas. We will be going through the list of those who have signed up in advance and then if anyone else would like to speak, I will call on you. All persons, please address the mayor and council. Please speak in a civil and courteous manner and be respectful of the members of the audience as well. Each person will be allotted three minutes. There is a time clock in front of you. Please state your name and whether you live in the city of Rockville. Our first participant is Ken Liu. Welcome.

My name is Ken Liu, and I live in Rockville in Hungerford. Good evening, and thank you for the opportunity to speak. We're here tonight as residents of Hungerford in strong support of allowing deer mesh in Rockville. We ask that any new rule not set limitations in your location or setbacks. Both the urban planning staff and the city council have had multiple discussions about solving the deer problem in another way. While we wait for the solution, residents are left to manage the situation the best way we can. The deer problem is not an exaggeration. Deer reproduce in twins, so the population literally multiplies. These animals are no longer wild and hungry for it due to severe overpopulation. Deer walked up to our front door and ate all of our plants the first night we moved in. This weekend, my sister's dog jumped into the road because a buck charged her right off of Flea Street. Deer, right now, they give birth right next to our doors and patios, bringing the risk of tick-borne and other diseases into our yards where our children play, children and pets play. A dehydrated fawn was abandoned in my neighbor's yard and it screamed for hours and hours before animal control shot it. This is happening in backyards, side yards, and front yards. The deer don't discriminate. Our neighborhood is overrun and we need deer fencing everywhere that the deer can access. There's a beautiful, beautiful native plant garden at Dawson Farm Park, tended by many Hungerforders who are Rockville weed warriors, who, as you all know, are champions of citywide restoration efforts. That garden is protected by deer mesh because without it, it wouldn't exist. Importantly, we know to the council that restricting deer fencing to backyards only and requiring a 10-foot setback unfairly punishes neighborhoods like Hungerford. Many of our homes have very little yard to begin with, and if we're required to do a 10-foot setback, we might as well have no fencing at all. A setback rule effectively bans fencing for the people who need it the most. We are passionate about conservation, and we plant in front and side yards out of necessity when backyards are unplantable. Our city actively encourages this. The Rockville Rainscapes program offers rebates of up to $5,000 to residents who install rain gardens or replace lawns with native plants to support our local ecosystems and pollinators. But when we can't protect these plants from the deer, they get eaten to the ground in a single night. This is a waste of taxpayer dollars. We planted a native serviceberry tree that was given to us by the city right up front where we have very nice sun. Every night, deer came and stripped the leaves bare until we put netting on it. We're asking to protect our family's health, protect native plants and native habitats for all, support the mesh, support native plants and pollinators, skip the setback, keep our families healthy while we live alongside the deer. Thank you.

Thank you.

I also have one more if you guys want this for your kids.

Welcome, Leah Larson Rabin. Good evening.

Thank you for having this opportunity for me to speak. My name is Leah Larson Rabin. I am a resident of Rockville. I have lived here since 2014. And I live at 214 Harrison Street. The reason that that's important is because we share a backyard with the Rockville Presbyterian Church. And one of the things that we have treasured about living in Rockville and being a part of this community is that Rockville takes very good care of its marginalized and vulnerable communities. to have a women's shelter right there, to have a nursery school right there, a cooperative nursery school that provides care for children, for families who wouldn't otherwise be able to afford other forms of care, is so critical as part of Rockville's identity. And it's something that we really Sort of feel it speaks so loudly to who Rockville is and these two organizations have been in Rockville Presbyterian Church The the nursery school has been there since 1964 The shelter has been there since the 80s Recently unfortunately and due to economic pressures. We've both been forced out And I say we because I'm a board member of our PCNS and my four-year-old goes there It has been a very, very difficult year for a lot of people. We know that nonprofit organizations are particularly under stress, but it is It's very disappointing that Rainbow Place and RPCNS are being forced out of this space, of this town really, because unless we find a new place for ourselves, there's no place for home insecure women to go. The RPCNS cannot continue to exist. We've been fortunate in the sense that we have found an alternative location. Rainbow Place has not yet found that location. And they are being forced out as we speak. They are moving their stuff out with no options. So I'd like to announce an initiative that our two organizations have joined together to create. It's called Yes in Our Backyard. It's a little bit on the nose because it's technically in our backyard. We need to move away from a lack of ownership of... the community and the diversity that having these types of organizations here require. We are, to that end, holding a fundraiser on June 20th, which is apparently a very popular date, and we welcome the community to join us in supporting the two organizations, but we will also be engaging in other efforts to raise awareness and to provide opportunities

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Welcome, Mark Porgella.

Thank you, Madam Mayor and members of the council. It is still impossible for any neighborhood association to determine what differences there are between the current zoning and the proposed zoning ordinances. This body did not provide its last zoning instructions at the May 18 meeting, so you continue today. What then is the adoption schedule? Still June 29 or now early July? The staff materials state both dates. The final zoning ordinance text will now be released June 15th. This does not allow adequate time for review. Both ZOR hearings were in April. There have been many adjustments since then and asked for comparison materials have not been provided. For MXCD zones in section 25.8.2.2B, there is some new text. We appreciate limitations on vehicular access one in the MXCD zone. Vehicular access to a secondary residential street is prohibited unless determined by the director of public works, chief of inspection service, or fire marshal to be necessary. The CGCA still requests that one sentence be added. Such determinations must be made based on a public standard and in consultation with impacted neighborhoods. If access is needed for stormwater management, utilities, or emergency services, then access can be limited for only those purposes as for Newmark Commons. Better yet, pre-submission meetings should still be required for large projects. This is very useful for Turnbrook Quarter, and for large projects, this can be a time saver. For another request, it is still the CGCA opinion that a purpose statement for zones actually include a purpose. This is found on page 151 of the red line version. For the R90, R75, R60, and R40 zones, please add The purposes of these zones include, one, provide appropriate located areas for residential development that are consistent with the plan of public health and safety, and two, stabilize and protect the essential characteristics of existing residential neighborhoods. And that was taken directly from the current ordinance. This will reinforce policy two on page 23. Three of the 2021 master plan on land use and urban design maintain large areas of residential detached land use while allowing one additional accessory apartment or accessory dwelling unit per residential lot. That's pretty specific. The CGCA requests that a comparison table of permitted uses be put together by city staff at the table explicitly state what differences are required by the state which are at the direction of the mayor and council. The proposed ordinance goes far beyond policy two on page 23 and why is it so hard to determine who is responsible? Thank you very much.

Thank you. Welcome John Butler. Do we have John Butler? Okay. Welcome, Anusha. Thank you, Sarah.

Are you born? Thank you for this opportunity to stand before you. I'd like to do this once a month to come and say thank you. because you guys spend so much time listening and analyzing and studying all the needs in our city, and you work hard to try to make it equitable for everyone. So, someone once said, I have one life and one chance to make it count for something. I'm free to choose that something. My faith demands that I do whatever I can, wherever I can, whenever I can, as long as I can. Does anybody know who said that? So I have taken this opportunity as a city resident. This is my fifth year starting living in the city of Rockville. I used to live on Bower Drive, not quite city. And I've been enjoying all the opportunities I have gotten to volunteer to make a difference in this city, to give back to this country that gave me what I have today. compared to a lot of people who are struggling to find work and pay their bills. And I thank the city and especially Rockwell Town Center Village for the opportunity to host the coffee club, which we have now moved to the Cambria Hotel and I invite all of you to stop by and have a cup of coffee with us. But one of the important things I really want to stress is how grateful I am that this

Thank you.

How grateful I am that this city gives us a place to be ourselves. And you, the mayor, I know you have worked hard to put the Sri Lankan community in focus, the dancing at the Richard Montgomery College and the International Night. And we also got to dance on the square stage, which was a dream of mine that I have been working on for one year. So when dreams come true for immigrants like myself, I think there's a lot of hope for people around us to understand that we are all trying to work towards some means of bringing community together, to bring peace together, to keep our schools safe, to keep our roads safe, to keep our condos safe, et cetera. Thank you.

Welcome, Marty Rice.

When I walked in, somebody handed me a note here. I only wish it was my age. My name is Martin Rees. In August, I will have lived with my wife, Anne, at number nine, Don Mills Court, for 54 years. In December, I'm going to be 92 years old. Neither Ann or I will be here when the first housing unit is built on the former poor farm 10-acre site. But we do have concerns. We've looked over that land for 50 or some odd years. I have a question for you. What do you think are the most important considerations in providing new housing? I think there are two things you should consider as you enact zoning changes. They are the number of housing units, obviously the density, but also the environment in which the occupants and their children will live. If you plan to build 150 housing units on the 10-acre site, then put a 40-foot high limit on the units as designated for the RMD 15 zone. Four-story buildings should be the maximum. Encourage the creation of an environment where all the trees are not cut prior to the construction. Let the occupants' children grow up with their home units in harmony with nature. Maximize green spaces, mature trees, include walking paths, mini tot lots, and playgrounds. I'm told that a 40-foot height limit will still permit a version of the two townhomes and that it exists someplace today. Thank you for your time and any consideration you can give to my plea.

Thank you. Welcome, Julia.

Good evening, Madam Mayor and Council Members. My name is Julia Binder. I live in Newmark Commons. I'm a member of the HOA Board. I want to thank you for your continuing invitations to communicate with you on the matter of rezoning ZOR ID 17. I'm here to revisit the question of why the zoning team is proposing a height cap of 55 feet for the RMD 15 zoning designation, a definition that isn't in the Rockville City Code. Why are the owner of the property and the zoning team proposing to alter the definition for this parcel with a height cap? That's more than 37 percent higher than the 40 foot cap in the code the chart that you were shown a couple of weeks ago comparing the number of dwelling units for RMD 10 15 and 25 at 55 foot height is misleading with this altered height cap Please ask for a revised chart at 40 feet. I RMD 15 allows for townhouses, stacked duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes, and cottage courts to be built well within the 40-foot height cap. These are the favored home types for the missing middle, which is what the city wishes to attract and provide options for. in the 2040 Rockville Comprehensive Plan. Myriad examples for the missing middle housing options can be found on missingmiddlehousing.com and they illustrate that the city code does not need a height cap exception to build such housing in an RMD 15 or RMD 10 zone. But what the developer and the zoning team do need are some imaginative solutions. Imagination is what Edmund Bennett, the developer of Newmark Commons, had. Nearly 60 years ago, Bennett pursued the ideal of affordable, contemporary modern architecture and preserved natural surroundings. He visited communities in Europe, Canada, and the US that integrated respect for nature, embraced the existing terrain, preserved tree canopies and green space, and utilized modern architecture to let in light and create space. This is what I challenge the city administrators, landowners, and developers to do. Stick to the 40-foot height cap that is in the code. Preserve the natural surroundings. Adapt to the terrain. Build on a human scale to integrate nature and architecture in a seamless blend. Provide attractive, affordable housing options that complement instead of clash with the surrounding R-90, R-60, and planned development zones. Thank you very much for your continued support for reconsidering the high-density zoning designation of this parcel. With its wetlands, wildlife, and special place in Rockville history, I very much hope that you'll arrive at a decision that balances the needs and hopes of those of us who already live here with those who wish to. Thank you again for your responsiveness on this matter.

Thank you. Welcome, Pat Reber.

Good evening, and again, thank you for listening to us. My name is Pat Reber. I have owned a home in Rockville since 1985 in Newmark Commons. I'm returning this evening to City Hall. to ask you to reconsider and discuss later this evening the height limit for the RMD 15 zone you are on the way to adopt for parcel ZOR 17. The height limit you have agreed upon is 55 feet. We understand that this would increase the profitability of development on this property. It seems, however, that the price would be paid by the detached homes adjacent to this property in Markwood and Newmark Commons neighborhoods. Buildings at such a height would create a wall that would act as a multiplier of noise and pollution coming from I-270. This woodland at present protects us from the ill effects of both vehicle emissions and the roar of traffic. If you care to come and look again sometime some warm evening in July, You will also see one of Rockville's most remarkable displays of lightning bugs who make use of the dark sky preserve over this woodland. By replacing the woodland with buildings that are 55 feet high, the price would be paid by the health of the neighboring communities. The resulting wall would be more than twice as high as the adjacent detached homes, which average about 25 feet. We are asking you to consider a height limit of 40 feet. This would be in keeping with Rockville's current regulation for the RMD 15 zone. The proposal of 55 feet puts mayor and council in conflict with its own zoning code. This is a problem easily solved by reducing the height to 40 feet. That's logical, isn't it? We have reviewed community input on this issue up to April 22. the last available, we are puzzled to find only a handful of supporters for the original rezoning recommendation, perhaps three or four since September. And only once or twice have we heard oral testimony supportive of dense development. Yet we keep hearing from some of you that there is strong support for dense development on this plot. Where can we find it? And there has been overwhelming testimony from our two communities, including about 700 signatures on a petition. You all know that. Thank you all for having listened to so many of us who have been testifying on the proposed zoning update for this property since last September. We thank you for finding ways to reduce the density and for finding ways to prevent our two communities from becoming a cut-through for traffic. This is our final request that you reconsider the height limit of 55 feet so that it is in accord with Rockville Code and would help prevent a multiplier effect of emissions and sound. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Welcome, Ana Astrid Molina.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. My name is Ana Street Molina, and I have lived in Markwood for over 30 years. I thank you again for listening to our concerns regarding traffic, safety noise, and the historical burial site. We're deeply grateful for your decision to limit the access through Don Mills Court to emergency and pedestrian traffic only, and to totally reject the RMT25 proposal for the SOAR 8070 plot. To responsibly accommodate the city growth, I respectfully urge you again to consider an RMD 10 designation with a 15% MDPU bonus, kept at the strict 40 foot height limit. My neighbors and I are deeply alarmed by the proposed RMD 15 designation carrying a 55 foot height exception. A 55-foot structure will completely tower over our single-family homes, which max out at 25 feet. Councilmember Fulton mentioned that RMD 15 zones in College Garden have worked beautifully. However, those townhouses, again, are under 40 feet. They consist of two floors and a basement. What the city proposed for ID 17 is not the same. It effectively doubles the height of the College Garden townhomes, making it entirely incompatible with the R90 zones. RMD 15 is 333% increase from the density for our current R90 zone. Even if RMD 15 is chosen, the 40-foot height can and must be maintained. We do not need a 55-foot exception to build density in the housing. For example, in the Patrick Terrace neighborhood in Aldi, Virginia, there will be these looking like traditional townhomes, but are exactly three stories high, and they have a multi-level lower ceiling. a three-bedroom unit and a two-bedroom single unit on the top. And they have each their own garage. And I know this because I have friends living there. Furthermore, from my own experience, when I first moved here in 1990, I lived in a single lower unit. I think this could be actually done here. You can have a lower multiple unit and a single unit here, of course, without the cars. But if you really want to make it luxury, you can add a terrace. And I think that will accomplish what you're trying to do. I think this lower single-family home is good not only for young families, but also for people that have mobility issues that I don't think they are being addressed on the conversations that I've heard from you. And there are also other solutions. You have beautiful duplexes, multifamily homes. So I really want to leave this here for you, and I really thank you for your attention.

Thank you very much. Welcome J.D. Kumar. And if you want to leave some pictures there. Perfect. Thank you.

Okay, guess who's back back again? J. D. Here. Televoter, please. Now, Montgomery County, Maryland government, you figure out how many monsters you've created good ones and not so good ones. Thank you. Now, city of Rockville, Maryland government, CRNG council and mayor Ashton. Thank you for this opportunity, this Open Democracy Forum. My name is James Dhruva Kumar, JD Kumar, Democrat candidate for United States Congress, House of Representatives for this Maryland District 8. My website is votejdk.com. I'm EIC explainer-in-chief, not humble on this. Now, I pledge allegiance to the flag of British colonial America, to the flag of the continental USA America, which was a British East India Company EIC-inspired USA India flag. We never quit the Brits, reasons for our immense wealth and emerging as a lone superpower in 1991, which is not just another number. I pledge allegiance to USA America everywhere. I pledge allegiance to rule of law, rule of law. Now, some issues, adult issues here. which is perhaps everyday health issues also for some of you, some of you not so frigid ones perhaps. Recently at a drop-in meeting, I discussed about sex and relationship survey. I requested you coordinate with Montgomery County, Maryland government for a budget for this survey. Please, CRMG, please don't waste your limited budget for this. This should be a county-initiated survey. because Montgomery County, Maryland has been cheating the city of Rockland, Maryland government for decades. Now, you, not you, but exactly whoever you decide to appoint for this study, this sex survey, and this can be amalgamated with JEDI, as these are society and potential discrimination issues. You should start with the political leadership, with Montgomery County, Maryland Council and their executive, Some kind of fetish staying at MCPS and funding MCPS so much. High school, staying there for years, working there. You should ask them public questions, the public, and then do the survey with the public. You should ask them questions like their first intimate relationships, their age when they did this. Did they marry their first partner? If not, why? You all should answer these questions too. Have they ever been physically or mentally abused in a relationship? Do they support LGBTQ plus? Because it is a popular thing to do. You should also pose this question to my home country, little India peoples. I want to know their response here in my home nation, USA. Dr. Drew Pinsky has very good advice on these issues for decades. Again, now vote JDK.com policies. ADA, you had a commemoration today. My mom has ADA issues. I take her everywhere in a transport chair. Now, you have to look into public accommodation in Montgomery County Board of Elections in terms of political canvassing. Political canvassing is not the same as solicitation.

Thank you.

There are no signs anywhere.

Thank you.

No trespass.

That's it. Sorry. Your time has expired. We appreciate your commentary.

Thanks.

Thank you. Welcome, Kathleen Kleinman.

Thank you, my name is Kathleen Kleiman and I am a Rockville resident. I just learned recently that the zoning is writing policy that indicates that food venues cannot have drive-throughs in Rockville. I had noticed early on that there was a shortage of them even before I moved here because I would visit frequently. But to absolutely exclude them, I don't think you understand how they are utilized by people with disabilities heavily. Back when I was a working person, and time was always short because I was raising a family, working 40 to 60 hours a week, and 40% of my time was travel. I would have missed a lot of meals not having access to drive-thrus. And I'm not alone. A lot of people with disabilities who drive tap into that to sustain themselves through the busy week. It takes me about 10 minutes to get into the driver's seat and be ready to pull out of a parking spot. It takes me... about five to seven minutes to get out and hop over to get something to eat. But that's a big chunk of the time that I've allocated just to eat. So drive-throughs become important. If you're a person with a disability trying to do what citizens do in this country, which is work and take care of a family, and you have a busy life, but the drive-throughs are a lifesaver for us. I just wanted to mention it, that that's who's gonna miss it the most. The other thing I'd like to say, it relates to my complaint about some of the driveway aprons. in Rockville, not some of them, most of them actually. One of the residents at Victory Court this week decided to take her power wheelchair to the farmer's market. She thought she was ready for that, because she's only been using a power chair for about a year, and she thought she was ready to go one block And she went early, and I wasn't aware of it, but she told me later. When she got to the driveway, getting close to the market, her chair toppled, of course, and she got dumped on the sidewalk. And you wouldn't know this without me telling you, and she's an 85-year-old woman. It'll be really hard for me to convince her to come back out in the world with this wheelchair. You've got the curb cuts, but the driveway aprons completely make effective the curb cuts. If you can't get through the block. Now, I'm working. I mean, there's certain ones that are arteries getting you to Rockville. Important places I and I think the farmers market is one of those and I'm asking that if we really get into doing these driveways and Not I mean on the on a priority basis and not just wait till we do all the sidewalks in that neighborhood Thank you for your attention Thank you Is there anyone else who would like to speak

Welcome.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. I'm Amanda Boslin, the Marketing and Communications Director at Rockville Economic Development Inc., better known as REDI. I'm here to share an exciting program returning this June, Explore Rockville Global Bites. Global Bites is a month-long celebration of food, culture, and community running from June 1st through 30th. It's built around something that Rockville can be proud of. We're one of the most diverse cities in the nation and home to over 50 global cuisines from Peruvian and Japanese to Jamaican, Korean, and more. The concept is simple. Dine at any Rockville restaurant, excluding national chains. Submit your receipt through the Global Bites form. And for every receipt received, Ready will donate 25% of the value to a local nonprofit chosen by the diner. Visit two or more restaurants, and you're also entered into draw-ins for Visa gift cards. This year, nine local organizations will benefit from the campaign. They are... Friends of the Library Montgomery County, Haiti Brigade Inc, the Mattis Stepanek Peace Foundation, Peerless Rockville Historic Preservation, Rockville Housing Enterprises Foundation, Rockville Bike Hub, Rockville Concert Band, Stepping Stone Shelter, and Twinbrook Elementary PTA. Global Bites also includes a culinary tour for families. Pick up or print a Global Bites dine-in passport, one like this, and I've distributed some to you all as well. Dine at designated Bitesite restaurants across Rockville's neighborhoods and collect Global Bites stickers. Collect four stickers to complete the passport and upload a photo of it and you're entered into a drawing for additional prizes like cooking kits. What makes this campaign special is that it asks nothing extra from anyone. No special menus, no discounts, and no apps to download. Diners simply enjoy the diverse cuisine that Rockville already offers. And by doing so, they drive sales for our local businesses and direct real dollars to community organizations. We'd love everyone, residents, employees, visitors alike to take part. You can learn more and find participating restaurants at explorerockville.org. Thank you and happy dining.

