Good afternoon. It is September 23rd. We're here for our afternoon session with the Planning Housing and Parks Committee. We are returning to continue our conversation on the 2024 to 2028 growth and infrastructure policy. We have colleagues with us from council staff as well as from the planning department and I believe we also have some of our executive branch folks as well who have joined us today. Welcome to everybody. We are going to continue from the September 16th work session that covered the planning boards recommendations for school adequacy and testing and the first seven recommendations related to transportation adequacy. This work session is going to cover the planning boards, which we'll have to address any follow-up items to come back to. We had a few last time and so we'll be able to take those up on October 7th and if anything comes up today we do have an opportunity to come back to it which we have given ourselves some breathing room to be able to do which I think is important so that we can be thoughtful in our work here. With that, let me turn it over to Mr. Kenney to take us through the packet with thanks to you and all of council staff. We got the full team here today. So thanks everybody for all of your work. Great. Thank you. So we'll pick up from where we left off with, we left off on recommendation 3.7 in the transportation section of the growth infrastructure policy. We'll pick up on the section relating to the LATR proportionality guide calculation. This recommendation came about as the introduction of non-motor, so if it was pedestrian, bicycle, bus transit, etc., adequacy tests in 2016 and 2020, led to significantly higher costs for developers in making LATR-related improvements. In response to these increased costs, the planning board adopted the LATR proportionality guide in 2022. This calculation sets a maximum dollar value for LATR improvements to set a cap to ensure proportionality. This calculation is included in the staff packet. In brief, it takes into account the size of the development. So the number of units, a proportionality guide rate based on the color of the policy area, red, orange, yellow, green, and an LATR proportionality guide adjustment factor based on the non-auto driver mode share goals for the policy area in which the development takes place more on the NADMS goals later. While the LATR proportionality guide has made the cost of constructed improvements more predictable, according to the planning department, it continues to generate disproportionate and excessive costs for some projects. Thus, the 2024 GIP includes the following department, it continues to generate disproportionate and excessive costs for some projects. Thus, the 2024 GIP includes the following recommendation, recommendation 3.8. Quote, as part of the 2025 LATR guidelines, develop a vehicle trip-based proportionality guide calculation that better accounts for impacts. Quote, if this new recommendation is approved by Council Planning Staff will work with a consultant to develop these new proportionality guide methodology, this new proportionality guide methodology by examining similar systems in other jurisdictions and closely coordinating with stakeholders. The Council received public testimony from Dan Wilhelm from the Greater Colesville Civic Association and from MBIA and NAOP, all of whom are in support of this recommendation. Council staff recommends, I suggest the committee support this recommendation. Let me turn it to Councillor Drona. Thank you. Big recommendation here, I don't think you can just roll through it without talking about it. So how would this work planning? The language says you'd work with a consultant to develop a guide methodology. So how would that work? Would you come to the committee? Would there be multiple options? Would you guys proposing you decide on your own? Go ahead. We're proposing to, we'd bring it to the planning board. We've already begun working with a consultant on developing a new guide and this would go to the planning board this this winter. And whatever the planning board under this recommendation, whatever the planning board decides, that's what you do. That's correct David on Spspucker for the record. Typically, once the growth and infrastructure policy is complete, the staff and ultimately the planning board update the LATR guidelines, the local area, transportation review guidelines for whole number of things to reflect the recommendations in the currently approved growth and infrastructure policy. So we would do that here, not just with the LATR proportionality guide, but anything else that the council also ultimately approves. Got it. And the context here that was shared, how does this relate to? So the suggestion is so a better accounts for impacts, right? But the framing, go ahead, you want to go ahead? Sure. So there's this, the specificity we get in this recommendation as this calculation will be based, will be vehicle trip based. So right now the proportionality guide calculation does not take into account exactly how many vehicle trips development is anticipated to generate aside from the number of units, the size of the development. This relates to a, I neglected to mention one, test one item of testimony that the council received. This is in the addendum that was posted this morning from William Commoners. This adendum contains that testimony, which