Hey y’all. It’s spring in Maryland… the grass is turning green, trees are starting to bud, and Mother Nature is throwing out random temperatures like she’s picking Powerball numbers.
It’s also spring in an election year, so local candidates are out and about canvassing, doing interviews, and making social media posts. Which means that the usual myths and bellyaching about housing, adequate public facilities, and school capacity are making the rounds in Howard County’s metaverse. So today, I’m going to do three things. One, I’m going to ask that everyone re-read the piece I wrote last year titled Perception vs. Reality that dispelled a number of common housing myths. Two, I’m going to share the testimony I sent to the County Council regarding Deb Jung’s bill CB9-2022 to change the criteria for an APFO waiver, because I think her bill clearly illustrates how elected officials exploit these myths to deflect responsibility and create a pretense of taking action that will only ensure the continuation of the status quo. And three, I’m going to encourage everyone to read The Merriweather Post’s explainer on the Patuxent Commons project and send supporting testimony of CR29-2022 to the County Council.
My testimony on CB9-2022:
I write to you in opposition to CB9-2022, which would modify the criteria for a housing development to receive an Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance (APFO) waiver.
CB9’s requirement for affordable housing developers to meet with HCPSS prior to applying for grants or Low-Income Housing Tax Credits in order to qualify for an APFO waiver creates a pretense that ensuring adequate school capacity is the developer’s responsibility. It is not; it is yours.
A constellation of bad decisions by Howard County’s elected leaders past and present have led to our current school capacity issues, and those issues are the government’s responsibility to solve. APFO does not add school capacity – building schools does. And it is wrong to allow our government’s continued failure to build schools, and its adoption of policies that make it harder to build even affordable housing, to exacerbate a housing crisis that impacts our lowest-income residents the most.
As I write this testimony, I am reminded of Anne, a resident of Roslyn Rise to whom I spoke when the APFO waiver for its redevelopment was under consideration. Anne lives alone, is disabled, and cannot work. She waited six years on a housing waitlist before being placed at Roslyn Rise seven years ago. Folks like Anne don’t have the luxury of choice when it comes to housing. Imagine the indignity of having so little agency over your housing situation because policymakers have decided that affordable housing should take a backseat to other infrastructure.
Affordable housing and school capacity are not an either/or proposition. There are families with HCPSS students who need affordable housing, and there are adults like Anne, who have no school-aged children, who also need affordable housing. We can solve both; it just takes political will.
I would rather we use our political will to build schools and affirmatively further fair housing, rather than use it on bills that will build neither housing nor schools. It is long past time for “adequate public facilities” to include affordable housing.
Happy Spring, y’all.