Thank you very much. Is there anyone else who would like to speak? Thank you for everyone who came to participate. We appreciate your queries, your concerns, your ideas, and your events. We will be following up. I know that if you would like to also send us an email for specific questions, please reach out to mayorcouncil at rockvillemd.gov. We'll now move on to our public presentation by the Board of Appeals. I'd like to welcome staff lead, Jim Waslick, who's our zoning manager, and the panelist participants from the Board of Appeals. We have Alan Frankel.

Thank you.

Rory Deitman, Jimmy Hauer. And I also want to recognize Nick Dumai, who serves as the senior assistant city attorney.

Good evening, Madam Mayor, members of the City Council. It's always a pleasure to appear before you. And the first thing I always say is that my family and I love living in Rockville, and I can't see us ever living any place else. I come before you this evening not to talk about zoning. I appeared before previous Boards to deal with that tonight. I'm here in my capacity as the Chair of the Board of Appeals of the City of Rockville, and our responsibilities are to review and act on applications for special exceptions and zoning variances, review and act on appeals from administrative decisions per the zoning ordinance, act on all appeals from administrative decisions that are de novo and shall be considered by the Board in accordance with state law. 2025 has been a pretty quiet year for us. I think part of this has to do with previous amendments made to the zoning ordinance, but we've had three applications for variances from setback requirements on residential properties, These were reviewed and approved. The board received regular updates and a briefing on the zoning ordinance review and comprehensive map amendment during the year. And I think you've heard enough about the zoning ordinance. 2026 goals and objectives. The first one I'm going to, it's not on here, but I'm going to say, maybe you can find us an alternate. You know, there are three of us. There's myself and my co-board members, Roy Deitchman, Jimmy Hauer. And I come every year and say, we are the least diverse board or commission in the city of Rockville. We're three old white guys. Okay, we need an alternate, which makes our life easier, and it would be nice to have some diversity on the Board of Appeals. But in the meantime, our 2026 stated goals are consider all application requests objectively, fairly, and based on the information and evidence presented and or available. allow applicants to present application requests fully and completely, provide maximum opportunities for the public to participate in and to testify at Board proceedings, ensure that all actions on applications are based on required findings and made in a timely manner, and learn about the revised zoning ordinance when adopted to ensure seamless consideration of applications. Now, we don't make the zoning ordinances. That's your job. But our job is to apply them to the situations that appear before us fairly and properly. I also want to thank Jim Waslick, our staff member, and his underlying staff and our Council Nick Dumais who is an invaluable asset to the Board of Appeals and I'll answer any questions if you have any Thank you, this is a special presentation and I appreciate all the work that you're doing our members of the body will be sending any questions to mr. Mahalik Thank you very much. Thank you very much madam mayor. It's always a pleasure to see you and the members of the council.

Thank you very much. I We now have our consent agenda. There are several items on the list. Consent agenda item 9A, approve and authorize the city manager to execute the fiscal year 2027 agreements that extend resident community performing arts organization status to Rockville Little Theater, Rockville Musical Theater, and the Victorian Lyric Opera Company to enable these organizations to provide performances at the F. Scott Fitzgerald Theater and Social Hall and use storage units located at Rockville Civic Center Park. b authorize the city manager to execute the youth and teen swim support agreement with the rmsc parents club to formalize the city's long-standing arrangement to receive support for the city's competitive swim team program c approve and authorize the city manager to execute an agreement with the state of maryland department of natural resources requesting program open space funding in the amount of $153,000 to fund a portion of the renovation of the David Skull Park improvements project. D, authorize the city manager to enter into a memorandum of agreement with the Montgomery County Police Department to assign a sworn member of the Rockville City Police Department to the vice and intelligence units. E, approval of and authorization of the City Manager to execute the Molly Price Dwelling Unit Home Ownership Program Agreement, and approval and authorization of the City Manager to execute the Declaration of Restrictive Covenants for Rockshire project between the Mayor and Council and EYA Development. Those are affordable housing units that will be coming for ownership. F, award and authorize the city manager to execute a contract with TY Lynn International for planning and engineering services for the Turnburg Pedestrian and Bicycle Bridge Study Project responsive to RFP 526 in the amount not to exceed roughly $381,000. And G, the approval of minutes. Colleagues, are there any that you want to pull for discussion? Council Member Valeri. Yes, Madam Mayor. I'd like to pull A and F. Thank you. Colleagues, do we have any others? Is there a motion to approve the others? Council Member Shaw.

Madam Mayor, I move consent agenda item B, C, D, E, and G. D and E, right?

Can you do that again? Yes, please do.

Madam Mayor, I move to approve consent agenda items B, C, D, E, and G. Perfect.

Thank you. Do we have a second? Council Member Larry seconds. All those in favor, please raise your hand and say aye. All right, let's move to questions Thank You madam mayor.

Um, I had a question regarding Consent agenda item a I have absolutely no problem about renewing the It's an annual renewal. No problem with that but was curious about and I I was curious about why Rockville Civic Ballet is not a resco and if this is something that can be looked into and possibly come back.

We'll bring that back, Mayor.

Okay. I appreciate that. Thank you. I also will just note that Young Artists of America has been trying to also become a resco, and I did pass it on to City Manager. I believe the staff is working on that and will come back to us with an update as well. Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you. Do you have another question?

Yes. I do. Thank you. And I think our RESCOs are great. So we just want everybody to have the opportunity. On item F, I am extremely excited to see that this is on consent. I have no problem in supporting it. What I want to note is that my understanding is in the creation of the CIP by the previous mayor and council is that This CIP TC22 is approved for funding through 100% of design. I know staff is working super hard on grants that are going to offset the costs of the CIP all along the way, that we got to do feasibility before we do design. Absolutely makes sense. I believe that, you know, this body is committed to the CIP. We're committed to 100% design. because of the previous decision. So I would note that the CIP page as included in our packet does not reflect this language as of yet. So I would definitely encourage that slight change just to reflect the decision of the previous body.

Mr. Mihalik.

We'll take a look at it. Thank you.

Thank you. With that said, do we have a motion to approve A and F? Council Member Valeri.

Madam Mayor, I move that we approve consent agenda items A and F. Do we have a second?

Council Member Shaw seconds. All those in favor, please raise your hand and say aye. Aye. Excellent. Thank you very much. We'll now move on to the consideration of approval of the proposed 2027 Maryland Municipal League legislative action request. I'd like to welcome Linda Moran.

Good evening, Madam Mayor, members of the council. Thank you for this opportunity tonight. This is the mayor and council will consider 2027 legislative action requests each year. The Maryland municipal league invites its membership to submit up to 3 topics with broad municipal impact to be considered. for its priority program in the upcoming state legislative session staff is recommending three legislative action requests that are based on mayor and council priorities and legislative issues that the mayor and council have advocated for in the past approving the 2027 lars is the first step in the mayor council's discussion of 2027 state priorities. In the early fall, the Mayor and Council will discuss its comprehensive 2027 state legislative priority programs, excuse me, program. Staff recommends that the Mayor and Council discuss and approve the three recommended LARs and authorize staff to submit them to the Maryland Municipal League. Staff will now provide a very brief overview of the three proposed 2027 MML LARs. The first LAR has to do with municipal revenues. and it has two components. The first component is supporting legislation that MML would advocate for based on the findings and recommendations of the task force to modernize county and municipal revenue sources. The second aspect is protecting and preserving municipal highway user revenue and police protection aid from the state. Given there are ongoing very significant state budget shortfalls projected over the next several fiscal years and state law is set to change the highway user revenue distribution to municipalities is going to be reduced from 3.0% to 2.4%. Which says is going to be a 12Million dollar hit ongoing across all municipalities. It's going to be really important to advocate for municipal highway use where revenue as well as the state aid for police protection funding. The second recommended MML legislative action request is exempting municipalities from the family program requirements. Family stands for Family Leave and Medical Insurance Program. This LAR would entail Rockville partnering with MML and member jurisdictions to get an exemption from the state requirements to be put on local governments. While Rockville supports the overall concept of expanded family and medical leave, The program as it is structured currently places significant financial and operational burdens on local governments. Municipalities statewide have expressed concern about the administrative complexity of implementing the family program alongside with existing local policies, the duplication of benefits for jurisdiction that are already offering comprehensive benefit programs, the compressed time frame, and the challenges of maintaining essential core public services when there are extended leave absences. So this LAR would request exemption, at least from the requirements, or a more workable local solution that would better align with municipal budgets and operational capacity. The third proposed MML, LAR, relates to aligning Board of Educational Facilities master planning with municipal growth and planning data. So this is also a continuation of the Mayor and Council's advocacy from the 2026 session. The Mayor and Council supported SB 31, which was sponsored by Senator Lamb. It was entitled School Construction and Housing, School Zones and Adequate Public Facilities Ordinances. Senator Kagan put forward an amendment to this legislation. So while this legislation primarily impacted counties, the amendment would have required boards of education to consult with all municipalities in the county with planning and zoning authority to make sure that they include municipal planning data in their growth enrollment projections and their future facility planning. During the Mayor and Council's advocacy in support of keeping Wooten High School at the Wooten campus, the Mayor and Council expressed significant concern that it was established and confirmed by MCPS staff that they only include approved site plan data in their enrollment projections and don't include approved planning documents. The City of Rockville requested that when determining enrollment projections that the Board of Education incorporate growth reflected in all approved development and adopted planning documents to ensure that MCPS aligns its facility planning decisions with Rockville's long-range planning efforts. So continued advocacy for this MML LAR is important to protect residents and communities from school facility planning decisions that could negatively impact communities. And given that 108 municipalities across the state have planning and zoning authority, we believe that this MML LAR could garner significant attention, excuse me, attention from MML. So in closing, staff would like to reiterate that we're asking you to discuss and approve the three proposed MML LARs and to authorize staff to submit them to MML. Staff and the city state lobbyist, Christine Krohn, are available to answer any questions that the mayor and council may have. We are looking forward to your conversation. And with that, I will turn it back over to you, Madam Mayor. Thank you.

Thank you, I want to thank you for the excellent presentation, uh, and the background research that you've done. Can you just also remind us the deadline to submit? I know that we are doing these activities now, and then you'll submit them to Maryland Municipal League, and then they review all the municipal submissions and determine what they're going to advocate for statewide.

Yes, thank you, Madam Mayor. So we have until July 1st to get Mayor and Council approval, and they actually asked that forms be forwarded by May 31st. So staff forwarded draft forms with these three proposed LARs, but giving MML staff a heads up that this was not scheduled until today, and that we would inform them based on the Mayor and Council's decision this evening.

That is excellent. Thank you so much. I appreciate that background information. I do appreciate all the three. I know that there was something that got passed for municipal revenues, and I appreciate this will be follow-up so that after the study is done that there will be some actionable work to make sure that municipalities are getting their fair share. HUR is something we've always discussed and have advocated for. and this entire body worked very hard to try to make sure that our data was represented and I want to thank my colleagues collectively for that. We saw some challenges in that experience this past year and some concerns about understanding our growth and how that will have an impact on our schools. So thank you for that. I did want to just clarify on the family piece. The city of Rockville, one of the few municipalities that actually has a parental leave program and we're very proud of that because we support families. This is about giving municipalities also sort of credit for what we're doing. I just want to make sure it's clear that we do support family leave. We have generous programs here compared to what is in other places. But it's not recognized at all in the state's current framework. and where in the state's current framework, which I think is an excellent step to try to make sure that parental leave and time to care for relatives and giving people the opportunity to make sure they have that. They didn't contemplate municipalities having such robust programs and we don't require employees to pay into it. It is a pure leave program. So this is really about clarifying what Rockville does and saying that we are providing a better benefit in terms of giving someone leave and not making them have to pay for it. And with the current legislation, the employee has to pay generally and the municipality has to pay. So I think we're just trying to remind that there's not uniformity across the state and how can we encourage and support municipalities to do things like give the employees the adequate leave versus making them pay for it. So I just wanted to clarify that comment. Dr. Miles.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Apologies for stepping away. That was the only of the legislative action requests that I did have concern more about the optics of it, and I think you addressed it. I don't know if there's a better way to phrase it because, again, at first glance, it looks as though we may be against the family program, but how to make that threat that needle in a way that shows the work that we are doing while being mindful of the constraints that it could place. That's all.

Thank you. Council Member Fulton.

No, I'll just add to that. When you were giving the presentation, you actually added language that I thought was helpful that I can't remember at this point in time. It was like exempt municipalities or find an option that recognizes municipality distinctions. I just feel like that that kind of terminology might be helpful. You said it, but it's just not written there. Thanks.

Thank you. Council Member Valeri.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I agree with Council Member Fulton. And I can't recall exactly what that verbiage was, but I think it also referred to the EPIP alternative. So I think giving that context, because I don't think we're trying to opt out of supporting people. I do want to put this forward to my colleagues up here. maybe an additional step in the number three. Maybe we can, if this is viable, maybe we can rebrand it as something akin to municipal school alignment. Because I think this goes beyond planning data. Planning data absolutely is critical. We do know that there's the, you know, for instance, Twinbrook Quarter, one part, the initial phase is not actually zoned for high school in Rockville proper but then subsequent are and are currently the boundary for Richard Montgomery so I think it makes sense to include those numbers but what I want to I'd really like to explore state legislation that would authorize municipalities to enter into agreements, MOUs with the counties to ensure that there is a guaranteed percentage of school impact taxes generated in a municipality are actually used within the municipality. So if we're generating and we're doing the right things here, we are increasing our economic development activity and housing, And then some of us are in a position where we are literally having to beg for the barest minimum, which occurred in this last year. It's getting extremely frustrating. And I can't imagine that we are the only municipality, I know that we aren't, dealing with maybe a disconnect between housing generation in a municipality versus housing generation in the county. So I'd like to see what is actually possible. I believe, and Madam Mayor and I were kind of talking lightly on this, it would require state legislation to be able to do that. But again, I think there is being part of the community and then there is having to beg for what we are doing the right things here in the city. So that's kind of where I am coming at it from and I'd love to hear from my colleagues on this and see if that's something that we can expand and include in our LAR.

Is that something that we can explore? And I think on that last piece, I have heard when people say they pay impact taxes, but then the work doesn't happen anywhere near where the impact is. And so it's just a follow-up question on that to see if that can be

Yeah, I mean, this first time we heard about it was just now, so we want to research out a little bit. I like the concept of it. If we put in the money, the money should come back to the city, if you will. But I'd like to understand more of where exactly those dollars go and what are the rules in place right now before we put it into an LAR. But I like the concept.

Excellent. Thank you. I did want to go back to for the family. I think it's part of the first sentence. I could say Rockville has a leave program that is a bit more generous and actually provides leave without requiring the employees to pay into the system. And that's something we started last term, and I've heard a lot of people taking advantage of it. So I think start with the positive on what we're doing so that we can educate, because they may not know what's happening in all the municipalities. I think that would be very helpful in terms of reframing, and I appreciate the comments of my colleagues on this. I am interested in the question that Council Member Valeri also mentioned, so I did say that. And then I do have a few other questions for LAR on topics. I'd love to continue to support The algorithmic pricing that this entire body has been trying to do at the local level on statewide, I think there are some other bills that we've been gaining traction on and have been advocating on, but we haven't been able to see that cross houses in the same way and get the same support. So I just wanted to raise that issue. I know that Julie Polakovich Carr is also working on some legislation that would allow bicycles to to cross on pedestrian signals. It sounds very simple, but could improve experiences. Something that I heard at our nonprofit symposium, there is current state law that has some tax credit for nonprofits, but it's not working fully as intended, according to several of the nonprofits who reached out and shared their feedback. they're seeing insurance rates, health insurance go up 27%. And we really need nonprofits at this time more than ever as we're expanding the network. So I just wanted to flag, even if it doesn't make it to NML, but maybe that could be one of our priorities to D17, that we look at that. I know we have limited NML opportunities, I think it's three or so. So I wanted to raise that for this ongoing legislative action request. And then the last two, the senior tax credit that we've been advocating for, as well as initiatives that will help to reduce utility costs for our residents and small businesses. One of those is Balcony Solar. It's been tried in other states. It's succeeding in some and not yet in others, but I just wanted to re-raise that. those issues as potential legislative action requests. And I know that this builds on things that we've done previously and there are others that you would probably pull in, but I wanted to at least say some of those new ones.

Thank you. Yes, staff can bring those forward for the mayor and council's comprehensive state legislative priorities discussion in the fall. I think that would be a great time for the body to consider these.

I do have a question about that, Tommy, and I really appreciate you sharing the fall. What we've been hearing from D17 is that they're actually working on LARs over the summer. Whatever reason, they're having to introduce bills day one and have pre-filing So I just wanted to potentially raise that for getting some of our homework done so that we can get those circulated among D17 and maybe get some bills moving forward. Thank you. Council Member Jackson.

Thank you, Mayor. So I think basically everybody has said... that I'm in agreement with I do want to pull on the thread though of the additional things that you're discussing I was there when the person from the nonprofit was talking about health insurance going up and I thought it was really interesting it's directly related or at least partially related to the layoffs in the federal government because obviously it if they have a spouse or children, then they need to get coverage, and they're working for a non-profit, then they get coverage there, and then they have the costs of the... The program for the nonprofit goes up so I mean it's a double whammy and it's a it's unfortunate because obviously nonprofits don't run a big big operation So I think that that is something that should be explored I'm really I don't really have a problem with with any of it. That's discussed I'm in agreement a little bit with the city manager on item number three. It seems like a topic that came out, it was discussed tonight. And so I would want to know more about that additional language. But yes, I'm comfortable with what's proposed.

Thank you. Council Member Shah.

I also strongly agree with all of the requests proposed. One thing to explore, perhaps, is that recognizing that Rockville does have collective bargaining rights and a number of municipalities don't, And I know that a bill passed in Virginia and some other places. And so it could be an understanding how important it is to have employees to have a voice. I think it's incredibly important for us to explore collective bargaining rights on the state level. Thank you. Thank you.

Councilman Van Graak.

Thank you. Yeah, I think this list is excellent. But kind of following up similarly to what Council Member Valeria was talking about, in that third area where we're talking about municipal data, it's no surprise that every one of the mayor and council have signed letters with regard to what we saw happen in Wooten. And I think the issue is not just about what we have here. The amendment to SB 31 is important because we talked about data. But there's also the issue of what is being considered, the money that's out there. Because as Council Member Valeri said, there's issues of money. There was also a bill that actually did get through with regard to the state providing money to charter schools. Charter schools that essentially that money that could be going to public school assistants is essentially now has a priority lane to charter schools. So there's a lot of different things that are happening at the state level that are affecting what's happening with our county schools, not the least of which is, and I agree fully here, this issue of municipal data being excluded. The amount of times that members of this body kind of went before the school board and said, where's the missing data? And they said, well, It's kind of within our purview. So, this is definitely a great focus, but I think there's also a broader issue of what's actually happening to our schools from a state level and how we can usher towards it. But I really appreciate the list that you provided. Excellent job. Thank you.

Thank you, and I'll just put an exclamation point underscore support on the comments about school data. The city of Rockville noticed that in the planning considerations for Richard Montgomery High School, as well as for Wooten, that it was, and there are residents who also go to Gaithersburg High School, those sections did not mention our comprehensive plan and our Rockville Town Center master plan. I know I raised it multiple times, my colleagues did, we wrote a joint letter, more than one, and I haven't seen it updated in the cluster considerations. And that's really hard because other sections throughout the county recognize those planning documents that show what is the intent of a community and how do we plan for and considering our schools, and then that's missing. So I do know that there were very extensive conversations at the Board of Education. I'm not discounting any of those, but those two were simple things that could have been added at the very least that were missed. So I just wanted to provide some background on that. And then just to, I know my colleague, Council Member Jackson mentioned also the health tax credit for nonprofits. I wanted to clarify so that there's some direction here, or not direction, but a background. The current tax credit only qualifies, it's only eligible if you have a nonprofit with less than 25 full-time employees. And so nonprofits like Interfaith Works or MANA or Community Reach, many that are providing integrated basic needs for our community are not able to qualify. And it's causing a challenge while people, they need to be providing support for our community even more given federal layoffs and a number of funding challenges that are happening to core programs that locally they're helping us, local government, county government, to provide social safety net. Council Member O'Leary.

Maybe a possible friendly amendment, and in theory should be a relatively easy ask, is having worked at nonprofits my entire career, often it's not the number of employees, but it's the actual budget of the given nonprofit that's the consideration so that it actually has, and especially for health insurance costs, right? Like that makes, to me, that makes much more sense than, you know, counting the number of employees. I think you should go based on the budget for a given nonprofit. So maybe that's another like clear cut angle that in theory could be easier to, to address it.