requests that the proportionality guide calculations account for the quantity of impact as determined by an LATR study. So that gets at that same sort of direction that the recommendation provides to more, provide a more fine grain quantification of impact. Got it. That's very helpful. Thank you. Okay, I'm fine. Without objection, we will agree and let's continue. Great. Moving on to the next section regarding mitigation payments. Most developments that need to address transportation the next section regarding mitigation payments. Most developments that need to address transportation deficiencies identified through an LATR study will do so by directly constructing improvements through the LATR process. This approach is strongly preferred by planning and MCDOT. However, constructing improvements can be impracticable for a developer due to issues such as unattainable right of way, overlap with an existing CIP project or other operational issues outside the applicant's control. In cases like these, the GIP allows developers to make a mitigation payment in lieu of constructed improvements. These payments can be spent on similar mode specific improvements as identified as being deficient in the study within the same policy area or in an adjacent policy area for red orange areas, red policy areas and orange town centers. However, these relatively small payments attached to discrete modes and areas make the tracking, budgeting and spending of these payments challenging. all payments attached to discrete modes and areas make the tracking, budgeting, and spending of these payments challenging. In general, we've heard that as a result, these payments will oftentimes just be, you know, or rather, what these payments will displace existing CIP funding into the general fund. We've been working with planning and MCDOT to find out, trying to quantify exactly what that impact has been. And we do not have that data currently. But this is a structural issue that these recommendations are seeking to address. So these are recommendation 3.9. Allow all fee and lieu funds to be spent in both the subject policy area and adjacent policy areas and recommendation 3.10. Rather than limiting the use of funds to specific modes, allow fee and lieu funds to collected for non-motor vehicle deficiencies to be used for any non-motor vehicle improvement within the subject policy area or an adjacent policy area. So making this county wide the ability to spread across modes and policy areas. This will fix some of the structural issues related to how these mitigation payments are spent within the CIP. The council received public testimony from the county executive in support of recommendations 3.9 and 3.10 And testimony from William commoners in the addendum Opposed to these two recommendations council staff suggests the committee support these changes I appreciate that just to put a fine point I had asked Council staff to request from Department of Transportation and accounting of how these funds have been used and what funds moved out of payments that were intended to be for transportation that were moved for other uses. We don't have that information up to this point, so we would reiterate our interest in finding that information. I think that that information would be very helpful for us as part of this broader conversation. So we'll just note that as well. Appreciate them being here. If you did want to join us and let us know your progress on that, we're happy to hear from you. If not, you can just take account of that and come back to us when you have the information once it's available. Come on up. My name is Rebecca Torman with MCDOT. We have been obtaining payments for many years. They are a variety of payments before this LATR was in the process we would do, would take in other payments. So we do have a list. The problem is it's such a short time period that we haven't collected that much, that many payments at this point. So what we have collected would be a small amount of payments that we can provide you. We just have to go into a little bit further detail about the specifics of what payments that we receive so far. Okay, we're gonna expound upon that. Is this working? Okay, Hayley Packet for the record. I just, I think that the important thing right now, and for the sake of your recommendation, is the amount that we're getting is so small that if we were to try to spend it exactly in any one area, you just don't get very much. Mostly because most people are either providing the projects in kind or there's not enough projects in any one area. So being able to do this gives us a greater likelihood of actually getting a benefit as an agenda. Sure, which is why you support it. Yeah, exactly. There's no disagreement here. I think the question is that it's come to light of whether or not funds have been moved from how they were intended for other uses and we just want to get a handle on where those funds have gone. What the funding was used for, I think the reality here is providing some level of flexibility to use these funds, because they don't fund entire projects on their own. We had the same issue conversation when we talked about the UPP payments. In the last iteration of this this and we had a similar conversation just in the previous conversation here about schools of shouldn't we be able to use it for capacity projects and adjacent school community if there