Thank you. I would like to pause and see what else do you need from us in terms of feedback for this as well as for the future LAR for D17?

Thank you, Madam Mayor and council members. I thank you very much. I think the council and the mayor gave excellent direction. It sounds like the three requests are approved. We can, staff will tweak the family item to show all that the city is doing already and that we, you know, we do support what the state wants to do. We're just looking for a little bit of flexibility. And then the mayor and council gave some great ideas, I think in clear direction on additional items.

And if we can't muscle these all into the LAR, then we'll absolutely consider it if we're recommending their legislative priorities later on this year.

Thank you. Appreciate it. Okay. Thank you, Ms. Moran. We appreciate it. We'll now move on to agenda item 12A, which is work session number four. And I'll say work session number four for this Mayor and Council. It has appeared before the Planning Commission several times as well. We're talking about zoning text amendment application TXT 202600271 for the zoning ordinance rewrite and map amendment application map 202600126 for the comprehensive map amendment Mayor and Council of Rockville applicants Articles 9-13, Nonconformities, Signs, Historic Preservation, and Platts and Subdivision. Welcome, Holly Simmons, Deputy Zoning Manager for Community Planning and Development Services, as well as Jim Wasilek, Chief of Zoning. And I understand that you have backup support with Evan Johnson, who leads the department, and Nick Dumai, who is supporting as Senior Assistant City Attorney.

Thank you so much. Good evening, Madam Mayor, members of the council. For the record, I am Holly Simmons, Deputy Zoning Manager in Community Planning and Development Services. And as noted, we are here before you this evening for our fourth and final scheduled work session of the mayor and council's portion of the adoption process for the zoning ordinance rewrite and comprehensive map amendment. During this work session, we are planning to provide a couple of follow-ups on items that the Mayor and Council has discussed previously. One is the continued conversation of a Planning Commission recommendation, and the second is additional information requested by the body at their last work session. We also, as noted, will be going over the key changes from the old ordinance to the new staff draft for articles 9 through 13. As you'll recall, any of the red text are items that the mayor and council have provided direction to staff on previously. Black text are things that you've potentially seen previously, but no specific direction was provided. And then we will also go over next steps. So you've seen this many times before, our adoption timeline, high level. Again, we are here at our last planned work session on June 1st. We are headed toward adoption on June 29th. And diving just briefly into a little bit more specific level of detail, we also are intending to release our final staff draft of the zoning ordinance and map on the 15th, following this work session, prior to the adoption date on the 29th. So first we are going to address follow up from the mayor and council discussion. These items we are going to pause after both slides and seek direction from the body. You'll recall from prior work sessions that with the slides that pertain to the key changes, we'll go through those and then at the end have time for questions. So first up, we have electronic message centers. You'll recall that we addressed these back on April 13th when you heard the Planning Commission's recommendations. At that time, the body asked for regulations that would allow these electronic message centers, these digital display signs within the city, balancing support for small business and quality of life. So we did go ahead and review best practices here and are proposing a number of standards that would allow electronic message centers within the city of Rockville. So first off, we are proposing that they be limited to freestanding signs in our industrial and mixed-use zones, except for the least intense mixed-use zones, the MXC and the MXT. This is consistent with our other changeable copy signs, which we do permit kind of marquee signs within the city of Rockville. And those are requirements that apply. We are also proposing that the images change every 30 seconds maximum. It be an entire sign change. It wouldn't pixelate in and out. And if the sign is malfunctioning, it would be required to go dark or to freeze. And when it comes to brightness, we are proposing that they be set to a maximum 0.3 foot candles above ambient light. And in order to understand what ambient light is, they must have light sensing devices. And this is based on best practices and recommendations of the International Sign Association. So with that, I will turn it back to you all for discussion and direction.

Thank you. Dr. Miles.

Nothing on this particular topic.

Thank you. I don't have anything on this either.

Thanks It just struck me as I was sitting here that we have some already existing in residential areas and those are MCPS electronic message centers so and I it hit me because I One is malfunctioning that I just went by. And it was not dark or freezing. And so I think there will be a challenge there. I don't know what the brightness is because I don't have one of those cool machines. But I guess this would be. clearly we're not gonna grandfather in, but if we ever get to the point where a school has a new electronic message center go in, would it be, would it fall under the existing rules because Again, that a lot of those are in residential. So I'm a little gotcha. Thank you. I was just trying to figure that out. Because I know that we were all thinking, you know, like snow crab legs and stuff like that. But I was thinking more like, you know, field days and stuff like that. That would be my only concern.

Just one thing to keep in mind about the schools and Montgomery College that have these types of electronic message centers, that they're not subject to our zoning code, and so we can certainly work with them if there would be some issue with their signs and let them be aware of that, but otherwise we can't really regulate them through zoning.

No, and that makes sense. Thank you so much. I knew that, you know, we all work together. We collaborate, but thank you, and thank you for the changes and the research on this as well.

Thank you, I appreciate that you put some level of timing because I have seen some signs that are blinking quickly and have disturbed residents who it causes a health challenge for. So I think you guys were very thoughtful and how do we allow something but also think about not causing challenges for other people. And then just also to clarify, these are in industrial and mixed use zones. So this is not necessarily appearing like flashing in someone's home window. Or could it?

So the flashing is something that we would not be permitted with these regulations. I think if we had an instance where something were malfunctioning, it's on private property, then potentially we're looking at a zoning violation or just coordination with the property owner. When it comes to flashing or being visible from

individual residences it's going to depend on you know what's adjacent to or confronting those mixed use or industrial zones and this that you feel like the parameters are um helpful enough to allow businesses to do the advertisement but also won't turn 35 into times square that's the goal okay thank you councilmember jackson

Thank you. I really appreciate the thoughtfulness that you put into this, and I think it looks great. No questions.

Thank you. Council Member Shaw.

I agree with my colleagues. No questions. Council Member Van Grag.

This is exactly what we asked for. This is perfect because we specifically said we want to go a little bit more. We don't want to disturb neighborhoods. We want to have something that actually addresses the flashing, addresses the light ambient. And I think, you know, when I was going through it, it's almost exactly, and I looked at some other jurisdictions, they have almost these exact parameters in some of the similar sized cities. So just kudos to staff for kind of listening and putting something together that was on point.

Thank you. And I know that we're going to get into signs later, correct? I know that is when we'll get to the Article 6. Yes, that is correct. But you want to cover some of the broader issues first. Thank you.

Next up, and this is the second and final item of follow-up from the prior Mayor and Council discussion, we did want to provide additional information on ADA parking where no minimums apply. As you will recall, our draft does include provisions that would eliminate minimum parking requirements within a half-mile of Metro and a quarter-mile of Bus Rapid Transit. This is consistent with the policy recommendations in the Town Center Master Plan and also with the policy in Montgomery County. So we did receive some questions regarding ADA parking in these instances at our last work session. And staff is recommending that there simply be no parking requirements in these areas. This is consistent with the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Maryland Accessibility Code requirements. Those requirements are based on the number of parking spaces required. So because of that, it is structured to provide flexibility in cases where no parking is provided. We also anticipate that in many instances, as you heard throughout the Town Center Master Plan process, the market will still demand parking. And where there is parking provided, generally ADA accessible spaces are also provided. We also understand that eliminating curb cuts, this would reduce the need for curb cuts, which also can increase the ability for on-street parking to be provided. And finally, it increases accessibility by reducing the land dedicated to vehicular parking. So if you have less parking spaces, it's easier for folks who walk, roll, use transit to access the entrances to buildings as well. Thank you. Council Member Fulton.

I was, continue to be, and I am good with this no parking requirements for all the reasons previously discussed and the ones you just gave us. So thanks. Thank you. Council Member Valeri.

Thank you. And thank you for all this additional information. I'm always still a little... not perplexed, I'm challenged by the inclusion of bus rapid transit only because I think a lot of it will shift on 355. Like we'll know, you know, we know what the for the most part right now, right? Like we'll know where the stops are there. And I guess, you know, I guess as long as we stay on top of how that evolves over time, because I think that this part of, you know, the parking requirements as a whole may shift. So I just always like to put a pin in that, that we know bus rapid transit's coming. The stations may adjust, you know, over time. And as long as we kind of keep up with that, then I'm absolutely, I'm great with this. So thank you.

Thank you, we have a brt update coming but i'm assuming that staff also has checked and cross check to see what has moved proactively and because I know we're approving the zoning ordinance you're right in advance, so you will adjust as the brt adjust. Is that correct.

Yes, absolutely. And the way that the language is structured is the same as what the county has, and it does account for flexibility there.

Okay, thank you. I was curious about, so I think this is not a discussion broadly about parking mems at all. I think it's really about the ADA piece. And so I was just curious. I've lived in cities where the market demands it, but they don't get it. And so I was just curious for people who are in – Walkers etc, how do we, how do we deal with this will the city will the city be reevaluating it's in a maybe increasing Ada parking if there's a demand or a need for it. I think that we have to think about people, we have seen more people in our Community aging in place. And walkers and people with disabilities and being able to have things closer to where they live it's it's harder for them to navigate people with I was talking to another resident with a disability who has vision impairment and at night is hard to come from a farther location to get to the building so I just was curious as to what we might do as a city to contemplate needs and make adjustments.

I think those are excellent points and really get to kind of a broader conversation about how the ordinance itself functions. We are headed toward adoption, but this is a living document. So if there are changes that need to be made, if there are fixes, which we do anticipate, I know you all have seen this in the staff reports for probably every single one of these work sessions, that Our intention is to adjust as we go to be tracking any issues that come up with the ordinance. So if there are things that need to be adjusted, considerations that happen in the first six months to a year, we are certainly anticipating being able to address those through future zoning tax amendments.

And would the city have a protocol of analyzing on-street parking to think about placing the ADA parking closer to the residents if they don't have parking?

That is not something that we have previously discussed, but I think it's a point well taken, and we certainly can take it into consideration.

Okay. I remain concerned about how we're thinking about people with disabilities and people who are aging and pregnant and expecting mothers. I've had high-risk pregnancies and had limitations with bed arrest and things, so I think about all the needs of our most vulnerable residents, and this is one that still gives me pause in terms of, are we thinking around creatively even what the city can do? So I remain concerned. Council Member Jackson.

Thank you, Mayor. I really like this discussion, and the Mayor and my colleagues have raised some excellent points, and you've been really thoughtful in answering the question. I would just encourage city staff to think practice proactively um when it comes to you know disabilities aging in place i mean i think you've heard loud and clear from this body that this is an area that we're really we're focused on and we want staff to really kind of get ahead of the the issue so thank you i really don't have any questions i think this has been a good discussion but i just encourage you to like think about down the road what is needed and when, and don't just say, yeah, we're gonna monitor the situation and we'll take into account ADA when it comes up, because it's gonna come up. So just work at it in your plans ahead of time.

Council Member Shaw.

I also want to thank staff for proposing this. I mean, I agree with reviewing this and monitoring this. I just want to keep in mind that particularly around the area of town center, there is a higher number of people with disabilities in town center and some other places closer to the metro. And just to keep in mind some of those equity concerns while you're monitoring this. And I would... and just to bring up issues as they come along. Thank you. Council Member Van Greck.

I want to thank you for this because when we were doing the Town Center Master Plan, we specifically were saying we were doing this at Town Center with the idea of pushing this everywhere kind of around the city because it should be mirroring what we're doing. And I really appreciate you adding to that and ensuring that we're going to have that same consistency around the bus rapid transit and the centers that we're doing. Again, we want to be encouraging the development and the use around these transit centers. So really appreciate staff going to and listening to what we were talking about with regard to how we're going to be developing around the centers. So thank you.

Thank you, Dr. Miles.

I have no additions to what's been discussed. Thank you for bringing this.

Thank you. Council Member Fulton, you have an addition? I do. So given my colleague's conversation, I feel compelled to say I also am concerned about people with disabilities. Feels like I had to say that. But I listened to you and the research and weighed all of our disparate goals and heard that the impact here, we don't expect to be good based on the research that's been done to be bad based on the research we've done everywhere else. And I think you have been proactive in looking through all of this. And of course, we will monitor. But I have a lot of concerns about a lot of things. We have to make decisions. So that's where I landed on this one. I remain concerned about people with disabilities.

Thank you. But I think what you've heard from some of us is that we appreciate the work on this, but perhaps we can look at our policies if we see that there is not parking being developed for people with disabilities And there's a challenge that we would even just as simple as we look at where we're placing Those parking spots on right-of-way just to consider how we evolve with this potential policy change We heard council loud and clear.

I think it is evolving We'll try to stay ahead of it. And if we think there needs to be a correction, we won't hesitate to bring it back to council Thank You councillor Valeri

I had a thought, and it kind of struck me sitting here. So we're having this discussion, but we also know that the amount of housing that is actually truly accessible is very limited. And we know that those kind of buildings, accessible, wider doorways, et cetera, are, again, minimal. And that's really the individuals that are looking for those kind of parking spaces are also gonna be looking for that kind of housing as well. So I think it's a little, it's a tough situation. I don't think any of this is really easy to kind of figure through. I will also note as well that we are talking about specifically ADA parking. I will note, and I hope this changes at some point, but for individuals, and I know Ms. Kleinman was here, her and I have talked about this a lot, there's actually less and less people with adapted vehicles, especially if you are a power chair user because it's extremely expensive it is prohibitively expensive so these things may shift over time and again I am really just talking about individuals power chair users almost exclusively but I agree I think everybody up here is extremely concerned and wants to go even, you know, do better than the ADA, which is, as I've always said, the starting point, not the ending point. But again, I think over time, culturally, we're going to see shifting patterns, especially with automobile use. And all of this that we're talking about is the future. And I'm probably going to say that like five times tonight, but These things are not going to happen overnight. We're not going to see development in a certain zone overnight. And some of us may never see it, even if we change the zone. I think we have to think about, you know, the original plan was the Rockville 2040 plan. And I think that we have to still keep that in mind that we're, We're building on assumptions that are current as of right now, and we don't know necessarily how things will shift over time. So it's tough. But I just wanted to note that particular fact. Thank you.

Thank you.

Back to you. Thank you so much. With that, I will turn it over to my colleague, Mr. Wozolak, to go over Articles 9 and 10.

Thank you, Ms. Simmons. And just to remind the Mayor and Council, we are going to present Articles 9 through 13 in total, and then come back for questions at the end of the presentation. So Article 9 deals with nonconformities, and there are two types of nonconformities. One is nonconforming uses, and those are uses that may have been legal at some point in time, and with adoption of subsequent zoning ordinances became not legal or became not permitted, I would say, in that particular zone. The other type of nonconformity is development standards nonconformities, which similar concept, although it relates to the development standards associated with property, such as parking requirements or setbacks, things like that, which affect the site design. So, those things can also become nonconforming as new zoning ordinances are adopted. As you can see, the Mayor and Council, you gave us a significant amount of direction on non-conforming uses. We'll say that the provisions in the ZOR are more flexible, specifically for non-conforming uses. It allows for up to a 20 percent expansion of non-conforming uses, which the current code does not permit. And it's still subject to a non-conforming use expansion approval. which is stipulated in the code. It allows certain site improvements to be approved through the standard process rather than going through a separate non-conforming approval process and allows sites to bring the non-conforming use into greater conformity with the code. It allows for site improvements for maintenance, safety, and ADA compliance, and also to improve facades, increase stormwater management, and provide for pedestrian and bike facilities. So there's a significant amount of flexibility built into upgrading non-conforming uses. The ZOR also allows non-conforming uses and structures to be replaced or repaired in kind in the event of a fire, flood, or other natural disaster or emergency. In other words, some calamity that is not caused by the property owner taking an action that he or she had no control over. That allows those types of facilities to be reconstructed as they existed prior to the destruction. I'll move on to Article 10, and that deals with signs. And the Mayor and Council probably has seen most of these regulations regarding signs.

Can I just ask a question? Do you want us to weigh in on the non-conforming uses now?

We were intending to move all the way through 9 through 13, and then we can come back to whatever we need to. Perfect.

Thank you.

I will note that the sign ordinance actually was rewritten significantly in 2019. And this kind of iteration really focuses more on reorganizing the article for ease of use beyond what was done previously. It exempts certain signs, including directional signs and those regulated by Chapter 21. which is the city's road code. It further ensures that regulations are content neutral. That was one of the driving forces for the prior rewriting of the sign ordinance. And so we have, again, pushed for that given subsequent decisions. And For example, we have collapsed real estate, temporary noncommercial signs, and yard sale signs, not as separate categories, but collapsed them all into temporary freestanding sign category. We've also introduced new sign types and associated regulations. So A-frames are now legal in the city. for commercial businesses. Window signs will also be regulated, something that we have not done in the past. And we are also permitting building-mounted banner signs to exist longer than just, say, a grand opening sign that we have. So it allows for more flexibility for businesses to get their message out in a variety of ways. And we also allow for up to three temporary freestanding signs per residential lot without a permit, probably seeing a number of those at the current time. We did provide some clarification on what signs are prohibited, specifically signs that move or give the illusion of movement. Again, similar to the electronic message signs, we don't want signs that are roadside signs to be distraction to drivers and walkers and others that may be utilizing the public right-of-way. Signs such as feather flags that draw attention are illegal under the ZOR. We've also increased the permitted sign area of signs, specifically for the industrial zone and also the mixed-use zone. What we found is across the MX zones, they really weren't consistent in terms of the amount of sign area that was permitted. And so, we have done that through the more intense MX zones. We still have a couple of zones like MXC and MXT that are within residential neighborhoods, and those have limited sign area. but the areas where we're seeing a significant amount of non-residential development, we've provided for additional and consistent sign area across our zones. We've allowed for an expansion on the scope of repairs for non-conforming signs. I will say we don't have many of those, even though we've written our sign code a number of times. Signs seem to be something that our businesses like to keep updated, and there actually are very few in the city that we found when we wrote the code in 2019. We've eliminated the requirement for sign plans and optional sign packages in the code. This was something that the city had had in place for sites that have multiple businesses and that the signage is consistent across those businesses. You will may notice in shopping centers that all the text is the same color and the same font and all of that. which I think addressed maybe an issue the city had in the past, but we have opted for more flexibility to allow for additional colors, for logos that may have a certain color or certain design, and so those are not specified. necessarily by the city. Certainly landlords have the ability to enforce their sign regulations as part of their leasing, but the city would really look at the sign area and where signs can be located as opposed to regulating the color and font and et cetera of signs. Optional sign packages, we've only had one, and that was for the Trenbrook Quarter development. They put together the package prior to or just after the Project plan approval, it's been amended a number of times because sign demands just keep evolving. So we didn't see the utility in keeping the optional sign package necessarily in place. I will say all of this has been replaced with a requirement for sign plans for properties that from this point forward would require more than one sign. So Subsequent to site plan, an applicant would just be able to tell us where they intend to place the signs on their building and on their site, but not get into specifying, again, the color and the font and all of the types of signs that they might propose. And lastly, the ZOR does revise and update the required approval findings for assigned variants. Sign variance has been fairly rare since we wrote the code. Those are granted by the chief of zoning. And as the current holder of that position, I can tell you that I'm very appreciative of the simplified findings. The findings that we have now are not particularly relevant. And I think we've really done a good job in addressing that. And with that, I am going to... show you some examples of signs as what I've been talking about as it might be implemented on buildings and on sites. So, we've got a freestanding sign in the upper left on a residential property. and that is a temporary freestanding sign. We have building signs on the right graphic that shows you where those building signs can be located. And then in the lower left, we have freestanding signs on mixed use properties essentially. Those are some call the monument signs, but those are the signs that are anchored on the ground as opposed to being mounted on a building. And with that, I'm gonna pass it over to Ms. Simmons to discuss historic preservation.