is a way to alleviate the issue in a more thoughtful reasonable rational way by making a slight adjustment to a boundary to address a school capacity issue that the schools may already be doing. It may be something that they're already undertaking. Why would we restrict the funds to not allow them to utilize them in a way that helps them to solve a problem? So totally agree with that. I think what would be helpful, though, is for us to actually have the number, if it's a short list, over a short period of time, it would seem that it would be easy to obtain. So I'm not quite sure the delay, but if you get back to us with that, I think it would be helpful having said that. Agreed to agree to agree. It seems like there's universal agreement here that this additional flexibility would be helpful to the department and I think it makes sense for our planning objectives and for the council's priorities so we all seem to be in agreement and without objection on the committee will accept the recommendation appreciate the response from the department thank you Appreciate the response from the department. Thank you. Thank you. Moving on to the section on LATR exemptions, there are five recommendations in this category. We will get to council staff comments on these recommendations holistically at the end of this section. So I ask for your patience as I quickly walk through these recommendations to get to that point. Currently the growth and infrastructure policy has one full exemption from LATR requirements, a temporary suspension that was granted in 2020. For bioscience facilities. It also exempts affordable housing units from the calculation of a project's required mitigation payments if applicable. For the 2024 GIP, the planning board recommends creating several new exemptions that reduce or eliminate LATR adequacy requirements to incentivize certain land uses that align with broader county goals. The first of these, the first of these exemptions is related to affordable housing. As I mentioned, the current GIP exempts affordable housing units from mitigation payment calculations. But the 2024 GIP recommends expanding these affordable housing recommendations for LATR in two ways. So the first is recommendation 3.11A, which is to expand the current offsite mitigation exemption for affordable housing units, which currently only includes mitigation payments to include constructed improvements. Adjust the proportionality guide limit by subtracting trips attributed to new affordable units. The trips generated by these units will still count towards the 50 or as the committee has amended 30 LATR or vehicle trip LATR threshold. There's some information in the packet of exactly what kind of units this would apply to. And then the other recommendation to get at this affordable housing goal is recommendation 3.11b, which would exempt development projects that meet the definition of a mixed income housing community in section 3.3.4a of the zoning code from the requirement to complete an LATR study. Mixed income housing communities are a new type of land use created by ZTA last year to expedite the review process for developments that have both deeply affordable and commercial opportunities in areas that lack commercial spaces. The Council received testimony from MBIA and NAEP, Dan Wilhelm from the Greater Colesville Citizens Association, Michael Larkin from Montgomery for All, Liz Rogers and Stephen Robbins of Lurch Early and Brewer, plus William Commoners, which is the public testimony in the addendum, all of whom are in support of recommendations 3.11 A and B. Moving on to recommendation 3.12, which deals with multi-family units with three or more bedrooms. This recommendation would exempt multi-family units with three or more bedrooms in multi- structures from off-site mitigation construction and payment Adjust the proportionality guide limit by subtracting trips attributable attributed to new multifamily units with three or more bedrooms the trips generated by these units will still count towards the 50 or rather 30 vehicle trip LATR threshold like Like recommendation 3.11A, this recommendation exempts only multi-family units from the calculation of the LATR proportionality guide, whereas others including the mixed-income housing community exempt those developments completely from the LATR process. The Council received testimony from Glenn Orland in opposition to this recommendation and from MBIA and NAEP, Michael Larkin from Montgomery for all, and David Schneider as well as William Commoners in support of this recommendation. Moving on to the exemption related to daycares, recommendation 3.13 would exempt daycares from the requirement to complete an LATR study. Again, this is a complete exemption. The Council received testimony from MBIA in AOP and Dan Wilhelm, as well as William Commoners, all in support of this recommendation. Finally, the section on bioscience, bioscience facilities are the only current, are the only land use currently completely exempt from LITR requirements. That exemption, as I mentioned earlier, was granted on a temporary basis in the 2020 to 2024 GIP to address economic strains caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and expand and allow bioscience facilities to build or expand more quickly. So recommendation 3.14 would extend the bioscience LATR exemption for another four years. So it applies to