Thank you, Mr. Wasilek. So next up is historic preservation. This is one that I imagine you all are quite familiar with. You'll recall that the changes to the historic preservation article were largely informed by the city's 2023 to 2033 historic preservation work program, which laid out a series of recommendations for the zoning ordinance to be updated to modernize the historic preservation programs and practices of the city. The work program includes six specific updates to the zoning ordinance, and as you may recall, it was endorsed by the Mayor and Council in May of 2023. So since that time, the Historic District Commission discussed these proposed changes specifically in July of 2025. This body discussed and provided direction on the recommendations in October of 2025. The Planning Commission provided further input and recommendations in February of 2026. And then you all provided additional direction on a selection of these items prior to the publication of the revised staff draft. So no surprise, many things in bold red here. First key change is that the historic preservation article codifies Rockville's nine designation criteria. Currently these designation criteria are outlined, but they are located in guidance documents and they're not in our ordinance itself. It also modifies who can submit an application to nominate a property for historic designation, specifically allowing that the property owner, the historic district commission, or the mayor and council can perform that action. It expands the work in the historic district overlay zone that can be approved administratively by staff as opposed to requiring a full HDC review. This includes things, minor work such as installing mailboxes or house numbers, storm windows and doors, utility meters. All of this currently requires HDC review. It also prohibits demolition by neglect of historic properties. Currently, demolition by neglect is defined in our ordinance as failure to maintain property or any component of property located within the historic district zone so as to jeopardize the historic integrity of the property. But it does not prohibit demolition by neglect. So there's no enforcement mechanism to really give that definition any teeth. And finally it outlines a process to remove historic designation from properties in rare circumstances. After historic preservation, In Article 12, we have subdivisions and plats. So this is kind of a quirk of our existing ordinance that along with all of our regulations governing development, we also address subdivision. So subdivision is any time that a lot is proposed to be created or lot lines moved or changed, kind of general rule of thumb. This is an article that really was not touched with our 2009 update to the zoning ordinance. So we were very excited for lots of opportunities for improvement, enhancing organization, increasing clarity and accessibility in this article specifically. So high level, we did create two new processes for subdividing property, minor subdivision and major subdivision. As with demolition by neglect, our ordinance defines minor subdivision, but then it doesn't have any processes associated with it. It doesn't delineate what happens if you have a minor subdivision versus a major subdivision. It just says, here's what it is. So now we clarify specifically what types of subdivision qualify as a minor subdivision, what types of subdivisions qualify as a major subdivision, and the process differs a little bit. The minor subdivisions are able to go through a quicker process. And we did review a number of different subdivision ordinances in nearby jurisdictions in the region to get a better sense of what should fall into that category of minor subdivision. And then you've seen this one before, but it allows record plats for minor subdivisions to be approved by the chief of zoning. Currently, the Planning Commission is the approving authority for all subdivisions, but delegation to an administrator is something that the state allows. So we're writing it into the ordinance. The Planning Commission is intending by resolution to actually enact that delegation immediately after the adoption of the ordinance. Currently, we have that on their agenda planned for July 8th. assuming that the ordinance is adopted at the end of June. We've also revised and updated the required approval findings for preliminary plans of subdivisions. You've seen these before. They are exactly the same. That was exciting. They are exactly the same as what you saw for project plans and site plans previously. So we did look for consistency there. It also allows the creation of lots for multiplexes where only one unit fronts the street. Currently, all units would be required to front a street, but this is something that we looked at particularly in terms of middle housing types that we're wanting to promote. We modeled these regulations on the county's attainable housing solutions proposal and coordinated closely with the Department of Public Works. It also allows for the creation of pipe stem lots. This is something that the body discussed and provided direction on back on October 6th, understanding that this would increase options for housing diversity. The article also updates requirements for streets, pedestrian and bicycle connections, public utilities, floodplains, and sediment control. A lot of this was cleanup. Many of these items refer out to other entire chapters. in city code where we deal comprehensively with sediment control. And in our subdivision regulations, we say you need to conform to those regulations that are contained elsewhere in city code. We've also proposed that it would give mayor and council authority to accept land dedications. Currently, this is something that lies with the planning commission. You all saw this before when we were doing our analysis. We really did not think that the ability to accept land for dedication in the city aligned with the planning commission's roles and responsibilities. It's more aligned with mayor and council's policy and budgetary responsibilities. We've also added a requirement for access to burial sites, which is required by law, and dam inundation areas, clarifying that if property is located within an area downstream of a dam, that is, if the dam were to break, this area would be inundated. You cannot create a lot within those areas. And we've also clarified the provision allowing for waivers of certain subdivision regulations. Currently, the language says in our subdivision article, it says you can get a waiver from any provision in the entire chapter, the whole zoning ordinance. We have the ability to waive them through the subdivision. article, which we thought that doesn't make sense. That might be a typo. We're not quite sure. But what we did was go through and figure out specifically which of the subdivision standards themselves should be ones that are waverable. So there are exceptions to that. We didn't think everything should be able to be waived, but we really honed in on what should be able to be waived. And finally, we've eliminated the creation of new cluster developments. So this will not impact existing cluster developments. Those actually will be memorialized even maybe more effectively than they currently are through the cluster development overlay zone that we discussed a few weeks back. But in the future, no additional cluster developments would be considered. And I will note that we did not go over Article 13. That is enforcement. The main reason being there are no key changes to that article. We did clean up the language a lot. We streamlined it. But substantively, it is effectively the same. And with that, we are happy to answer any questions.

Thank you. We're going to go section by section, just so that we're clear. Let's go back to nonconformities, please. Oh, there was something before that, let me just double check. Yeah, we're good, nonconformities. Council Member Valeri.

Yes, thank you. A lot of my questions on nonconformities were answered ably previously. And thank you both. Thank you both for many things, but especially in nonconformities. I think I mentioned a couple examples, both very personally, you know, as well as around neighborhoods when I've been walking around that I've seen. And This, to me, makes a lot of sense. So I appreciate any opportunity to do the least harm while allowing for flexibility. I appreciate that. So thank you.

Thank you. Do you think that in this new rewrite, we have a clear appeals process for this? I know that you mentioned that the language was so broad that anything could be appealed, but do you feel like we have a strong appeals process now with this new code?

Are you talking about in general?

Yeah.

Yes. Okay.

All right. I did want to re-raise something I've raised in the past in the spirit of supporting people with disabilities. There was some language discussed earlier about making drive-throughs for food and banking as nonconforming. I would respectfully ask my colleagues to reconsider that given our discussions on ADA, I will say that it has been beneficial for people who are, you know, have high-risk pregnancies, who are aging in place, people on walkers. It's my understanding that it's only allowable for pharmacy and for cannabis, which you can't get food at a bank. Is that correct?

That is not quite accurate. Currently, in the staff draft, we are proposing that drive-throughs be permitted. In some zones, they would be a special exception, specifically the mixed-use neighborhood commercial. Those are the zones I'm talking about. And that is really the only zone, I believe, that it is proposed to be a special exception. But the uses that it could be associated with are eating and drinking establishments, cannabis dispensaries, Banks and pharmacies and in many instance we actually we currently have within our existing zoning ordinance when it comes to restaurants with drive-throughs there are actually more zones in which it's Considered a special exception than in the staff draft So just to clarify this new draft reduces that reduces the ability to have drive-throughs for food and Banking or not It depends on the zone. In the mixed use transit district zone, we have said that drive-throughs would be not permitted.

That's exactly what I was focused on.

Thank you for clarifying that.

Yes, currently they are permitted within that zone, but only within a structure or, is that it? There's another, or a garage. That's part, yeah.

So, I mean, mixed use is where we have a lot of our traffic happening, right? And so like parts of 355, I just, I re-raise this for my colleagues. I just want to flag it. I'm very concerned. And I'd love to see where people's heads are at on this. But I've heard from members of the disability community. I've heard from seniors. And again, I'm concerned. I don't think it's necessary to remove. But I still think we're doing a lot of great things in this. But this is one area that I have concern about. I wanted to go to section 25912, expansion of nonconforming uses. it says can be expanded by no more than 20 percent of the total square footage. Can you give us examples of when people have asked for this, how did you come up with the 20 percent? Is it based on the history and experience of what people are asking for?

To be honest, we really haven't had specific requests for this because heretofore, the answer has just been they can't be expanded except for very limited circumstances. So we thought, because we know there are some non-conforming uses out there, the city's rewritten its code a number of times, that perhaps some flexibility is needed. I think since 2009, we've only had one non-conforming alteration that actually came forward and required approval. So there haven't been a lot of requests, to be honest, but we felt that flexibility was in order.

Excellent. Thank you. And then The termination of non-conforming uses, the right to continue a non-conforming use terminates if, and it talks about, I think there's a section here that talks about if you advertise it. I was curious about that because if someone has a property and they sell said property, they're advertising what the current uses. I understand they can't now change said property more than X percent and maintain it, but why would they lose the ability to have, and maybe that's not the case, but if you could help clarify that statement.

Well, that's another aspect of nonconforming uses. The uses become nonconforming because those are deemed to be uses that the city does not want to see in a particular zone going forward. So at some point, if a use ceases, a use that's nonconforming can continue on. operating as it has been in perpetuity, if it so desires. But if it does cease uses, for example, an establishment goes out of business and there's not another establishment to replace that non-conforming use, then if the use is vacant for up to 90 days, then the use cannot be replaced. When we were at the Covenant last time, we wanted to make sure that there was an out kind of for property owners who may be having difficulty recruiting a similar use. And so, we wrote in this ability to actively act marketing that space for a particular use. But if it gets to the end of that point, then the use could not be replaced with that non-conforming use.

This one is, I guess, given the vacancies and what we've seen in the economy through COVID and with what's going on with our federal workforce and changes, this one just gives me pause because people may have to sell their property. And then we're saying, even if you're not making structural changes, that you can't have what you currently have. But maybe there's a nuance there that...

you could clarify that part because I are we limiting people's ability to sell the same use if it's I mean 90 days is not a lot of time and I think what really happens is when when we're doing what we are now which we are rezoning certain properties and rewriting our code that can potentially create non-conforming uses and and will but And again, the thought was that those non-conforming uses are not the uses that the city would like to see in a particular zone. As you stated, maybe there is some additional flexibility that could build into the non-conforming use provision in particular, if you'd like to see even more flexibility in terms of whether the use ceases.

If I might add, there is a provision just below the part where it says that the use has not ceased if the site is being actively marketed for tenants to continue the use. There is also the ability of the property owner to request a six-month extension of the termination date from the Planning Commission, and they can submit up to two of those requests. So there is actually quite a bit of flexibility there as well for conditions that you are Um, outlining things with the market things with pandemics, unforeseen circumstances.

Yeah, I just I think we've seen how long it takes to fill vacant spaces. I don't have to name sites, so this 1 just gives me pause. I'll I'll know that, um, given where the economic activity has just changed. For me, if they're not expanding and they're not tearing down and redeveloping, I don't see necessarily the need to take away a right, a property right there. But there may be examples where we would want that to happen. I don't know. Maybe you've had experience there that we should know about that might help to shape our thinking on this. But I do have concerns about removing that property right at this time. Thank you. Council Member Jackson.

Thank you, Mayor. I'll be brief. I really don't have any problems with the non-conformities section. I just want to reiterate what the Mayor was talking about, about people with disabilities, aging in place, and access to drive-throughs for food, banking,

pharmacies and like I think that's something that's really important and needs to be taking a look at so I associate myself with the mayor's comments Thank You councillor Shaw and also support the statements of the community member that shared the issues with Taking away the drive-throughs and how this can provide more accessibility for the city Councilman Greg so a lot of the issues here we've got about non-conforming usage and it's not an automatic and

Exemption it's essentially what are we going to allow with non nonconformity? So with regard to the drive-throughs? I know the mayor and I talked about this last time this came up We really want to be able to provide that we've seen More and more businesses Utilizing this option and this is happening, especially among the 355 corridor and happening in some neighborhoods, too And that drive-through access is providing not only convenience, but is encouraging businesses to take advantage of that. And allowing a wider variety, even in some of those mixed-use zoning areas, is extremely beneficial. I mean, even just looking at the neighborhood And while it isn't currently zoned for that, but looking in the neighborhood of Rockshire, there's going to be a little commercial shopping center. There's an area behind there that someone might want to put a nonconforming use. That happens. That could extremely be a convenience to the neighborhood, to the community, to allow that. So, I would certainly encourage that type of access. Similar to what the mayor was talking about with regard to nonconforming uses and expansion, Again, I understand throwing out a 20 percent number. I would actually argue for a little bit larger. Again, because this isn't an automatic grant, but something like a third or 33 percent could be something to be considered. if there is a possibility from someone who wants the nonconforming use. Again, being able to utilize what's there if a particular site. It makes sense for that. We'd want to be able to allow the land to be used or the property be used if needed through a potential appeal. I also have some questions now I know that there was some discussion and that we've had before with regard to non-conforming use and so my colleagues were talking about it before with the grandfather and when you have a project that might be in the middle of something is that the process because I didn't see it in this section when we were talking about a certain time limit of

a grandfathering if someone is in the process prior but I didn't see that in this section or is that what we're applying in that first section are we talking about pending applications for site plan project plans etc that is something that we addressed back on May 4th I believe if you'll remember all the way back in article 1 you'll find it on page 3 of the revised staff draft with our transitional provisions So that does deal comprehensively with pending applications. We are proposing a couple of updates there as well, specifically to address special exception approvals and maybe one or two other things, just clarifications and refinements.

Okay, so then with regard to when we were talking here about the prior use going to that, not necessarily for pending applications, that's where we're talking about the non-conforming to be approved through the standard process, right? In those particular situations, similar to, and I think the Mayor was talking about it, I think there's an ability, and I like that. I think we've got a little bit of a wider use here than we did in the prior code, and that's, I think, what we want to encourage. So, I really like what staff's doing here, and I think those two additional comments about increasing the potential expansion as well as allowing a significantly wider use of drive-through, I think, goes through the spirit of what staff's doing here, which is saying, listen, we want to encourage Use depending on the circumstance and I think those two changes accomplish it. So great job Thank you, dr.

Miles, thank you madame I have no additional comments on this particular portion in addition to what's already been mentioned for my colleagues Thank you Councilman Fulton.

I have only one maybe two questions and I Under in the expansion, the findings the planning commission must find to approve includes the proposed non-conforming use expansion is compatible with the general character of the surrounding neighborhood or zone. We've had difficulty with that in the past. And it prompts me to ask, first of all, do we have those required? I should know this. But is that throughout where we talk about conforming to the character? Or is this a unique requirement?

I would say this is fairly unique. As a rule of principle, going through this rewrite, we really did try to remove neighborhood character needing to be consistent with or compatible with neighborhood character. I know you've had discussions on this quite recently. We did retain it in this one area. And perhaps my colleagues, Mr. Wozolak or Mr. Dumais, have additional things to add there. But generally, no, it is not sprinkled throughout the ordinance.

particularly in light of that because i wouldn't want to suggest like a wholesale rewrite i'm wondering if we can get at the actual purpose there in a more specific way like compatible with the purpose of the zoning sure uh but i struggle with that particular language and not just me like we collectively as a city have struggled with that language so i would i don't have specific language to suggest there but either removing that criteria or making it more specific That's my only question. Thanks.

Council Member Valeri.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I had misplaced my notes. I have now found my notes. But it's very short and sweet. One, I co-signed the drive-through issue that's been raised. I did forget this issue, even though we had talked about it. And I do agree. I think that that might shift over time as well. And that'll be probably a market-forced situation. But I did want to raise on nonconformities and the use table. We did hear from a very interesting business sector the green funeral spaces. I would want to put this to this body. We do pride ourselves on being very intentional around EV charging and solar and other things. And I really was compelled around the green cremation, non-incineration cremation. And as it stands right now, our code would not allow that to be present in the city anywhere. And actually, oddly enough, funeral home, which is a little bit more expansive than just funeral home, is not permitted at all in industrial zones. Is that correct? Because that's what I had on my older draft, and I don't think I saw it changed or edited. I think it's page 84 of the draft.

Yes, that is correct.

Okay. So I think that, again, the compelling part of it is, yes, incineration-based cremation. That is a whole separate, not trying to get into any of that. But as individuals are becoming more green and aware of those sort of things that we do after we are no longer of this mortal coil, I think it would... Benefit us. We do have a history of funeral homes in the city I I think I don't see a downside to making the code more amenable changing the the definition of crematorium definition to include incineration only and expanding the funeral home definition and to include these sort of green funeral, green cremation alternatives. So I guess I would put that to my colleagues as well to see if that would be something that we could add to and if it would be possible to include this in the upcoming draft. And if others support this. I do like talking about deaths sometimes.

Staff is conferring. Let's just give them a second.

Madam Mayor and Council Members, I did want to note that when we were initially approached about the green funeral process, our take on it was that it actually would be permitted under our current definition, even though we're not specifying incineration about crematorium, et cetera, but as kind of an accessory use to the broader definition of funeral home, we thought that it would fit in that definition.

It would fall under that because it's non-incineration. Okay. so then i guess it would just be a slight adjustment in the language then because if there was any sort of confusion um from a business community that is interested in doing that then maybe it just means it's a clarification point um i'm sorry yeah mr mahal i guess i'm just going to say mayor we agree with council members as long as the body doesn't object we'll make some clarifying uh adjustments to the language to make it explicit that that type of um

disposal is allowed.

Okay, thank you. No, no, it's no problem. Thank you, Madam Mayor, because I was like looking down. Then I guess my point then is if we tweak that language, would we then allow that as a permissible use in industrial? Because I could almost see that being maybe an option that industry may want to utilize.

I mean, we're not recommending that in the ZOR, but if the Mayor and Council would like to see that, that's certainly a change that we could make.

I just wanted to throw that out there as another possibility, and maybe Mr. City Manager has thoughts on it, too. I just noted, like, it just seemed to stick out at me that we're A-okay with funeral homes and, like, all the mixed-use zones and not industrial seemed odd to me. I'm not willing to, no pun intended, die on that hill, but I would like to adjust the definition for sure if everyone on the dais is cool with that.

Thank you. I appreciate that you're going to clarify that that kind of green cremation is allowed. I did have a question. Are there some places funeral homes can be, but cremation is not? Cremation is not allowable anywhere in the city. Not cremation, but incineration, sorry. Yeah, no.

It's prohibited within the city. period, like in all zones, the incineration.

Because I did see in the definition it said you can have a funeral home, but crematorium is not included in this section. So just to clarify, why is that a thing?

I think it's because of the emissions that's associated with it.

Okay. All right. But this green process would be okay? Understood. Okay. I appreciate and support that. Councilman Van Graak.

In addition to supporting making sure that the green cremation can work, I also want to follow up with something Councilmember Fulton said, because we have a body of talked about subjective criteria with regard to zoning. It's been used in the history of the United States, sometimes negatively, and it's also something that different bodies in making determinations have used. So I wanna echo what my colleague said that subjective determinations of how we're gonna be doing non-conforming uses is something that to the extent we can redraft that, I think it'd be beneficial for the city.

Councilmember Van Graak, I apologize just for clarity for the rewrite. Another option would be to remove it altogether, which is fairly consistent with what we've done in the past, and I did want to note that the finding below that one does require that the use expansion will not have negative impacts on the public health, safety, and welfare of nearby properties, which probably covers what we're looking for anyway.

Beautifully said, and that's why you're sitting in the chair.

thanks I have a question for you is there a reason why staff kept that one in and pulled it from other places I'm just curious because like have you had experience or concerns or especially because it's non-conforming I just wanted to understand your rationale because maybe there's very good reason I know I understand everywhere else you did it but maybe you said an unconformity we need to be more careful based on your experience can you just share that with us

Yeah, candidly, Mayor Ashton, I think this was probably just a holdover from when we had this finding and some of the other series of findings. I don't recall that there was an affirmative decision after we had removed that finding from other approvals to keep it here. But I do think that when we drafted this provision, there was a sense that we did want to make applicants make a fairly robust demonstration of need in order to get the use expansion. From my perspective, and certainly staff can weigh in as well. I don't see any negative effects if we were to remove the finding.

Excellent. And what about planning team?

We agree.

Okay. Thank you. Just want to make sure it's like, maybe there's something that you guys have encountered that we're not aware of. So I appreciate you clarifying that. No, thank you. Great. Thank you very much. I had one question. Something came up at the nonprofit symposium again. There was a lot of discussion at the symposium. There was a nonprofit organization that said, I want to buy a building and do some work in the city. I immediately referred them to Ready to say they can help you, and then they'll bring in planning staff. but I have been told that like there's a lot of strictness around an old bank can't be turned into a cultural center and I'm just questioning why so is that would that be considered non-conforming so we don't just to be clear on that one we're not so sure it's a zoning issue more be building code it's such an issue so give us some more time look at but we're pretty sure it's not a zoning issue Okay, just if you dig deeper and it is, if you could please let us know before we make approvals that we are trying to fill spaces with positive things. So I just want to make sure we're not doing anything inadvertently. Okay, so I'm seeing no more questions on non-conforming. Let's move to the next section. Signs, okay. How exciting. I know these are important to people and it's critical to the advertisement of businesses and organizations, et cetera. But I do want to note that To ask the question in terms of what you all have, I always want to know, like, what is sitting in your shoes? What have you seen? Uh, in terms of the projects that are coming forward that businesses are asking us for and signs, is there anything that we haven't done that you've encountered that we should be considering?

I don't think so 1 of the biggest things that we have seen is. you know, every property, every non-residential property has a sign plan associated with it, and more often than not, that has to either be amended, because ex-tenant does not use that color, that's not their corporate color, and they really, I think landlords end up being hamstrung to a degree by those sign plans, and so that was our recommendation, to eliminate those so there'd be more flexibility for property owners and landlords.

Last term, there was something that came up with, you mentioned Twinbrook Quarter. I don't know the full discussion, but they wanted more flexibility on signage because some of the businesses are on the side or the back of the street, and they needed visibility. Is there any lesson learned there that we need to address?