applications filed before January 1, 2029, and would remove the exemptions current three-year time limit to file a building permit. The Council received public testimony from MBIIA and NAEP, as well as Dan Wilhelm from the Creative Coastville Citizens Association and William Commoners in support of this recommendation, and received testimony from the County Executive requesting that the Council delete recommendations 3.11 through 3.13 unless additional funding is provided prior to implementation so that is the affordable housing, mixed income housing communities and daycare exemptions and multi-family units with three bedrooms and the executive supports recommendation 3.14 when it relates to bioscience. So that said, those are all of the LATR recommendations. Council staff notes that the LATR is not meant to be a fiscal tool for incentivizing certain types of development. It is a policy for upholding the standards of transportation adequacy established by the council through its adequate public facilities ordinance its master planning process and other legislation. In addition to slowing the implementation of master plan improvements, recommendations 3.11 a through 3.14 create a lower standard of local area transportation adequacy for each of these proposed plant uses. If applicants take advantage of these exemptions, the resulting projects may be served by inadequate road facilities, insufficient sidewalks, poor street lighting, continued ADA noncompliance, deficient bicycle infrastructure, and no new bus shelters. To exempt these uses from LATR is to deny residents and future customers and employees access to adequate local transportation facilities. Not only would these exemptions reduce the delivery of adequate local transportation facilities, but also the council staff has conducted high level analysis on the efficacy of these exemptions. And for that, I will pass along to my colleague Mr. Ali to walk through this analysis. Thank you, Mr. Kenny. Good afternoon. I'm members of the committee. So just picking up where Mr. Kenny left off, it seems at a high level, certainly that recommendation is 3.11A and 3.12, which only reduce the basis for calculating your LATR requirements would not necessarily provide a significant financial incentives regardless of the fact that it may create some savings. And it's unlikely at least to compel, including more affordable housing units or three bedroom units for the sake of realizing that financial gain because it's, again, not exempting or waving LATR requirements, but merely reducing the basis for which it's calculated. And to Mr. Kenny's point, there is still the question about what are adequate these standards for development projects. Certainly, exempting or waving the LATR requirements would go further in enhancing the feasibility of a project. That's the intention for including an exemption for the mixed income community projects, which include a lot more affordable housing at wider range of affordability. Again, there's the question of, do those projects still need some level of adequate infrastructure that would be explained and studied as part of the LATR study? But also, yeah, I mean, the main question is whether or not the adequacy is still necessary or, you know, important to provide for those projects. To the extent that the LATR requirements could be very costly and make a project infeasible, that really speaks to the underlying tests and requirements to maintain adequacy, which again is a policy standard that the Committee and Council defines. Again, it's also recommended as a financial incentive for bioscience. It could go further there as well, and there's obviously an economic interest in potentially incentivizing that kind of development. But again, it goes to say, it's important to point out that affordable development and indeed biotions does respond primarily to market conditions. To what extent does the counties incentives on adequacy compel a development to move forward outside of other factors that the council or the county is not in control of, and that's the reason to raise this concern for the committee's consideration. Again, if the intention for that exemption is to speed up biotech approvals, then it would at least make sense to consider some kind of time frame if that is the explicit intention of an exemption for bioscience. Staff does point out that for daycare, where there's market conditions are less likely to influence a project going forward and that market conditions are likely to make costs worse and there isn't necessarily the same upside from the revenue potential. There may be a case or a better case anyway, for the county to consider relieving them of adequacy requirements for that reason or for the financial purposes. But again, the question is, you know, how far do these incentives go? How important are the adequacy standards for these types of projects? And what balance can the policy and the committee strike there? Those are the questions that staff is raising. Appreciate the thoughtfulness and the deep dive here. Why don't we turn it to planning to respond to some of the concerns that council staff has raised and open up to the committee for a conversation about these various exemptions and you know there have been different views we've heard from the executive at this point between bio and the others and from community members as well, but we'll dive into that in a minute. Let's hear from planning on your response to council staff's concerns. Sure, Darcy Buckley for the record. We're in a housing crisis right now. And the intent of these recommendations are to make it a little easier to build housing in the county. Although these might be small reductions, they can, when combined with other incentives we housing in the county. Although these might be small reductions, when combined with other incentives we have in the county, they can make the difference for a project and they make it easier to build affordable units or larger units. In terms of providing adequate public facilities, every development is required to improve its frontage and to ensure safe access for its visitors and residents. It's just a subset of projects that are required to do these extra off-site improvements. And this recommendation just gives a proportional discount on the cost of those improvements for affordable housing and larger units. And just to add to that a little bit, we certainly understand that this could reduce some what the offsite mitigation. I think we did some quick analysis. And over since mid 2001, at least the affordable housing recommendation, I think that's 3.11 A, would have resulted in about a $300,000 reduction in value. Frankly, this is a policy choice, right? We think it's worth it. We, as Darcy said, we're in a housing crisis. We need to throw everything we can add it. We know one, we know no single one tool is going to solve our housing shortages. So this is another one that we can throw at it. You know, another point I think we want to make is that while it might reduce some adequate infrastructure, we certainly know that if we don't incentivize affordable housing, daycares, et cetera, we might not get the units period that need this infrastructure. So we think we wanna put everything we can into getting additional housing units, and these are some recommendations to help do that. What's your view on who would do the adequacy? So at the point at which, I mean, I do think there's a bioscience facility has limited impacts, and that was part of the conversation of how much impact is actually happening here, and do we think it's worth incentivizing it? Huge support for childcare, huge support for affordable housing. Those are some of the most intensive transportation uses, both car, but also we're talking about infrastructure related to pedestrian and bike as well. What is planning's view on, if you don't do the LATR, if it's exempted, either completely or partially, someone else doing it is planning doing it, is county government doing it, is somebody paying for it. How, you know, the concern that's raised by council staff is we wanna make sure that the infrastructure is built including and especially the non-driver infrastructure that we want to make lockable safe communities and accessible communities Who handles that what what what is the thought process there obviously 300,000 dollars is nothing to sniff at You know, so there is savings there and time as well, but what's the planning response on that? So it would need to come from, an eventual repair would come from the public sector, just as the public sector builds other thing. But who would identify that? Like the challenge that council staff is raising, I think it's a legitimate concern that we need to talk through is it's one thing to say that the Affordable Housing Project or the Chalker doesn't have to pay for the infrastructure. I think that that's totally appropriate. We need to be subsidizing these uses as a public good regardless. And in order to see them happen, we do that if we wanna see more of them happen, we have to do a lot more of it exponentially more of it. But if we're not testing for the adequacy, then what they're arguing and suggesting is that nobody is going to do a public sector otherwise. So just a quick clarification, we are testing. I think what we're talking about here is actual mitigation. According to the recommendation, some things are being tested, but others are not. Some you're exempting the test and some you're exempting the mitigation. Correct. That's correct. Correct. That's correct. For certain units. That's correct. After the test. So there is there's both as part of the the recommendation just to be clear. That's correct. There's a couple of ways that the infrastructure can be constructed. One, if we are through through this generating new developments, they will be required to do frontage improvements. So those projects could generate new frontage improvements that wouldn't otherwise have been generated if the counties have a requirement sort of made them not move forward with our project. To the area in which nearby projects are required to evaluate overlaps. So we might have one development project here and if the amount of mitigation that they're required to evaluate overlaps. So we might have one development project here and if the amount of mitigation that they're required to do is cut back a little bit. When the project next door or a block down proposes a development project, they're going to have to evaluate their infrastructure and they're going to have to make mitigation improvements as well. And then third, yes, capital budget could also be a source. For the record, Jason Sartori, Planning Director, I think it might be helpful to kind of go through each of these piece by