I think there's still the ability for sign plans moving forward. They got a comprehensive sign package that had variances built into it. But if they're moving forward, if a similar project came in, they could still address it in those same ways.

Okay. And are we having to say no a lot on sign issues? No. Not really. Okay. So there's no other missing problem to be fixed?

No, I mean, one thing we'd always heard several years ago that there wasn't enough sign area. We have not heard that once we wrote the sign ordinance in 2019. So apparently there's enough sign area that businesses have for their signs. Again, it was always just the sign plans and kind of the restrictions that those placed on property owners.

Thank you, you mentioned that we have a lot of signs around the city right now. And you've noted up to three signs on residential in the past has it been four signs.

I can't recall if it was four or five. It seemed like it was more than three.

Well, I just noted that our council has expanded, right? And so reducing the signs gives less civic engagement. So I was curious about why they went down to three because I remember there was a four number in the past. So it might be something to just confirm and look at to make sure we're not reducing.

We can do that.

If I might add, so I don't believe we have anything currently that would preclude someone from having more than those three, but you are allowed to have up to three with no permit required, which currently that is not the case.

Well, there was a number four with no permit required. At least it was conveyed in previous elections. So I know this is not election code, but I just wanted to make sure we're not reducing when there's a larger council or requiring triggering a permit.

We'll confirm and make sure.

Thank you. And then also, there's been a lot of signs placed in different places and rights-of-way. That's not legal, right? It's not allowed. We've also heard some complaints from residents saying signs are placed on their property without permission. Can you confirm that's not legal, correct, in this code?

That is correct, yes.

Okay. And is there a fine for that? So the city does spend resources and I will note like sometimes there's a commercial owners come and litter the city and put 30 signs in the rights of way, 50 signs in the rights of way. You guys clean it one day and then they come back the next day. Why wouldn't we consider and maybe that comes back to enforcement. I would like to hear your thoughts on that.

Certainly we could elevate it to a notice of violation and then get into the violation that would kick in the fine.

Because essentially we're working for them when we keep cleaning up their signs and they know there's no teeth to it, so they just keep doing it.

Yeah, we kind of were out of step a bit with the county because the county allows for, say, real estate signs to be posted in the rights-of-way for the weekend, and we don't. So I've noticed that some of the sign installers place those in the right-of-way in the city, even though we don't permit those.

HAB-Juliette Boone, yeah and I get the real estate signs and maybe it's it's just a there's a balance. HAB-Juliette Boone, I just we have seen like the littering of 40 and 50 signs by the similar companies. And I don't even know if we call them to say that's not allowable. And I know some of them don't even know it's not allowable. So I just wanted to flag that. I'm not necessarily trying to limit real estate. I get that. It's the littering part of it that gets out of hand.

It's been a while since we've had one of those massive sign installations. We had one recently. If you know one, please tell me.

The city manager took care of it. Okay.

But yeah, we can certainly reach out to the providers and remind them that our code is different than the county or whatever it might be.

And I think the county does allow real estate, but they have to be removed by X time. Yes. So it's like reasonable. But anyway, I think it's something to explore further. Council Member Jackson.

Thank you, Mayor. On the signs, I really have no problem. I think you guys have done a really good job. Would associate myself with the mayor's comments You know three signs does seem a little bit limiting especially As the mayor said when we expanded the the council By a couple of seats, but I think you know four signs is is good but I do I am really proud that Rockville does not have any restrictions on, um, signs and political signs, because I think it's a free speech thing, and I really am proud that we don't try to restrict free speech. Unfortunately, my HOAs are going in their other direction, but that's another topic for another time. But the city, you know, Three signs is a good, maybe four would be better, as the mayor said.

And just one clarity. I align with your comments, but if anyone's listening, you cannot put political signs in the public right away. Correct. Thank you. All right. Council Member Shaw.

Thank you. I do agree with staff's recommendation. Is there, just could you provide some clarification for if there's any different regulations with political signs that are temporary versus real estate or?

In the revised staff draft, there is no distinction. They would both be treated as temporary freestanding signs.

Okay. So I know that there's, there's like, yeah. Okay. Thank you.

Council Member Van Graak.

Correct me if I'm wrong. Hasn't the US Supreme Court said you can't limit the number of political signs on a property?

I don't think that they've been .

I thought there was a limit that you can't limit the number of political signs on a property. Is that not true?

Council Member McGregor, we might need to get back to you on that one. I'm also not aware of that. There are general safety and welfare limits that are allowable in limiting free speech rights. But you may be right. So I'll take a look at that and get back to you.

Then to the extent that isn't limited, even four, I would say, is potentially too small. It does make sense. whether it's on a county council level, whether it's a city council level, to allow people to be able to have that without a permit certainly makes sense. Talking generally, I know we could go into idiosyncrasies of the little areas, but I think for the most part, what is being done through these revisions is an expansion on the use of signs and an understanding of some of the concerns that property owners, that residents and people, whether it's real estate, whether it's using signs on multi-use buildings, that from what I can tell, staff is trying to be more accommodating. And I think it's exactly what you've heard from staff, Or sorry, staff has heard from the community. We've heard from the community. So while there might be little nits and nats that might be better, it's something we can always amend if we realize there's a problem. But for the most part, I think this code is moving in the direction of exactly the way we want it to. So thank you very much.

Dr. Miles.

Good afternoon. Thanks. I have no additional comments on this one.

Council Member Fulton.

So forget the political signs. If I have a kid graduating from middle school, a kid graduating from high school, and a kid graduating from elementary school, and I want to say where they're going to college, and I want to say congratulations to my kids, I want to be able to put six signs in my yard. If I'm bringing home baby, and I want to say welcome home baby, I want to be able to put that sign in my yard. So setting aside the political signs, on an individual single family residence private property, I'm probably alone in this, but I'd say have as many signs as you want. I would remove that prohibition entirely. That's my only comment on this one.

I am going to strongly co-sign the right honorable Councilmember Fulton on that point. And truly, as I think as some of us do have a congrats for graduating, and I'm blah, blah, blah bound. And some other folks that may or may not be running for election. Yes, I just remove it completely. If you want to have it temporary, we all get the temporary non-commercial. Totally get it. Yeah, I mean, as long as it's not a permanent fixture, put as many as you want. Like, there's so many issues in the world that I don't want us to veer toward the design guidelines slash HOA requirements when there are many of us that do not live in HOA controlled or historic district controlled neighborhoods. So yeah, totally take that out. I have seen, to kind of put a pin in it, I think enforcement, I know it's not here, but is, I think, our next biggest challenge. There have been political signs placed without consent of the owner. There are political signs in the public right away, like, whoa. I think at a certain point, same with the business ones, you're right, there haven't been a ton of the like, you know, green doctor sort of like signs that pop up all the time, but if there's no enforcement, then there's no mechanism to correct behavior. And I would really want there to be an actual something significant enough that it will be a behavior modifier. Because otherwise, you will have people placing political signs willy-nilly wherever they want to put them. And frankly, I don't know that residents know even who to contact You know, it's a challenge because you want to get along with your neighbors and so forth, but everybody has that right to say no, no thank you, and things should not show up anyways. So, yeah, I just wanted to note that, and I think in general, things like character, things like, you know, that last bullet point that's doing a lot of work there. I'm not going to be a big fan of that just because, you know, again, sometimes people make the choice to not live in an HOA community, and that is in itself a choice. I do also, to that extent, on I am not personally a fan of feather flags, but of all the things for us to be picking on, prohibition on signs that move. I've had some signs fall over, but I don't see all the overnight that we're gonna see a bunch of feather flags and all these other issues when we do have other more significant issues that we have to face like, bunch of mattresses appearing in the public right-of-way on certain roads like let's let's let's look at those things before we start beating up on the feather flags so I think the rest of it looks great I know that this is not easy I remember when the original sign ordinance was going through its stuff and I I appreciate all the work that you do on that so thank you councilmember Jackson yes

Thank you, Mayor. I'll be brief. I, Councilmember Fulton, you convinced me. So I actually would co-sign, you know, removing the three temporary freestanding signs for the residential lot. I think you're right. We can do away with that.

Councilmember Shaw.

I also agree with Council Member Fulton's comment. I do think it's related to freedom of speech, as well as not just political science, but also like issues like support for our schools and things. So I do think that's, it's important to remove that. That's a majority will remove it.

Thank you, and can you also just check to make sure that we're not violating any laws? Because I'm just remembering one of our District 17 commenters had this issue in Gaithersburg, and they went through some sign issues when he was on council, and there was some free speech concern, so I just wanted to, he has advocated on there's some Supreme Court rules about it, so I just think that we need to take another look. Certainly.

Madam Mayor, I do want to emphasize to the body, we did do a pretty thorough review of our sign ordinance to ensure compliance with recent Supreme Court case law.

OK.

So I don't want you to think that that wasn't part of our analysis. And we actually put a lot of effort into ensuring, in particular, that our regulations are content neutral. But there's certainly no legal issue with removing limits on residential properties. In fact, to the extent there might be a pain point for the city, that would probably be one of them.

Yeah, I mean, I do know that, especially graduation, there are individual little sticks. I have done it, because when your child graduates, it's like the letters, right? And I see residents do that all the time. But I have seen that cities can do the time and define what is temporary. And then we also can still maintain our X foot requirements from polling places. I mean, that all makes sense still. Next issue. Apparently signs were exciting. I'm excited. Council Member Jackson. I didn't plan this, I promise. If you want to pass and come back, it's okay. No, no.

No, so this is the historic preservation. And I think staff has done a really thoughtful job on this. I just, I have some hesitation on being unanimous, frankly. And I want to hear more discussion, but... You know, a unanimous vote is hard to come by. I would be more comfortable with a super majority vote of the various bodies, whether it's mayor and council or the historic district. That's, well, I'm sure we'll discuss it, but that's kind of where I'm leaning right now. the rest of it is good i wonder here's more discussion of um other people's ideas um you know before i i give it a thumbs up but i really do appreciate all the work that staff has been put into it and by and large um i agree with most of it councilman shaw i want to thank the staff and no questions

Councilman Van Graaf.

I also want to thank the staff. I think you've looked at a lot of the problems that we've talked about. And I know one of the problems that we've talked about is whether you've got an objecting property owner and it's being taken by a third party. And so, having that pretty high bar for that type of situation is reasonable. We have to make sure that there is reasonable grounds, and it's got to reach a high standard. So I think what you've got in this code meets that standard. If there becomes a problem, that for whatever reason, something that we've got in here that we might have gone too far, it is something that we can amend. But I think what you've got in here really seems reasonable, and I appreciate your hard work in getting it done.

Thank you. Dr. Miles?

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I am in support of and associate myself with the comments of my colleague, Councilmember Jackson, with regard to going towards a supermajority as opposed to a unanimous vote. The rest of it, I have no major concerns at this point.

Councilmember Fulton.

I have one question on the removal of the historic designation. 251113 a to the one criteria for removal is the site or structure is a deterrent to a major improvement program that will be of substantial benefit to the city. I could have missed it. But like that terms not defined anywhere, major improvement program. What does that mean? Like I feel like getting back to the being really specific, I think I know what it's getting at, and I think that's important to be there. I just don't know what a major improvement program is. Is there a way we can be,

I think this is one of those things, you know it when you see it. And I will say that we developed this language based on the feedback, I believe it was of this body or it might have been the planning committee. It would have been this body because it's in the revised staff draft to eliminate the other good cause, which is very broad. So we did go and coordinate with our historic preservation staff to come up with like, okay, what do we actually mean? And this is language that was borrowed from state law, not specific to removal of historic designation. It was directly related to something that will come to me, but not in this moment. But it is something that this language is used elsewhere. I think we could go into state law and see if that is something that is further defined. But in my mind, it is one of those things, it's maybe not as specific as it could be, but it's significantly more specific than other good cause. It still provides counsel with the leeway to remove within kind of these two bounds of these two criteria.

And Councilmember Fulton, if I can add a little bit to that as well. Just a reminder to the body, most of the series of findings that you're seeing in the ordinance have to do with really with quasi-judicial decisions where you're deciding property rights. This is not one of those cases. And one of the things that's a little bit unusual, although it does obviously all of your decisions in the land use context affect property rights, this is effectively a legislative decision by the body whether to zone or not zone a particular property. So it's a long way of saying these restrictions are restrictions that you're putting on yourself that really aren't legally required. And so when you choose to remove a property, you could do it really for any reason. And I say all of this because if you're choosing to remove a property from the historic district overlay zone, One of the reasons you may not need a definition in item number two is because it really is your decision as the legislative body as to whether or not there is a major improvement program. In other words, somebody can't appeal this decision in the same way that they could appeal, for example, the denial of a site plan. I'm not saying any of that to suggest that you need to change this language, but you have a lot of options here, and these are restrictions you are putting on yourself.

So that's helpful. Maybe I'll just make one, like, super... I'm bringing my day job into this. The word program is what's sticking for me. Like, if we could just change program to initiative, like, program implies something. Like, so, yeah, just a major improvement initiative might help. So that was just... Sure, yeah, yeah. Major improvement. Major improvement. Or initiative or whatever it is, just program, if everyone's okay with that. My only other, I struggle with when I read in concert the, we can place real meaningful restrictions on what a property owner can do with their property after they bought it. and pair that with not only are restricting what they do with their property, but under the demolition by neglect, we're actually telling them what they have to do with it. And this body talked a lot about, in the conforming uses, about property rights. And the double whammy of that, you can't do what you want to do, even though you didn't know that when you bought it, but you do have to do all these other things. I know we're going to get there. I know that's going to happen. But I say that to be, maybe that's why I'm still good with the unanimous, if there is written owner objection. That's the only case we would need it. That's it. Thanks.

Thank you. Council Member Valeri.

One of my favorite topics. I am extremely excited about this one. I was excited about science, though, too. So there are so many things. I want to get it. I want to get to a more foundational starting point and then kind of get more into some of these details. Right now, a property must meet just one of nine criteria to be eligible, including, quote, represents an established visual feature of the neighborhood, which really has no meaningful limiting principle. There is no minimum age requirement. The National Register generally requires 50 years. Draft language does not. And what I think is most distressing to me is that The owner of a property's interests are really not relevant at all during this process. I think we're talking about two different things too, right? We're talking about housing, residential, and then we're talking about retail, business, historic. So I kinda wanna focus on residential because I think that the rules are the same regardless, right? Which I think is part of the problem. I think that maybe at a minimum, there is a higher bar for residential historic designation than for office or other sort of retail buildings that are being designated. But even before we get to that point, appreciate the changes about who can nominate but right now there is no provision that a confirmation that an owner has received the notice and and correct me if I'm wrong how actually I'll turn this around how do owners get notified that their property has been nominated

We send written notice by mail.

Okay. And the written notice is English only?

I would say in most cases, yes.

Okay. So in writing, no return receipt or signature required on receipt? like confirmation of receipt, basically, not just, yeah. Right, I understand.

I don't think so, but easy enough to do.

So, there's really no guardrails? Is there?

Clarification is certified mail.

It is certified mail with a signature. In the notice, does it share with the individual that as of the receipt of that letter, there is a 210-day exterior change freeze? So even if they had work coming up, they would have to stop whatever project was in place until it was sorted out.

Yes, and that has actually happened.

So it's basically a property, a residential. I'm going to stick with residential because I think we'll get to adaptive reuse shortly. We need to put ourselves in the shoes of individuals who may or may not be comfortable in reading or writing the English language, not understanding the full implications of what's occurring, and frankly could just be nominated for because they represent an established visual feature of the neighborhood. I think that, oh, and they just have to meet one of nine criteria. So, we have a very, very low bar for something that's so significant in terms of the effect on a property owner, a residential property owner. I appreciate that There are homeowner historic tax credits. They exist. They do require pre-approval and documentation from MHT. Owner-occupied homes are not eligible for the federal historic tax credit, so that is a no-go for folks. And we're doing all of this and not giving the person We're not giving the person the capability of saying, hey, wait, no, I don't want this nominated. Because somebody could say, no, I don't want it nominated, it could still go forward, correct? Okay, that's my struggle. I do not like that at all. It could be something insignificant, not saying insignificant, it could be something like an architectural style to like, and Madam Mayor knows I used this example, to like the, something like the home that Thurgood Marshall once slept in. I'm trying to think of an example. That's a wide scope, right? Like, I'm not a big fan of issuing blank checks. I'm not a fan of not working to explain more about the process to a homeowner. I'm not a fan of not getting the affirmative response. Silence is not consent. It just is not. people get in trouble when they take silence for consent. And I think we can do better than that. So to that extent, I think it should be an affirmative. I'm laughing because the example I have is the notes that you would send each other in high school that's like, do you like me? Yes, no, maybe. And I need to check one of these. Can't just send it back empty in my note, right? So definitely getting something either way. Yes, no, I don't care. If it's a no, that should be a different decision branch, right? You can educate on what available options there are, and maybe there's a higher threshold, but we're essentially in this section of the zoning code, we're determining and defining property rights of a homeowner. And like, we're not having a bigger and more in depth conversation than this is a little it's, it's concerning to me. So Article 11, if I'm not wrong, does not distinguish between owner-occupied residential properties and income-producing or commercial properties in terms of consent requirements, right? It's all the same. So, at a bare minimum, could we not look at those two as separate? To me, that just makes sense. I also think that in the delisting process that Council Member Fulton started or was talking through, I get that. I think it was in the description staff said it's a process available in quote rare circumstances. Are we gonna further define that as far as like specific grounds, procedure? Anything like that? Or are we just going to leave that open-ended?

I would say that the text on the screen is basically a subjective synopsis or it's something that we developed. That is not language that is in the ordinance, the rare circumstances. Okay. Specifically, that term does not show up.

That's just in the slides because that was what I was working from. I didn't do like a one-to-one on that. So I think, I want us to get to a much better place than this. I think that whether it's unanimous, super majority, it doesn't really matter if we don't kind of address some of these bigger concerns. And the outreach component of it is just one piece. And yeah, I think I'll leave it there. Super quickly, Mr. City Manager, the historic catalog, did you ever get any sort of, it has not been updated since I think 2011?

I sent you guys a response. Let me look it up. I'll circle back.

Okay. Yeah, no, it's okay. I didn't see it, but I've been having email issues, not shockingly so. Yeah, I just, I hope that we have a little bit of a more thoughtful conversation on this. And I really, I also want to say I support the Planning Commission's recommendation for adaptive reuse now. I think it's directly supported by it, and I think that's something that we can do. It's a positive thing, so I really look forward to hearing from my colleagues on some of these tougher questions, thanks.

Thank you very much. I'm just going to do a time check to say it's 9.37. We have another agenda item and about two more sections to go through. I will try to speed, and I apologize for fast talk. I support the comments of Council Member Jackson and Dr. Miles on moving from unanimous to supermajority. I think we have done significant work to change who can nominate, and so it would be the HDC or the Mayor and Council. So some of those concerns about issues of the past, People can still come to the Mayor and Council or HTC but it's ultimately one of those two bodies who would move the process. So I think that is a big change and for that I support the super majority. And also I know we talked about the work of the HTC doesn't inhibit Mayor and Council so it's not required, correct, that both are now unanimous. We had a discussion on that last session.

That is, that is correct. We did revise that in the draft. Excellent.

Thank you. Um, I will just share, um, some history that I have seen in Rockville and something that informs my decision. I have seen, um, particularly some of the African American properties are people who have been, you know, There has been issues with properties who have been, people who have businesses here or people who have been long time residents and there have been a number of scenarios where those properties are just demolished. So you can call it urban renewal, you can call it, you know, that has also happened in other areas. So I do have concerns about that. about what has happened in the past and how black properties, black cemeteries have been less valued than others. And that is an issue, not just has happened in Rockville, but across this entire country. And so some of that gives me pause and why I think we should be looking at this more seriously. To the comment of my colleague, I think Councilman Fulton and Councilman Valeri raised it, I do have some concerns about people buying something and not knowing what they're getting into. and so the catalog needs to be updated and people need to know. That's a concern that I have and I believe the work plan was supposed to be, had that to be updated and we just need to know where they are and I appreciate that you're looking into that, Mr. City Manager. I do have some queries and I've raised this last term but 210 days is a long time. Is there any reason for that? Is it state law? Can that timeline be adjusted just so that we are, you know, digging in on the facts and can get back to people?

I think it was established in the prior code as a timeline that the map amendment, which the historic designation process is, could be accomplished and sometimes is controversial and those things take, you know, take some time.

I mean, some of the issues why things took time was not necessarily, not just controversy, but like things happen that could have been prevented. I'll just leave it there. Mr. City Manager, were you going to say something?

Yeah, the last historic preservation inventory was 2011. Yes, we could update it, but I'd want to put together a budget estimate for that. It's a pretty expensive process.

Okay, I will note that there was a work plan that was approved that said it would happen. So we just need to re raise the issue and part of our, you know, come up with the prioritization plan, among everything else that's going on. But I do have concern with the surprises. So if we I do think that we need to have an accurate catalog. The I wanted to ask the question about that section when, well actually I think I already addressed that one. It's Division 11-2 certificates of approval demolition by neglect. For that one, the HDC may, on condition of its approval, find it necessary to make those findings. Is that how you've written it? Can you just speak to the role of the HDC in that process?