piece, each of the recommendations, you know, with respect to three-point.11 a here what we're talking about is extending and an exemption that already exists for payments Saying that affordable units and a project aren't our exempt from having to make mitigation payments whenever we do LATR our preference Along with DOTs is always to get the developer to make the improvements. But if for some reason the condition exists that they can't make the improvements then we ask for mitigation payment. Well if they make a mitigation payment the affordable units are exempt. But if they didn't make the payment instead they actually made an improvement they're not exempt today. So what 311A is saying whether we ask for a payment or we ask for improvements, let's treat them the same. When we get to 311B, the point I want to make here too is this is the mix income housing community plans. These are ones where we're trying to move these along really quickly. You throw an LATR study in there in addition to the, potentially not getting some of the improvements that we would otherwise see. You run the risk of also slowing down that approval process that we're trying to get through in 60 days. So this is something that could help expedite the approvals too. Appreciate that response and clarification. Let me turn it to Councilmember Drowando I think that's a few questions. Thank you. Yeah. The first thing just would be, I just would love to hear from DOT, you know, just to expound on your view. We've heard from Council staff, we've heard from planning. You were just invoked in that you're involved in these transportation payments. So just before I ask any questions, just want to hear your view on these sweet, holistically, or you can break them down individually, if you, but I would love to hear the view. Yeah, thank you, Council Member Joando. So thank you. I think that a lot of what Stephen and Ms. Tarlie, like, testified was along the lines of some of our previous recommendations and testimonies. This is an adequate public facilities document, so anything that stands to threaten adequate public facilities, you know, the executive would be opposed to and DOT is opposed to, but I want to just talk about a couple things in specific. The more information we have, the better we can respond to the need for adequate public facilities on the ground. So even in the case like daycare, where we know that building a new turn lane, for example, to accommodate peak period entries and exits wouldn't be within the realm of proportionality for the day care. Having that information and having all those counts earlier in the process will help us better respond and make sure that we're not seeing impacts downstream that's stopping our roadway network from working as it's intended. Another thing I want to note is that there could be a new facility, a new development, a housing development that's a quarter, a half a mile away from a BRT or a new purple line station. The improvements happening in the frontage are great, but if people feel like there's not safe conditions, there's not good lighting, there's not ADA access to get to those transit stations, they're going to move in with a car. They're going to make decisions based on the infrastructure that exists on the ground and we're going to be working against ourself in terms of the mode shift that I think are goals we all share. And the last thing I just want to bring up is that having these improvements happen concurrently with the frontage developments is certainly a cost efficiencies for all. If we are looking at this after the fact and saying, we've got to add a new CIP project. It's going to take us two to four years to get the money into the CIP, to design it, to mobilize and to get it constructed. By which point, you might have different conditions on the ground in an even greater need. Or at the very least, you've got several years where people aren't having adequate public facilities. I appreciate that. That was going to be one of my questions for anyone who wanted to jump in, including Count Staff, was just the, I think there's a little blurring here, frontage with adequate public facilities. And it's not the same thing. You describe one way that it could actually work counter to our goals to do one and not the other. And just cost more, potentially, right, to do one and not the other. And I'm working now with one of the schools on that's real, as a state road and it's hard to get in, it's very dangerous and not across walk. I'm just very aware of how complicated these things can get where you have a lot of people coming in and out. So I think that's an issue. And so I don't know why we would not test in all of them. So the ones that don't have the test, you took out were for the mixed income, right? But furthermore, why we wouldn't try to do both of these things together. As Chair of the Education Committee, we worked really hard to delay a bunch of projects in the CIP, which is we know overburdened. So the idea that these are gonna be added to some CIP and done, I think, is that's a joke. I mean, that's not happening unless there's additional funding identified. I also am concerned this is the the conflation of these two things that council staff raises I think is the core point of this is an adequate fun facilities plant test not a vehicle for incentivizing you know and I know you could have a disagreement