Just to clarify, Madam Mayor, you're talking about the HCC's role in the demolition by neglect process. So as we've written that section specifically, The HCC would generally not have a role in that process, at least as far as the enforcement goes. So if you look at 2511.2.2, that's really just envisioning a process where we city staff have identified that there's a property that's been listed that is deteriorating, and we can take proactive steps to notify the property owner and request correction of that action. The only way the HTC would get involved is that because we do equate demolition by neglect with demolition. So if you actually want, and I can't imagine anybody would actually do this, but if you wanted permission to allow your property to deteriorate, you could go to the HTC and request a demolition permit to do that. But generally speaking, demolition by neglect, it's really an enforcement mechanism. It's not a process that the HTC would typically be involved in.

Um, so you're saying that, um. If you're trying to take this in the perspective, it allows staff to ask act faster to identify those properties.

That's correct. So, you know, currently, you know, there are there are property maintenance code requirements. So you, you cannot you cannot allow a property to deteriorate to the point where it is no longer habitable. Um. The idea with the demolition by neglect provision is that we can step in earlier than that. Because obviously the historic characteristics of a property could deteriorate long before the property becomes truly uninhabitable. And so if we identify a property where those historical characteristics are deteriorating, As this is currently written, the chief of zoning would have the ability to issue a notice of violation. And just to be clear, that's different than the citation process. A notice of violation would just identify the violation, give the property owner a reasonable period of time to cure whatever the problem happens to be.

Okay. So staff would be able to act faster on issues, but in terms of delisting a property, the HDC still has that authority?

Okay. Yes. So actually, so I apologize. So to be clear, the ability to file an application to remove the historic designation from our property can only come as this code is currently written from the mayor and council or the property owner. However, the HDC upon that application being filed would then have the ability to review that and determine whether, for example, the site or structure no longer has those historical characteristics. So the HTC can't initiate that process, but it would have a review responsibility.

Can you share what authority we're removing from the HTC in this code? If there is any.

Well, we're not, just to be clear, because I'm going to hopefully give my colleagues some time to respond as well. We're not removing any authority from the HTC in the removal of the historic designation process because that currently does not exist in our code. As far as the other... processes go, I might be missing something, but I'm not aware of any responsibility or authority that we're taking away from the HTC.

Okay. We've received some commentary about that, so I wanted to confirm whether that is a thing or not, it's an issue or not.

Was this from Peerless Rockville before our last meeting? Yes. So there are a number of instances throughout these processes where it refers to the chief of zoning review, and I believe there might have been some confusion about the effect of the chief of zoning's review. This is something that we currently do. We'll have the chief of zoning, or as... That individual is defined in our ordinance, their designee, which very frequently is a staff member, in this case our historic preservation staff member, who will do a review. And as we are doing with so many things, make a recommendation to the body that they present to. So that chief of zoning review would not take any authority away from the historic, from the HDC. It's just outlining that before something gets to the HDC, staff will review it. but then the HDC still has their authority.

Okay. And then, thank you for that clarification. Section 25.11.2-2, demolition by neglect, it says it's prohibited. However, if the neglect is caused by financial inability to maintain or repair the structure, how do you determine that?

So I'll weigh in on this as well, because there were some legal elements to this addition. And I'll point out this was helpfully identified by one of our planning commissioners. State law, and they don't do it in exactly this way, but state law effectively allows for demolition by neglect in the event that a property owner does not have the financial ability to maintain the structure. And in the land use article, they do that by adding that provision into the definition of demolition. So, you know, and I agreed with the planning commissioner. I don't think we have the ability to not include that provision. So we have to create a carve out. The problem is state law also does not identify what financial inability to support the structure would mean. And so what we tried to do was to create a process. I think this is largely in subsection C where we. allow the property owner to the opportunity to make a demonstration but it's a great question um madam mayor and honestly that's a that's something we're going to have to work out in the event that it actually happens we'll just have to make sure that there is some because ultimately this would be this would be you know reviewed under the substantial evidence test that's used for all of our administrative decisions so the question would be is there substantial evidence that the property owner has provided that there was a financial inability to maintain the structure

It seems like a gaping window. Okay. It sounds like you guys have grappled with it as well, and it's because the state law is just not clear. Okay. I've seen some people, there's a resident who wanted to put an EV charger at their historic property, and they had to develop all kinds of covers and Do we have limitations on solar and EV going on historic properties and that they have to do things to hide it? I just was curious about that.

Yeah, that's not historically accurate.

I mean, people have had electricity come in. I'm just saying.

I mean, those installations would require a certificate of approval by the HTC, but there's not specific criteria for either, I don't think.

Think that for those two pieces the process must be clear and fast Especially with rising utility costs I just that concerns me so I Will I will note that as As outlined in this slide we are proposing that a number of improvements be eligible for an administrative approval which currently they are not and that does include a The installation of utility meters, vents, cables, or telephone boxes, exterior wiring, antennas, satellite dishes, HVAC system components, electric vehicle charging stations, and exterior security devices.

How about solar? I didn't hear solar. I do appreciate EV, but I do know that that was an issue for a resident. I know it's getting late, so if you could just look into that and get back to us. It came up also because I know that there was discussion about we can't put solar on some things because it's historic. And I'm like, where is that a thing? At some point, we went to old properties and put heat and we put lights. So I just want to make sure we can evolve with times while still supporting the historic property.

Absolutely. I know that other counties do have some provisions for solar and historic properties. I think we can look into some precedents there. Okay. Okay.

The other comment we received from peerless I just wanted to flag is 25 11 1 3 a 1 the chart the change does not adequately describe The condition justifying delisting it should include integrity. Does that come up with staff? What was the section again 25 11 1 3 a 1 I

Yes. So we did look at that as well. And we did think that the outlines the criteria for removal. The first one is the site or structure on the site has lost the characteristics that justified replacement or justified placement in the site. That language we view to be roughly equivalent to integrity. So a way of saying integrity with different words.

Okay, I appreciate that. I am done with my comments on this section. Council Member Valeri.

I know it's late, but I'm going to explain why this is important to me. And thank you for the inspiration. So this is very personal to me for a variety of reasons, but I think I need to share this so Twinbrook has a very special place in the heart of this city although we're the farthest south right we have a very special place in in the heart of the city we also are the heart of those living at or below the poverty level those who rely on food assistance and Medicare and Medicaid and I live in a community where on either side of me, right, I could be entering into this 210 day exterior change freeze, which actually begins at nomination filing date before the owner could even receive the notice. So it is very possible by the time I get that notice, I've already been under a freeze. I don't know it. I'm struggling with the rising cost of utilities and materials, and now I have a process that has unfolded because I have one of the nine criteria. Only need one. Really want to mention that. I think we need to raise that bar to at least three, if not four, if we're going to remove the ability for people to control their property. I also think, to Madam Mayor's point, In my neighborhood, you will probably see a lot more demolition by neglect if there is not more fail-safes to protect folks who are already struggling to keep their head above water, who now have to go through more hoops to change, you know, repair a shingle to do any sort of thing that other homeowners have to do. It's really inequitable. This is an absolute equity issue. And the flip side of it is the fact that we're talking about economic equity right now. It just makes me, honestly, it makes me sad that, it makes me sad the example that Madam Mayor raised, for sure, and especially like cemeteries and so forth. I think they need to be treated with the utmost respect. Conversely, I don't think that turning any neighborhood into a landmine field of demolition by neglect does anything to A, solve our housing crisis, or B, Maintain that we are an equitable city and it's just very it's disheartening to me to not see more concern about some of these things so I just wanted to add that and add more context as to why I am a Little fired up about this one

Thank you. Any other comments? I had a question. There were three of us who said supermajority versus unanimous. I just wanted just to clarify, is everyone else on this day as supporting unanimous?

Correct.

Yes. Council Member Gregg, you support unanimous? Council Member Shaw? Okay. All right. I just want to clarify. Are there any other clarifications that you have for us?

That was the one. Thank you.

Okay. I was seeing your facial expressions. All right. I have concerns about that, but we are a democracy. Article 12, subdivisions and plats. Councilman Bouchard.

Madam Mayor, I don't have any questions for this section.

Thank you. Thank you. Councilman Van Graak.

No, similarly, I saw, I like what staff's doing. Again, I think this is going in a little different direction of understanding how things are put to play. It will remain to see if this works, but as of right now, it looks like how you've laid it out about what can happen seems to make sense. And I haven't heard from any comment, at least with regard to developers or anything, that there's a problem in it, but we're expanding and understanding how use has come about. So thanks.

Good evening, Madam Mayor. Just a question for staff. Is this the section that deals with pipe stem lots?

It is.

Yeah, I mean, that's the only thing I'm against, only from a... just makes it difficult in some contexts for neighbors, but I do understand the need to expand and utilize land for housing purposes. I won't stand in the way of this one. I personally just have a thing for it, but that's neither here nor there. That's all I'll say. That's all.

Thank you. I've seen you're good. I'm good on this one. I just had a question. The pipe stem lots must be a minimum of 20 feet wide. That's for fire truck safety.

That's correct.

Okay. I know we've debated this topic, so we've gone through it already. There was an issue that you raised earlier about dams. Do we have dams?

In fact, we do.

Okay. Where?

That is not something that I have personal knowledge on. I have seen the map.

It is an issue that we have to address. Okay. Wanted to confirm. Are you good?

I'm good.

Okay.

All right. Enforcement. You didn't have anything here, but I did raise the issue of signs and public rights away, so if you can get back to us on that.

I think we heard loud and clear, and I will note two things on that. You'll be very pleased to hear, I believe, that we have refilled our senior zoning enforcement position, and they are starting on Monday of next week. So we're very excited about that. We'll definitely get them out there taking signs out of the right of way. And the other is that we are taking a look at fines currently, so we'll be able to address that as well.

And I know this came up in previous elections, but just clarity on if someone wants to report an issue with a sign, where should they go? If a sign is placed in their yard without permission, what should they do? Those are just recent things that I've heard, so I just wanted to flag that.

The property owner has every right to just remove it, so that's probably the easiest thing. there's someone that they want to tell us that that's happened and we can contact you know that campaign or whatever it is but just remove the sign and there's no it's just sorry it happened well I could go either way it is a zoning violation technically if they want to pursue that aspect of it we're certainly have the ability to do that but if it was my property I would just remove the sign

Right.

Thank you. Just to add to that, we do take complaints. So if someone had a strong objection to it, they certainly could contact us and we would investigate that as well.

Thank you. Councilman Valeri, go ahead. Sorry.

Sorry, it's getting later. So basically they contact your department directly? I'm trying to figure out because we have already heard, gotten a bunch of reports of, especially in the right of way. Okay. I just didn't want them to send them directly to you, Holly. You seem very nice. So, okay.

They could also use a report of concern, I would imagine.

I think the concern, sorry, Madam Mayor, the concern that was expressed with reported concern, a lot of concerns, is that there's a lag sometimes in the reported concern versus being able to talk to a human being on the phone. At least that's what I've heard. I can neither confirm nor deny.

Thank you. All right. I'm sorry. So there's, you're asking us about any other questions? Okay, I have, I do have a couple of questions 1 was, um, college gardens asked us some questions. I know that I sent something to the city manager and got a response out. Did that get to the college gardens community? Yes, we did send that to the college garden civic association and can you just clarify the response in terms of adjustment that you made in response to their concerns?

The adjustment that we made in response to their concerns was reflected in the revised staff draft. So we did hear loud and clear concerns about access to, I believe it's the secondary residential streets from MXCD properties. That is something that in the original staff draft had been removed. We added that back in, but we did coordinate with our inspection services division in CPDS and also the Department of Public Works to ensure that they would have the necessary flexibility to allow for roadway safety and function. So that revision is currently in the draft. When it comes to the purpose statement for the R-90 zone, We did evaluate the comment. We discussed it, but ultimately did not make a revision there. We do think that many of the concerns or one of the two points is covered by the purpose statement included in Article 1. And the other one includes some of the language I believe that you all were discussing earlier this evening, neighborhood character, a little bit more subjective language. And we did not recommend reintroducing that language.

Is that the entirety of the main issues?

Yes. To our knowledge, I would say yes.

Okay. And you've sent the response to them.

Correct.

Okay. I just want to make sure that we are listening and addressing concerns or providing a rationale And I would just mr. Council former councilman for Sheila and if you would like to talk to staff I just we're not taking questions from the floor But if perhaps someone can be available in the back so he can raise the concerns that he has that would be very helpful So someone will meet you in the back if you would like to talk Okay. The other piece that I wanted to flag is for bonus heights, we have previously modeled bonus heights when people provide additional affordable. So are we doing that for the Newmark Commons piece, or are you just giving the bonus height away? Okay.

I believe that the only way that that particular property in Planning Area 12 would qualify for bonus height is if it is a qualifying project under the Housing Expansion and Affordability Act, which I know we've discussed many times before. I won't go into the details of that, but there are certain ways, certain criteria that you would need to meet, or if it came into the ownership of a religious institution.

So I'm just noting since we're giving 55, could they be asked to do more affordable units because technically 40 feet's allowed?

So, okay, so I think I'm understanding, correct me if I'm wrong, that there may be a desire among some members of the body to keep the RMD 15 height at 40 feet maximum with an additional MC. And I... with an additional increase for affordable housing above the minimum required.

I'm just trying to find ways to get more affordable units. We've done that in Town Center, and I'm just curious, could we apply a similar formula of sorts to get more affordable units? If they want to go up in height and we want more affordable, could we meet in the middle?

I would say technically it is possible, but we do have direction from the body as of two or three weeks ago regarding the recommendation for that site. So it would be kind of reopening the issue for consideration.

It's still allowing to go up to 55, but we're asking them to do more affordable for that to get to that point.

That is something that technically we could write into the ordinance. It would be something, you know, we would write the provision.

Okay, Council Member Valeri. Sorry about that.

I would be in support of that. I think, again, I think something that this body has said repeatedly from the dais is that if we're going to have one policy in one area of the city, we want to make it equitable across all parts of the city. So why wouldn't we do that here? or anywhere in the city like if if folks want to You know go up and beyond What I think you're hearing is, hey, more MPDU units is a really good thing, but there does need to be a give and take. And I think that that's how we are able to prevent market rate only or with very little MPDU units from kind of taking over and allowing us to not meet our affordable housing goals. So I would be supportive of that same standard across the city.

Uh, thank you. I just, I've, I've sat on a many a cog meetings and they're saying, yes, we need more housing and we need 70% of it should be affordable and there's nowhere we're getting close to that quite yet. So I just wanted to find other ways to get more affordable and I thought I would ask a creative solution.

We hear what you're saying. We do believe that's a major change to apply to either across the city or even to the RMD 15 zone there. Currently there's no bonus height.

In the RMD zone, so currently in RMD 15, it's 40 feet, but we're allowing 55. so we're just saying if we're allowing it. Since it's unique to that site, they could do more affordable. I'm just asking.

Yeah, as Ms. Simmons stated, we could do that for the RMD 15 zone in particular.

Okay, thank you. Is anyone else interested in this besides Council Member Leary and I? Council Member Shah.

I'm just stating I'm also interested in exploring it. Okay, and Dr.

Miles as well.

Councilman Valeri. Oh, yes, thank you. I think this is kind of a similar issue on Rockville Pike as well, and I know that we have the Pike plan coming shortly, and I think that that'll be helpful, but I think it's, and again, maybe folks need more information on what this would look like, but it was the idea of the champion project status is constrained only to the pike. I understand that physically there's not that many places for a project that large, but again, I think we need to think through some of these zoning changes more broadly. and not be so focused. We are focused on transit-oriented development. I get that. Transit may look different in the future. And I think we're going to have to wrestle, or others will have to wrestle with that, maybe. But all these sort of exceptions, like allowing for more height if you have more MPDUs, I think would be a great benefit along Rockville Pike, 355, because we have untapped potential in that corridor. not only for access to transit, but just in the ability to go up to a certain height and have that large enough footprint. So I think that, I think it's, I think it bears that, I think we need to have that conversation. And thank you, Mr. Waslick for, I think it's significant, but What is the point of having a zoning ordinance rewrite if we're not going to think more holistically and broadly about where we want to go as a city? Just makes sense to me. And having this piecemeal like town center can do it and some of these areas can do it, I think ultimately it constrains our ability to really attract people that are gonna do this sort of investment in the city.

Thank you. I know this has been raised before, and I know we are going to have a Rockville Pike plan. I do know that that plan would get to really having a deep discussion about base heights. However, I would be comfortable with applying the same bonus formula that we've done right in front of the 355 corridor. I would support that.

If I may, upon giving it a bit more consideration, the one thing I would caution with the RMD 15, applying a bonus height there. Currently, we are applying bonus heights in areas where those are specifically recommended in the comprehensive plan or in a master plan. Updating the comprehensive plan, the town center master plan specifically calls for bonus heights. We're also applying them in areas where state law calls for it. We're really not applying them in other instances currently. So that is not to say that technically we could write this into the ordinance, but I do think adding it to the RMD 15 or considering other zones at this point would be a departure from the structure that we've been operating inside of. I would also note that the comprehensive plan for that property in the Tower Oaks planning area calls for the RMD 25. which allows for a base height of 75 feet. Currently, applying the RMD 15 with a 55-foot base height, even though that is an increase over what the RMD 15 zone allows, for that property, it is a 25 percent decrease, actually slightly over a 25 percent decrease. from what is currently implicitly recommended in the comprehensive plan. So I think those are just points that I would raise for consideration.

I appreciate that. I think there was four who said we'd like to see what it looks like. And we don't apply that increased height for other RMD 15, but we've, as a body, determined that we would go in that direction to support it. Um, there, but I, we are trying to find creative ways to get more affordability. So I just would appreciate that.

Follow up clarify so armed 15 with us with a 55 requirement plus the additional. Um, affordable units, but only in that section 12, not throughout the city. Correct. Okay. I got it. Thank you. Just want to make sure everybody heard it. Okay.

Okay. Thank you all very much. We are now moving on to our next agenda item and work session, the JEDI strategic plan. Thank you to staff for your hard work on that. Mr. Mihalik, I'll just note as we wrap up that we're going to see the rewrite for the first time. So as soon as we can get it, it would be greatly appreciated so that the public has enough time and we have enough time to dig in on the details and that we do another round of notifications to community associations on our Broad City Blast, et cetera. The ZOR.

The ZOR, for ZOR.

We're looking at the 15th, but if we can put it out sooner, we'll certainly do that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay. So, we now welcome Jean Booth, who is the Director of Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. And we also welcome Dr. Patricia Morgan, who is the consultant supporting this effort. Welcome to you both, and we're excited to hear about this JEDI strategic plan update.