on that and we did it with the bioscience. I remember that was the one we did last on the Fed committee four years ago and in part I went along with it because of the limited impact the council president mentioned. But these are different. Again, things that I care about as you all know, I fought hard to get that three bedroom. We haven't seen as much as I'd like, but I we did this last time, I felt hard to get that in other parts of this policy to make it more incentivize it. But again, I don't think it's the biggest stick as we would like for a lot of reasons. So I'm really concerned about that. Plus, the public, when they hear that we're trying to fund adequate public facilities, and then we're trying to fund adequate public facilities And then we're like housing and daycare at all cost which is basically what you're saying which I I love those things But you're like we're like we're it's an emergency. We have to have them so What the tool that we have for adequate public facilities? Sorry. I mean that you know and again I that's really tough for the public to swallow for legitimate reasons, I think. So, this one's tough, these are tough for me. I'm okay with the continuing the bioscience, but it's gonna be difficult for me to go along with these other ones, but would welcome any comment on anything I've said. Yeah. One thing real quickly, I'll just say, well, it's true in the definition of this policy that we're here discussing is that it's the adequate public facilities, our implementation of our adequate public facilities ordinance. We call it the growth and infrastructure policy because we recognize that it's also about balancing that infrastructure need with our need for growth, whether it's economic development growth or housing growth. And so we do, in part of our scope when we review this every four years is how well does this policy mesh and interact with the other policy priorities that the county has. And so that is really at the core of what these recommendations get at. And again, I just want to emphasize that one, that first one, 311A is about equalizing how we treat the affordable units today. Right. No, I appreciate that. So just last question I'll ask to the point that Haley, what's your last thing? Pack it. I'm sorry. Miss Packet brought up and Council staff brought up around doing these at the same time and not and having the information for the study. Do you have a rebuttal to that? I mean, that seems to be very prudent and important to do. But I just I'll say, you know, based on the, the, the, the now vehicle threshold, that, that the council's recommend, or that the committee is recommending, not every, not every project goes through LATR, right? There's many tens hundreds of projects that we've reviewed over the past four years and 18 of them have been required. So does that mean your point is insignificant and you don't think it's going to have an impact? No, that's not my point. I'm just trying to convey to you only 18 projects have gone through LATR. And my second point was going to be that- But what does that mean if that's not your point? What is your point to saying that? Not every product is going through. Only some of them. Only the most impactful of the projects. And I think we're trying to not exempt all- No, I can't- Any project that has affordable housing, we're just trying to exempt the share that has affordable housing I think for daycare is what we're trying to say is there's a there's a heavy cost Studies to get this information that that we say that we need and that we do need cost about 50 plus thousand dollars So that can make or break a project especially a daycare project And in your words, I think this was you Mr. Osmocker, you said it might, quote, it might reduce some adequate infrastructure. That was, those were your words a few minutes ago. And you think that reduction is justified given what analysis about what we might yield. One of the points that former 12 council member, or do you go in Orleans here is, or I guess 10th when he was here, is that with there hasn't been a, I think he did this in the bioscience, but it's a question for the rest. What has the study been on the impact on what we did there and how you think this might move forward? I've had this broader question with you all privately and publicly too, with other parts of this policy. Of it's kind of like we're throwing everything at the wall. We're not really sure what we did in 2020 worked. We had a pandemic. In some cases, we're seeing some signs that the things like White Oaks town center's been built for example, I brought that up last time. Do you have analysis about how it's worked and how you think this will work? I think the one piece of analysis that we had for you that we presented earlier was that at least 311a, if that was in place four years ago, that would have resulted in a $300,000 reduction in the value of improvements. That's not nothing, but a lot of the projects that are being constructed today are $1 million projects plus $300,000 gets you something, but it doesn't get you a lot these days. Okay, thank you. You yield. Appreciate it, appreciate the line of questioning, appreciate the responses. I have a little bit of mixed feelings here. I do think it's adequate public facilities ordinance. I do think that the costs do add up. I do think that there are, you know, balances here that we try to