Thank you very much and good evening, uh, mayor Ashton and council. I want to thank you for the opportunity to be here tonight and your patients. Um, and as you mentioned, I'm Jean booth, this is Dr. Patricia Morgan, and who's been leading this strategic planning tonight. We're going to bring you preliminary findings update, and we're here to share what we've learned, but also to get some feedback as we move forward. So this is an outline that shows what we hope to talk about tonight. We'll start with a very brief background to set some context, then pause to share two specific questions that we'd like your input on before we go into the data. We'll then walk you through the preliminary results from our internal and external engagement efforts. And we'll close with proposed next steps and timeline and return to those same questions so that you can give us your feedback. with the full picture of the data results in front of you. So at its core, this work is about understanding where we are and charting a clear path forward, not just internally, but from every angle so that we have all of the voices represented. We're assessing the current JEDI landscape across city operations and the community. We're identifying strengths and gaps and using what we find to develop this actionable five-year strategic roadmap with very measurable outcomes. We hope to have a stronger organizational culture deeper community trust, equitable service delivery across all populations, and a JEDI framework that is sustainable because it is integrated into how the city operates, that it's not treated as a separate initiative, but it's really woven into the fabric of how services are developed and provided to the communities. This is not a report that's gonna sit on a shelf. It's a living plan that is designed to guide decisions and to hold us accountable for real change. All right this slide briefly shows the work that we've done, which has been a lot it moved quickly and deliberately. The executive learning lab was engaged in January and by February our equity champions, which are the internal folks that represent all city operations. We're at the table helping shape the assessment framework and to identify community partners. In March, following the mayor and council work session that we had, we launched the organizational-wide staff survey and completed employee focus groups. In April, we conducted the external community listening sessions. And tonight in very early June, we're back before you with what we found. So four plus months from start to find to where we are today just reflects the urgency that we feel and that we know that you feel around this work. So our engagement strategy was built around five pillars. I'm going to go through them really briefly, but they are very important. We informed the public about what our goals were. We then consulted, gathering feedback through all of the different mechanisms internally and externally. We involved the internal and external stakeholders in deepening our understanding of what that feedback truly means so that we had some clarity. We're now moving into the collaboration phase. where we're going to be using the data that are, and to co-develop priorities, recommendations, and accountability measures. And ultimately, our goal is to empower. So using the strategic plan to give staff and residents a genuine role in shaping policies and practices that will affect their lives. So tonight's conversation is a part of that collaborative phase, and what you share with us tonight will be incorporated into the plan. So before we go into the data, we want to put out our two questions to you so that they can anchor everything that you hear from us tonight. First, we're asking if you support conducting additional community outreach before we finalize the strategic plan. And the data will reveal why we believe that that's necessary. And second, if you do agree, are there specific groups or communities that you would like us to prioritize in this next round of engagement? So we'll come back to those questions after we review the data. So now I'm going to turn it to Dr. Morgan, who's going to walk us through the framework and preliminary findings.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. Thank you for having me. As you can see from this framework, we presented this framework when we met in May, and we were guided by some of the feedback, all of the feedback that you all provided to us, especially with trying to target those groups that were underserved and usually underrepresented. And so we conducted multiple rounds of engagement efforts, which we'll present tonight. And then we also had inclusive practices as well as anyone who wanted to make ADA our accommodations request, we also did that as well. And so we'll be presenting some of the findings for tonight. So let's go to the next slide. All right, so right now you'll have what's completed on the left-hand column. So far we've completed internal staff surveys. We had over 200 participants completed. We had more that started. On the back end we can see the number of participants that start, but we had over 200 that were completed. We also completed seven internal staff focus groups across 13 departments. representing over 75 participants, and we completed the data analysis in the crosstab breakdown, which we'll share when we dig a little bit deeper into the quantitative data. In progress, we're gonna continue with your approval with mayor and council interviews, as well as extending the external community focus groups, and I'll share some of the numbers of the sample size that we have right now. All right, now we're gonna go into the internal engagement efforts. I'm going to first draw your attention to the staff survey, and then we'll go into some of the focus groups and listening sessions. All right, with the staff survey, we had 210 responses. We had an average response rate across all divisions of 38.3%. Every department exceeded a 30% participation rate, which is meaningful and signals our engagement and the staff's engagement in this process. By role, we had 43% mid-level employees completed, 22% supervisors and lead, 15% from the city's manager office and directors, 14% frontline, and 6% for the leadership team. We also heard from every level of the organization. All right, so we're going to first go into some of our areas of strength. These four numbers represent real organizational strength, so I want you all to be very proud of these numbers, and then we'll dig a little bit where we have to do some of the work. And I also want to name what some of this means before going on. Eighty-two percent of staff said that they felt valued and respected by their colleagues. Sixty-nine percent said that they could be their authentic self at work, though I do want to flag right now that we'll also go into the CRAST tabulation that we conducted across role, race, and gender, which was something that deliberately came from the council. And so I want to flag that for you, so we'll come back to that. 71% feel that their voice is heard in the decision-making process, and 75% say their department is actively working to retain diverse staff. Beyond the four metrics, we also had some open-ended responses and had a lot of great qualitative feedback from that. Three additional strengths worth highlighting from that, is they noted that Miss Jean Booth, the existence and accessibility of the Jedi director is to be commended, and they cited her frequently throughout the survey as well as in the focus group, and they see that her presence as a signal that the Jedi work that we're doing is a genuine priority and not just a policy statement. The staff also recognized the equity impact statement process that is embedded into the budget process and policy review as concrete structural achievements. And among leaders specifically, 98% feel confident in creating inclusive team environments. But we're going to get into what the staff say as well, so I just want to flag that for you. Eighty-two percent feel supported by CD leadership in advancing Jedi priorities. So that is a strong, some strong values and foundation to build on. So we have meaningful positives, and this is going to help us set the baseline against some of the gaps that I'll discuss. So let's go to the next slide. All right, so this was something that came after the March 2nd meeting. We went back to the JEDI Equity team and we wanted to make sure that we added those questions in that were specific to the in respect to intersectionality that the board brought up, the mayor and council brought up at the last meeting. And so the citywide numbers that we saw on the last slide tell one story, but this story tells a little different story. As requested by you all, when we disaggregate the data, we have significant disparities that are emerging, and these five are some of the major ones. Frontline staff scored significantly lower than managers on seven out of the eight program areas that we measured. And that was internal JEDI communication, external JEDI communication, hiring and retention, language services, disability accommodation, engagement with diverse communities, using data to identify disparities, and training. So out of those eight topics, the frontline staff scored significantly lower on seven out of the eight program, meaning that the employees that are closest to the residents and service delivery are the least connected to JEDI efforts and most likely to report experiencing discrimination. Women reported microaggressions at nearly twice the rate of men, 48 versus 27%, and feel less valued and less heard than their male colleagues. Black and African American employees reported lower ratings on authenticity and voice. in higher rates of both discrimination and microaggression, and Hispanic and Latino employees reported the highest discrimination and microaggression rates of any group and the largest gap on equal access to advancement opportunities. And employees in their first year reported significantly lower scores on hiring practice, language access, accommodations, and community engagement. As this may be, they may not understand what services are available right now. So now let's go into some of our survey findings and some of the gaps that we feel that we need to address. And we've brought this to the equity champions. Training gap is by far one of the most significant findings. Only 34% of staff reported that their departments offered any type of JEDI training. And we'll also talk about what the leader said in this one. And so we dug a little bit deeper inside of our listening session and focus groups to find out what they're looking for And they say they want in-person interactive training, shorter sessions that fit into their work schedules, scenario and role-based content. So one of our recommendation is to move training from awareness to application. They want to know what happens when I experience or I witness someone experiencing a microaggression, not tell me what a microaggression is, the technical definition. And then they also want specific training topics such as bias, respectful communication, microaggressions, conflict resolution, and general team dynamics. And let's talk about some inclusion opportunities. The survey results also focus on accessibility, and we show moderate performance here. 61% agree that their departments provide accommodations for both visible and invisible disability. I do want to note that only 5% of the respondents reported having either a visible and invisible disability, and 11% selected the button that they preferred not to answer. So we wanted to dig into that a little bit deeper to see, and we did during the focus group, what was going on with that question, and I'll explain a little bit more over there. 61% says language services are provided when needed. However, all of the group says that their accommodation request starts with their supervisor and not HR. So it's inconsistent across the board. your level of inclusion, accommodation, and those things are dependent on the supervisor that you have, the manager that you have. For example, staff reported delays in receiving some aeronomic equipment or even with medical documentation because that's a process that doesn't go through HR at this moment. Language access emerged as a critical gap in every focus group that we interacted with with the public. The current internal language bank system, they say, is slow. It places a burden on the bilingual staff. They are provided a stipend, but there's not a centralized bank of who the trained translators are, and so most people go to their favorite person, and that person ends up translating everything and having to do a lot of work. Language line exists also, we found out, but it's difficult to use and it's not well publicized. So staff default to using their personal phones, Google Translate, to assist residents in crisis situations such as eviction proceedings, which can be very timely, and they want better support there. There's also no centralized directory, I believe I said that, of multilingual staff, and they noted that one REC registration system has no language preference prompt. So staff can't proactively identify residents who need translation services. All right, now we're getting ready to go into some of the top barriers that leaders felt. Leaders said that, 49% of leaders said that they had unclear expectations from senior leadership. No, time constraint was 49%, unclear expectation, 51%. insufficient data 40% limited resources 35%. But they noted that it wasn't just money staffing was a huge concern. So they wanted to wanted that to be addressed as well. So leaders want to do this work, but they don't have clarity on what's expected, or the tools to implement it. Next. Now we'll go into one of the major themes that came up with shared organizational definition of JEDI. So during our focus groups that we conducted in early April, we had over 70 participants across all levels and department. Overall, attendance was strong in six out of the seven groups we are recommending in today's recommendation at the end to open up two more staff sessions for those that were unable to fall into the seven that we conducted earlier. And so here are some of the themes. There's no shared definition of JEDI. Most frontline staff have never heard of the acronym before, and there's no common language or role-specific model that tells, for example, park workers, police officers, administrative assistants, what JEDI looks like in their work. So they did have this in our research of past programs. They all, uh, some were aware of it, but most frontline staff had not had never seen this. Um, so this of course is a foundational gap without shared, not shared understanding and no consistent training program. We can't have a way to actually implement a strategic plan. Next, the next theme was focused on staff experience in the workplace. As I stated earlier, it's entirely dependent and determined by their immediate supervisor, not by the organization. Where supervisors model inclusive practices, staff feel valued. They feel that they have psychological safety. Where they don't, staff hesitate to even raise concerns and feel that issues go undressed. Process also, we had these microcultures that were being produced because of this, because we don't have a JEDI identity. And JEDI is something that cannot happen in teams, on some teams, and not happen in others. All right, the third theme, and most consistent across all findings, as I stated, that training exists, but they didn't find it useful. And then the fourth.

Yeah.

Yeah, we did this already. Yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Leaders genuinely believe that Jedi efforts are underway and moving forward. However, staff experience those same efforts as unclear, not connected to their daily work. So this isn't about the leaders are not being honest about their... their feelings that they're able to implement JEDI and create these safe spaces. But what we notice when we look at the roles is that as you start at the top, the leaders feel that they can do it. But as you get to frontline staff, when they start questioning about JEDI, its implementation, what does it look like in practice, the number goes down drastically. So it's not that anyone's being dishonest. I think the leaders think that they can do it. They just want accountability and want to know how to do it and the tools to do it. And then we also had additional internal focus group findings. Um, one of the big one was psychological safety. This varies across group, um, psychological safety, as you all know, is that shared belief for people to feel that it is safe for them to speak up that speak up culture to raise concerns. to be honest without fear of retaliation or judgment. And we saw meaningful variation in the sense of that across the focus groups. Some groups were forthcoming and other groups said that it depended on their managers. They were really afraid of retaliation. Even some noting that they appreciated having the focus group and they did not participate in the survey because they did not know if the survey would get back to anyone. And so that was a huge concern and something that we wanted to ensure that we kept those results confidential even when we share with our equity champions the breakdown. We don't show like departments, small departments and such. We bulk them together so that it's not easy to identify what's being said by departments. Second, JEDI is seen or widely experienced as compliance rather than culture. Staff described it in terms of training, initiative, and external mandates, not as a value. And so how the city hires, how it supervises, how it evaluates performance. So until it lives in those core functions, then we're going to have JEDI seen as more compliance than culture. And lastly, one that came up in almost every group is the federal climate is creating real and practical uncertainty. For example, grant applications are navigating DEI terminology. So there's some efforts that we have here to have inclusive practices with grants, but they are being limited because of the current federal mandate. So they want to know how is the work that we're doing right now aligned with the current federal mandates. All right now we're going to go to our external efforts and this is where we are looking for your feedback on how to continue supporting our engaging some of the groups that we mentioned earlier. All right, so on this slide, you can see our target number for each of our groups were 10 to 12. And you can see how many we have on the external side for seniors and targeted groups. I think that's the only one that we had enough to have sufficient summaries from because we had enough people in that group. But there were others where we only had one participant show up. But we also accommodated members of the community if they were unable to join one of the sessions or they fit across multiple sessions, we held private interviews with them as well so that we could hear their voice. And some participants didn't want to share their voice in a group and so we were able to accommodate them that way. Um, we also conducted individual, um, mayor and council interviews and we were asking to continue with that as well. Um, but we are also asking to continue with the, um, the additional focus groups, for example, the education groups, housing, faith, business and small, and maybe another round of, um, participants with disabilities as well. All right, so first I'm gonna give you the summary from the mayor and council interviews. There's five themes that came from here across all the participants that held individual interviews with us. First, geographic equity came up. Everyone named the east-west side divide as a persistent and unaddressed problem, especially with Twinbrook being called out as a neighborhood that does not feel seen or resourced equitably. Second, language access, along with the staff that came up in these interviews as well. It's near unanimous agreement that the current outreach channel only reaches residents that are already engaged with the city, and we experienced the same thing. We sent over 250 emails. to 250 different organizations and groups, and we found that the people that showed up found out through word of mouth, despite having the flyers and the different promotional materials that we developed. Third item that came up, training. Participants want training to extend not just for staff, but also elected officials, boards, and commissions. Fourth, accountability. There's a strong call for outcome-based KPI key performance indicators and not just progress. We don't want to measure progress. We want to know what does this look like in five months, in a year. And we also saw this with the staff wanting to know could we do the survey again and see if those numbers move after we implement some of the suggestion. And fifth, this came up before in the staff group, but the federal climate participants acknowledge that immigration enforcement is actively deterring community members from engaging with city services and coming to different events, which is also why we held some virtual sessions as well to create a safer space for that problem. Now, we'll go into some of the groups. Of course, these are groups that have limited engagement, so we will not be able to generalize these findings, but they're just here so that you can get some of the feedback that we have. For housing and faith-based community, we have people in these groups that range from Housing, economic, faith-based, youth, and for these different groups, we had about two to four in these different ones. They said the themes that emerged were on the housing and economics. Navigating the city's services is a complex issue for them. If only residents... with social capital that can figure out what's going on. On faith-based organizations, the population most in need, Latino immigrants, transient families, and seniors are largely invisible to the city's current engagement infrastructures, and they also noted that faith communities are underutilized. Um, for the education and youth group, they documented disparities between after school programs and under resource areas. Um, and then they also know that majority Latino areas versus wealthier neighborhoods and immigration enforcement is disrupting youth and family participation in the way that the city has been addressing it previously. And also the city, you know, doesn't control the county schools. So there was some issues there. Now, for the next group, for the seniors in diverse communities, we felt like we had a good amount to generalize some of these themes, so I'll go through some of the participants that we had. Across the participants that we had, we had people representing disability advocacy organizations, the Human Rights Commission, AAPI in Caribbean, community liaisons, and others. They were very knowledgeable, but also they said that they also had the social capital to find out about these events from someone in the neighborhood, so that was We can keep that in mind. On digital accessibility, they said that the city's emails are not properly screen reader compatible and images lack audio descriptions. On physical accessibility, community center equipment requires staff to operate, which is exclusionary. And they also mentioned Twin Book Community Center, again, as having sidewalk and transit barriers that prevent nearby residents from safely addressing it. On transportation, they noticed that flex rides coverage and hours were insufficient, and we know that that's not the city's domain. And some of the bus routes in Twinbrook do not safely cross Rockfields Pike in the evening. On AAPI barriers, the AAPI community said they're not a monolithic and they do not share the same media, and we cannot treat them as one audience. There was also jurisdictional confusion, which was also cited in the last report that we reviewed from previous years. This one was the needs analysis that came out in 2024, and we found similar findings. that residents don't know which services belong to the city versus which ones belong to the county. They did give some glowing remarks about some of the city's program, specifically the autism acceptance proclamation, which was described as being genuinely moving, and participants said they were brought to tears by the depth and intentionality of the event. With the business and civic owners, we had two and four participants, respectively. And so we had a lot of participants who named real gaps. Twinbrook, again, residents felt that they were left behind. They noted that they had mold in some of the lower resource and income apartments, receiving less city attention than some of the wealthier neighborhoods. They also noted that award programs and advisory boards skew white. and renter and apartment residents being systemically excluded from outreach design around homeowners association. But again, we only have two to four, so we can't generalize these themes. And now we'll go to some of the cross-cutting themes across all of our sessions. First, the people most in need are the hardest to reach, and this is not a motivation problem with our residents. It's a structural design problem in how we conduct our outreach. Our systems are built for people who are already engaged. So if you think of Engage Rockville, if you think of all the areas where they have access to information. Second, language access is a system and not a translation. So providing translated document is a starting point, but it's not a solution. We need real language access, trusted messengers, culturally relevant communication, and meeting people through channels that they actually use. Next, geographic equity in Rockville is the most visible gap. Twinbrook came up by name in nearly every session and interviews that we had. The east and west divide is not perception. It's a pattern that shows up in resources, representation, and responsiveness. Four, Rockville is actually doing a really good job in a lot of areas, but it is uneven. We heard real praise for some of the city's programs and the moments of inclusions that we have. The challenge is that you are not starting from zero. It's replicating what works well across all communities and all departments. And lastly, measurement and accountability are non-negotiables. All participants said that they want commitments and not a plan. They want to know who is responsible and how will we know that it's working. So that is the question that our firm is answering. I'll hand it back now to Ms. Booth.

Hello. So now we're going to shift. And based on everything that you've heard tonight, we're going to talk a little bit about next steps and then get some feedback from you. So for our internal efforts, we're proposing next steps are that we'd like to add some additional focus group sessions specifically for programming staff. And that's really important because those are the folks that are most Closely connected to the residents of the city, and we want to make sure that we have a robust representation of their feedback on how things are going. Sorry, and we're proposing to. get more additional feedback from our larger departments. So our CPDS, Community Planning and Development Services, and HCD, which is not one of our larger ones, but it is a very important one because they are very closely connected to the community. So we're hoping to have those particular programming staff represented in a more robust way. And then externally, you see here five communities that we'd like to reconnect with, add some additional recruitments and sessions for five of those stakeholder groups that you see listed here. It has the details, but the through line across all five is the same. These are the voices of residents who interact with the city services in the most direct and consequential way. And we wanna make sure that they are robustly represented in our data so that we can make sure that our plan will be meaningful for them. So I'm just gonna move on. So our timeline is that in May and beyond, we hope to complete the mayor and council interviews We hope to conduct some additional staff focus groups. We just mentioned that. Conduct additional community focus groups and begin the strategic planning sessions with our equity champions. Excuse me. And then starting in June, we'll bring it all together. All data collection will close by the end of the month. Cross tab analysis will be finalized and we'll integrate every data source. The survey, the focus groups, the interviews, the community input into a cohesive picture. We will incorporate the direction that you give us tonight and we'll deliver a draft five-year strategic plan with a year one roadmap for your review. And that will be in late July. We plan to finalize the plan, establish the baseline metrics and progress tracking system that is going to hold us, me, all of us accountable going forward and present this final plan to you. And this timeline is achievable. It's ambitious. And we know that. And it will be helped by your feedback. With your support, we will stay on track. And we are ready to move forward. I think I might have missed one thing. Is that a note for me? No. OK. We're passing notes back here. So our requested feedback again are, do you support additional outreach? Are there specific groups that you'd like to see prioritized in our outreach efforts? You've already seen the participation data. We've been real transparent about what we have been able to achieve to this point. More than 250 organizations were contacted. They were emailed multiple times. We had a lot of communication and flyering and postcards and things that went across the community. And despite that effort, a lot of our sessions with the external community did not meet our threshold or projected our and what we hope to achieve with 10 desired thank you threshold of 10 to 12 participants in each community. So our question to you is, Simply, do you support this? We believe that we cannot responsibly call this plan community informed without a more robust participation. So that's why we're asking you that. But we do want your direction. And then if that answer is yes, our second question is equally important. Are there specific groups or communities in this table that you want us to prioritize. We know that you have relationships with the community. We know that you have access points that we may or may not also have. And we know that there are populations that we have not effectively reached, and we want to hear from you tonight. One of the things I want to mention is that that list in those tables is not an exhaustive list, but it is just a representation of the groups that we did reach out to. Again, lots of emails, 250 emails. And it was conducted through email, personal contact, and then public flyers at all of the facilities. We have the Engage Rockville page that is up and live, and we're providing updates as often as we possibly can. We've reached out to all staff liaisons and to all board commissions and task force members. And so this just demonstrates a summary of the representative organizations that we contacted. So those are our two questions. I'm going to pause.

Thank you very much. I know everyone up here has been super excited about the plan development. I know we've been working and waiting on this since last term, and everyone has been totally supportive of this initiative. So I just want to speak on, I think I can speak on behalf of all my colleagues and say we are very thankful that this is moving forward. I do, I'm gonna go in line, but I did want to say, based on my colleagues, we've always supported additional outreach to be more representative, so I think that is not, can we just do a thumbs up on question one?

Okay.

All right. I'm sure each of us will have ideas of organizations. I'm wondering, do you want us to spend time giving names up here, or can we email those to you?

I think if you email them to us, that would be just fine. Okay.

I just want to make sure we're using our time wisely. All right. I have a lot to say, and I'm excited, but I'm going to follow the stack. So, Councilman Van Graak, you're up next.

Don't want to go into excruciating detail, but a couple things. One, this is fantastic. You've really done an effort, and I think it showcases what my guess is we all know. We're doing some things really good. We're doing some things not so good, and that we really need work. We need, obviously, just as the Mayor said, more outreach, and we need to drill into some of those areas. Obviously, just as the Mayor said, I think there's a number of lists that I and my colleagues have, but two things I do want to bring up. One, and I know you've touched on this a little bit, something that I think we need to address beginning around September of 2023. There was an incident with regard to the Jewish community, and there was intended by the mayor and council, by a resolution, to have a circle back with the Jewish community with regard to some of the feelings that the community had. And when we brought it up, it's we're gonna get back to this when we get into the ready communication. That, I think, is something we need to at least address, because I know that I don't think there's been a communication directly with the Jewish community as a follow-up for some of the things that happened before. And I know that I've been contacted every now and then by some in the Jewish community saying, hey, is there ever going to be that follow-up? And we're now kind of three years from that. So I want to make sure that as part of this outreach, we're being cognizant of the fact that if we're touching base with the Jewish community, which you clearly are, it's on the list, that we're doing so with the knowledge that they're probably waiting for some type of additional, hey, where's the communication that was supposed to come? The only other thing I do want to add, and I think you've touched on it clearly, you've heard there's a geographic divide. And with regard to the future outreach, just as kind of there's the issue with going on the kind of the Twinbrook East Rockville side, there's an issue kind of west of 270. And interestingly enough, there isn't an organization here listed that's from the west of 270. Part of the reason for that is... it's almost exclusively residential. And what that means is if we're mostly just targeting organizations or businesses, we're really not going to touch the west of 270. And so, it makes it difficult, especially when we look at some of the surveys and feedbacks coming from the city, and we have the geographic, The west of 270 is one of the areas that gets low. And I know that some of the feeling from the west of 270 is feeling separated from the city. Now, some of that might be because there aren't a lot of organizations for us to be able to more easily touch base in an organization from the area. But it might mean that we need to do a little bit of extra drilling into some of the residents in that area to kind of see how they're feeling with regard to the issue that you have directly addressed, which is geographic diversity. um but i think overall this was extremely helpful and i think it really showcases some of the things that in the city we really need to improve it on and i think that and i'm really hopeful that with the further engagement with the further figuring out a plan because the first step, as you noted, is figuring out what do we need to do or what are some of the problems. The more difficult step is what are we going to do about it. And I know that's, and I also want to, I think you identified properly That's a pretty aggressive timeline because we still haven't even finished, as you've acknowledged, the outreach to try to figure out where some of the problems are. So I want to encourage you that I know this has taken a long time. This body has talked for a while about trying to get it done quickly, but... We don't want to rush things because this is so important. As you are finding out, there's a lot of things that we can do better, and I want to make sure that the city does better in all those areas. So thank you for everything you're doing, for really highlighting it. I think very clear in identifying some of the things that we really need to do better. So fantastic job. I appreciate it. And I'll follow up via email, obviously.

Thank you. Dr. Miles.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I want to thank staff both for your patience and I know this was rescheduled, and thanks for staying, hanging out with us late tonight. Thanks for the work that you've put into it, and I'll get my specific groups back to you all via email. Thanks so much.

Thank you. Council Member Fulton.

So on this feedback, yes, I will give some suggestions. One of the things that might address what Council Member Van McGraken was saying was HOAs. Like, there's, it's not that there's more residential, well, there are more residential units, but it's not a residential versus non residential. It's community association versus HOA, that I think might cause part of the problem there. I just I had two other questions that I'm just gonna ask. One, on the internal side of things, remind me, I knew I knew this at one point, the equity champions, Roughly speaking, that's comprised of what level and what's the representation on that group?

Thank you for that question. They are between line staff and mid-level managers. So there is a senior leadership It's a separate group. So yes, it's the folks that are connected.

Perfect. I just thought that, but I just want to make sure. Overall, I thought the survey was, I've done a lot of these in my day. Your actual response rate and representation in that survey was, you guys didn't give benchmarks for a lot of this stuff, like compared to other organizations. I would be willing to bet that both in terms of response and even some of the sentiment, it's better than a lot of places. Not that we don't have work to do. My other question that I raised this last time we talked, it is incredibly important to do all the work you're doing on outreach and we should do more of it. And hearing from people makes it a credible process and a meaningful process. At the same time, I saw all my colleagues nodding. There's very little that surprised anybody. What I'm worried about is the translating, the identifying the problem into a plan. You've got outreach concluding and a strategic plan being done all in the same month, and I don't know how you make that leap. You used words that I actually wrote down, resources, representation, and responsiveness. I'm interested in knowing how we turn the feedback we get into these are your problem areas or your areas for improvement into what are we gonna do about it. So if you guys tell me you can get that all done in like, Two weeks, great.

It's not really.

It says June. So that's the only thing I'm interested in and or concern I have is turning the problems into a plan. Or you said plan isn't what people want, they want commitments. Problems into commitments. But those are my only thoughts. Thank you. Council Member Valeri.

Thank you, and thank you. This was a phenomenal presentation. You know, coming from Twinbrook, I was feeling all sorts of feels. It was one of the few neighborhoods stated, but it's why I am who I am, and I absolutely cosign everything all that feedback because I know it and I see it and I feel it so thank you thank you for that I feel about really good um definitely have some ideas to add to this I think in the same vein as councilmember Van Graak noted I would flag that they there are two Catholic churches in the city of Rockville And especially for certain outreach, I think, again, I'm not trying to paint anyone with a broad brush, but we got a lot of Catholics. And I think that that would be great. And I know St. Raphael's, I will not call it Raphael's, in particular has a tremendous Latino outreach. So I would throw that out there. But I can send more on that. I definitely think, and I think I could say a lot of stuff, but the one thing that literally I wrote the note that this hurts my soul, and that is the 11% of people that don't feel comfortable to share that they have a visible or invisible disability. And so I think that, and even, the feedback for the autism acceptance proclamation that felt a little like we got to do more than just proclamation sort of like yeah anyway so any sort of outreach maybe more significant outreach to NAMI they NAMI Montgomery County were phenomenal in during the Diversion Center conversation really highlighting and lifting up folks you know from the mental health community and from the recovery and substance use disorder community so I think getting more of those voices as folks feel comfortable to engage I think that might go a long way to like hey what are we doing that you know, that maybe folks don't realize they're doing, but even doing like, oh, that proclamation was so heartwarming. It was, but we have a lot of great proclamations. Like, we got to make it feel comfortable for everybody. But thank you all. I enjoyed my time and the interview process. I thought it was really... it was solid. And I, you know, if anything that we can do to to be better ambassadors to kind of be like, hey, I talked to these folks, they were awesome. And you know, please let us know because we can maybe kind of help to help you out. So thank you very much.

Thank you very, very much. As I noted, I'm excited about this plan. It's a long time coming. And the phrase that I really liked is moving from compliance to culture. I think that's the goal of what we're trying to do. And once we have the right the culture and it's supported, then we can start to see like the outcomes and the measures because it's going to be a part of our DNA and how we operate. And I think that will really help us sing as an organization and people will not only hear our hearts, but they will see it in action. And so I'm very hopeful. I mentioned the additional outreach. I do think that the staff Outreach is strong. The community one needs a lot more work. And I appreciate what you're doing. One of the things I thought was, are we doing the same kinds of outreach approaches that the city's already been doing that's not reaching the people we want to reach? So is it that we need to be going to that swim team meet or the basketball soccer game or, you know, just being where people are as a public health professional and has done a lot of community leadership work You go to where people are. You don't just expect them to fill out a survey. And you make them feel like, why should they do this? So I'm just wondering if our approach, if we might employ a couple of different tactics versus continuing to send out the survey link to more people. In terms of the emails that you sent out, there were over 200. Did that include staff emails or that was all community outreach emails?

Those were externals.

And that came from the consultants or from staff, the email?

The emails came from me.

Okay. All right. Okay. That's helpful. I was just wondering if people were like, who's this person? Possibly. And the language and geographic access really resonated with me. I will say there are things that I have found, like the issue with, not being seen in surveys and populations. Like there's small tweaks that we can do that'd be like, yes, we get it. And they're systematized so that every department is doing them in the same way. Some get it right. Some may not be as familiar. And so there are things that everyone shouldn't be starting from this from scratch, right? We should be building on the tools to help each other on here are some of the foundational geo socioeconomic geographic background questions we're gonna ask. Okay, now get to the content. So that at least there's some uniformity there. I really like the positive feedback as well. Very, it's heartwarming to hear Ms. Booth about the leadership and people seeing you as accessible, that is step one, right? Because if people see you as a visible resource and they see that you really care about this work, they'll want to help you. I actually did feel moved as well about the autism acceptance. There was a proclamation, but we also did some work that summer to really address some of the elopement issues and it's pairing the proclamation with what are we doing to change our programs and the design of our community swim center. And it was good to see the police department get some kudos as well in terms of them being able to be seen as a trusted partner in Rockville. I know that's not every community feels that way so I thought that was really strong. There was the work, what do we need to do, the operational implementation really stood out to me. I wanted to just flag the JEDI training. So I was on council when George Floyd really was a big national conversation. And the farther we get from it, the lower the output and the activities. There were in-person trainings with staff. um we we moved but then over time that stuff fades and how do we not be like something happens okay now we got to move something happen it's like again how do we make it part of our culture so that it's being done on a consistent basis and we're building it into our protocols this is how this is going to happen over what frequency we need to write that stuff down uh and make sure that you know staff changes mayor and council changes but there's a part of our ethos that stays core to who we are. The other piece I wanted to flag is Boys in Commissions training really was something that was discussed last term, and I heard some this term as well. They advised the mayor and council, and there have been some issues in the past. I haven't heard as many this past few years, but it's a thing that we need to make sure that we're doing that work. I like the idea of not just saying what is a microaggression and what is this and that, but how do we create scenarios that people can figure out how do I handle this? And that goes on the side of the person who feels like they have been discriminated against or there's a microaggression against, but also the people who may be doing those things and not even realizing that they're doing them. That is a big thing and we need to have that conversation on both sides because sometimes it's awareness issues, sometimes people are aware and still doing it, but just thinking about both perspectives as we do that training. I was curious to see if you all did a comparison between the last employee survey and this one. What has changed, what hasn't? Did you guys have a chance to look at the results of the past survey, and are we making progress? I will say that the issue of gender came up last time, microaggressions came up last time, so I didn't see that presented, so I was just curious if that's something that can be shared with us.

We don't want to short shrift it tonight and given the hour, but we'll send a separate relatively detailed email with the comparison.

And I would like that to be in the future packets as well.

You bet. Just to be honest with you.

Okay, perfect. The language piece is a real thing. And I, and I agree with it's not just translation. It's how we approach. each community in their own language and cultural sensitivity. And I also like some of the operational comments that staff gave in terms of thinking of a centralized bank, spreading the workload so it's not just one person. And one of the things that also stood out to me was thinking about communications for people with disabilities. I know I keep talking about this, but it is a thing. We just did our website. I don't know if this survey was within enough time, but are we still not 508 compliant?

We are. That has been updated. Websites have been updated since the survey.

So at least that part is addressed. And what about the tagging and stuff? I don't have to answer that now, but I just...

I think it's the emails.

It would be good to just show that if we're already addressing some of those issues, we're making progress. We're not going to wait for... a plan to descend upon us. In terms of outreach, other parts of outreach, I felt like we were missing, I'm just thinking of some of the groups that, I didn't see a focus on nonprofits. I think some of them are embedded, but that is, they are so close to the human needs that people have. I thought that could be an addition, like a focus on who are the, and we have grantees, right? Can we get all the grantees to respond? But I have just learned so much in talking to our nonprofits because they are frontline seeing what's happening to everyone, a lot of people every day. I didn't see whether we're really getting a lot of feedback from the boards and commissions. So the HRC and the Human Services Commission, they both did surveys in the past that did some sort of a climate survey. I'm not sure if that was looked at on this or if we've gotten their feedback, but I just wanted to flag that to your attention. And when we're looking at renters groups, like expanding them as well, like Maryland Legal Aid and others, I'm not gonna go through the whole list. And the Rockville Villages would be another great list to be. But I also just wanted to think about making sure we're getting responses from each of the geographic areas. And so when we do surveys, we try to report out on have we heard from East Rockville, West Rockville, North, South. I think that would be helpful to track. During our last term, we started with a matrix and it was hard for me to see like, how is this going to translate into the functional areas of work? So there's a lot of work and I've developed these kinds of plans before. and I'm feeling for you, because I know it's a lot of work. But I'm gonna be optimistic and just know that there's a lot on your plate with this. And one area that we did talk about, race, language, disabilities, gender, interfaith, I didn't see explored, and that was something we actually talked about as a body. previously so I think that I wanted to call that out I agree with some of my colleagues that I'm I I trust the process but I also think that there's a lot to be done to create a five-year plan and so I just would ask for radical honesty if you try this again and you know you want to produce the best product that you can, and please feel free to share that information with us. Participation, I did think that it was pretty good, but I would really like to get the frontline employees, because they also see people every day, and maybe it's not just, not all the frontline employees are sitting in front of a computer. They're taking out trash. They're cleaning our streets. They are They're not used to sitting in front of devices that way, the way office level work is done, and so we might have to be creative on our approach there too if we really want their responses. I have more to say, but I know it's late, and I'm gonna pause there. But just a thank you. Thank you very much. This means so much to our city and to our residents, and also to, in this moment, in this country at this time, to say this mayor and council and this entire city team is moving forward to support justice, equity, diversity, inclusion, I think means something, and I just want to say thank you. Council Member Jackson.

Wow. No, first of all, thank you. This is really exciting. I know that I spent time talking with you at length, and you've taken all of our feedback. and the feedback of the the staff and the residents I really don't have a specific Group that I would prioritize Prioritize at least that I will go through right now But I think that this list of people that you have reached out to is really impressive So I don't want to give the impression to anybody listening at this hour that that you somehow came up short. I mean, this is really great work, and I really appreciate the presentation. It was really thorough and well done. I really don't have any questions to say, well done, but, and this is, I think you alluded to this, Well, let me back up for a second. I do agree with the mayor, what she said about getting out to events, to the swim team, to community-oriented events, because I think that Having a survey by email is good, but you can't get the same honesty and the questions answered the way you can in the communities themselves and face-to-face. And I think that some residents who are difficult to reach, maybe you could reach them by getting out to those events. Now the one other thing that I will say is we are great in terms of putting together a plan. I mean five-year plan, four-year plan, one-year plan, but execution is really where it's going to be at. And, City Manager, I'm looking into you. I think, I mean, we're going to have to be really serious, take this plan, and really execute it so that it's not something that just sits on the shelf, but becomes a living, breathing, culture-changing kind of document. And so that's really where the rubber meets the road. I'm really happy where we are. I think we're going in the right direction, but I guess, you know, it's going to be up to us, the city manager, and, you know, city staff to actually execute it and make it really a cultural change. And just one more thing, and I just echo the mayor. I'm really proud that we're doing this work. I mean, in the environment that we're in right now, with the federal government and with the attacks on businesses, Jedi di I mean the fact that we're doing this work and proudly and openly says a lot about Rockville So thank you very much Councilman Bashar

I wanted to echo my colleagues and thank you. This is very impressive and excellent work. Um, I did have a few questions. I kind of want to take a step back here and understand what is the goal of the strategy. And I say that because there are a lot of disparities throughout the city in housing, in income, in jobs, in public health. There's just across the board. And I've also seen plans come and go based on justice, equity, diversity, inclusion. And I've seen them come and go like trends. And the disparities, there are some disparities that are actually increasing. And also, I think there's some of our diversity is also it's our diversity isn't as it's lessening a bit. And it could just be because folks are moving or, you know, there's a lot of different things that I think need to be tracked. And so can you just share a little bit more, because I know we're talking about services, we're talking about accessibility, we're talking about justice, equity, diversity, inclusion, we're talking about language, like there's all these things, and I know that when we took the GARE training, the approach was also understanding that race has some of the most profound outcomes and it intersects even with different groups in terms of seniors. Like we can go across the board and race has some of the most profound impacts, structural impacts. And so could you just share a little bit more about like the goal and the approach? Because we're covering a lot of different things. And yeah.

Okay, so I think that we're our preliminary goal is to gain some clarity on the service delivery and the gaps and and what's the community is identifying as the need, right? So and then we can help the organization set some priorities around where are we going to start and where that's why it's a five year plan. So What can we address now? What are our short term goals, long term, mid term goals, long term goals? We have some of those in the past, but we want to make sure that when we're developing the plan that it's actionable, right? So it's not just, oh, we want to improve health outcomes for people. We want to be really specific and really clear about how we're going to do that and how we're going to be able to check back in and say, Did you move that needle? And how much? And if not, what needs to shift so that you can do it? So that's gaining the clarity, being really clear and concrete about what our goals are, and listening to the public. So I have great ideas, I like to think, of what we should be doing. And I think it needs to be informed by people with lived experience. So that, in a nutshell, is what the goal is. which is hopefully helpful.

Service delivery.

Service delivery and the experience for internally, we want to make sure that the people that work here feel supported and respected and resourced so that they can be successful also. So it's twofold.

So it's the organization... and service delivery. Correct.

Okay.

Because I would love to see a plan that's like Vision Zero or like the CAP plan where we're talking about this regularly. We have presentations. We have data. We have, we're evaluating the data. We have like actual measurements. And instead of kind of like, I mean, I love a proclamation, but it, that, that doesn't necessarily substitute for policy, right, and service. And, you know, there's a lot of nice words and proclamations, but we also have to, like, make sure that the same things that we're saying in the proclamations are coming out in our outcomes. And there's actual, you know, the way in which we're measuring these outcomes, we're disaggregating the data, and we're seeing real change, which actually gets to equity. So I think just having more specificity with what we're doing I think would be really helpful. I have a lot of respect for all these organizations here. I also just want to echo my colleagues and share that I feel like this is still very much a bubble on the slide. These are folks that I think are just like really well connected to the city. I think it's kind of like the same folks outside of the mayor and council, like the next fear outside of the mayor and council, not necessarily the community. And then I noticed that you had two or four people that you were talking to. And it would be good to understand the demographics among like across the board with your stakeholders, like, you know, like gender. I mean, you don't have to share it, but just like understandings or like where they're living or just to see if there's some diversity, because I'm I know that our boards and commissions, there's a lot more opportunity for them to be more diverse. And so, I think these are great groups to start with, but I just, I don't see like, I mean, there's a few groups here, but I just think that these folks are the closest to us, right? And I do think we should have start with the GARE training starting with data, disaggregated data. What are the disparities in housing? What is the overall population currently right now? Has our diversity increased or has it not increased? Because we keep talking about diversity and celebrating it and all of this, but let's see the numbers. Um, also, uh, income and jobs. Um, how is our, or I think you have small business here too, but I think, you know, that's a whole nother issue as well. Um, so, and I know I'm like throwing all these things out there, but I think at the same time, understanding having a just, a justice or Jedi lens in all of these issues, um, I think it's really important to, to get to equity or to get to justice. Um, Oh, and I also think that a really important document is 10-21. And I kind of feel like we don't go back to that document very much. It's there. And again, it's like we see a lot of these things come and go. I think we have to just be very intentional all the time. And one of the ways in which we can practice that document, 10-21, are through really strong, thorough equity impact statements and just making it particularly clear on how we are making decisions. Because if we have these equity impact statements that are projecting if we are advancing equity or if it's regressing or what have you, and we are voting against it, we just want to, I mean, we just want to be clear about that. You know, we just want to be clear about that. And so, and that is also another way, because we haven't talked about accountability yet as well. And there could be some ways within that equity statement that there's more accountability And I know it's really late, so I'm like throwing all these. But I think this is a really excellent start. And I just, you know, I echo every single thing that my colleagues have said. And I would love to just see more specificity. And we have a lot of great plans that we're tracking and measuring. And I would love to see the same thing with justice.

Thank you very much. I think you've got a lot of feedback and ideas. May the force be with you. But thank you again. I appreciate the feedback of my colleagues. And I will flag that that previous matrix was going into issue areas versus this seems to be more global services. So I'm curious to see how you're going to marry the two, what the output would be. So thank you very much.

Thank you.

We're now moving on to our mock agenda. Does anyone have any comments or feedback? Okay, great. All right, next we have old new business. Anyone have anything? I have, just listening to some of the feedback we heard, I know Mr. Mihalik is looking at the apron issue. I'm horrified that someone has fallen because of the driveway aprons, and it's a senior who we want, we want our seniors to be able to safely go out. Could you just give us an update on where we are, even if you're following up, but I know you may need to come back to us.

We are absolutely going to follow up. We've already been in contact. And we'll certainly take a look and see if we can do an immediate correction. Thank you.

Thank you so much. I wanted to flag two things just as something to watch as we're talking about equity and public safety. there are a number of positions that relate to loss of English language learner support, counselors, special ed supports, that those PPWs uh within the school system the very positions that help lift up our community and provide wraparound services and so i just think it's important for us as a city to monitor what's going on mcps because the needs are not going to go away they may amplify with this so i just um i just wanted us to flag it and to see you know how does that impact our community and what do we need to do in collaboration with MCPS and the county. I also just wanted to raise the continued conversation with that in mind about at-risk youth. And then lastly, just wanted to follow up on the childcare tax credit discussion that we had. I'm not seeing additional hands. Thank you everyone. You all provided such thorough comments tonight and I just want to say thank you to staff and to my colleagues. I hope you have a great evening. And with that, do we have a motion to adjourn?

Who wants to go?

Council Member Bragg.

Motion to adjourn.

Who's going to second? I'll second. All right, second. All those in favor, please raise your hand and say aye.

Aye.