find. And I do think there's a big difference between testing for something and who pays for it. So, you know, there's a lot here to be clear. Isn't there a third way, though? Can't we require the test to happen, but county government to pay for it for childcare centers and for affordable housing projects? Can't we include in the, you know, why can't we do that? Because I do agree with you that $300,000 for a housing facility that the county is paying millions and millions of dollars to make happen because affordable housing projects don't happen without our public subsidies and adding something on top of that in the beginning of it is really short-sighted and unhelpful. And the idea of $50 to $100,000 to do this type of test for a small childcare facility when we're desperately trying. In fact, the efforts by this state to try to expand these haven't worked because the subsidies, even that have been put forward aren't yet enough to do it. I'm not totally comfortable with the idea that these are two of the most intensive transportation uses possible, multifamily housing and child care are two extremely intensive transportation uses. So to not have anybody doing a test is hard to respond to community members who are concerned about the adequacy of our transportation infrastructure. Having said that, you have to fund things, you have to subsidize things that you want that are public goods, and there are few public goods that are more important than childcare and affordable housing. So could I get some guidance on that? That's absolutely something we could work on. If that would be the committee's recommendation, we could put in the APFO and then could be executed through perhaps our proportionality guide because that governs the improvements and that's after the study happens. That's governing the degree of improvements. So you could say for certain uses that you need to do the study, but through the proportionality guide do not need to do improvements. That is possible. Well, there's two aspects of this just to be clear. There's the mitigation payments exempting from the mitigation payment. And then there's the test itself. What I'm suggesting is yes I think we should cover the mitigation payments for affordable units and child care. I think we're gonna have to subsidize these uses if we want to see them but the test itself who does the test to pace with this because there is a legitimate concern here that we've made tremendous effort to uproot the entire process to make it easier to do a mixed income community. If LATR then puts a complete halt to all of those efforts and slows down that process, that undercuts our ability to do that. Having said that, we can't pretend like there's no impact to affordable housing from a transportation infrastructure perspective just because we desperately want it. You know, hope, as I've said before here, is not a strategy. And so I just, any response to that, is there a mechanism that we could use where a test would happen, but the county government would pay for the test? Let's walk through the ones that would require or would not require testing. So starting with 311A, that requires a test. It's a test that they do now and they would continue to do. 311b as written it wouldn't require a test. One of the one of the things about this type of land use is that it has a 60 day review period. So we've actually also found it hard to do the LATR process in those 60 days. It's difficult but a test could be could be could be included in there. 312 is again a test would be still be required for 312, the multi-family unit one. And 313, we are recommending not having a test, although keep in mind that there are still access assessments. And for 314. I think it would be easier when you say 311 312 just for people who are watching to explain what those are we have the packet in front of us but not everybody's watching probably does so appreciate that so for 311 is what director started was talking about earlier where it's a trying to create parity between the mitigation payment. Yes. And that. Okay, so here's my suggestion. Why don't we separate out if, and I'm going to turn to colleagues to see if they have questions on this particular thing, but I think it would be helpful for us to separate out the recommendations where there's no test recommended, the recommendations where there is a test recommended, but a mitigation payment that would be exempted, because those are two different things, and then a continuation of an existing condition that would just be getting an extension from the last one. Since there's, there have been very different feedback on those three items. So 311A which is the parity and 312 which is the three bedrooms, those both require tests. 311B which is the mixed income housing community 313, which is the day cares. Those two are new exemptions that would not require tests. Yeah, my comment earlier was related just to be clear on the mixed income community and on the child care, which is what I specifically noted when I suggested it. And the test itself and whether and whether a test could happen, but county government could be responsible for it. Because I agree with Plannings goal here, which is to say that these are uses that don't pay for themselves already, that require massive amounts of public subsidy to even be remotely possible and are in extreme scarcity as it is, which is calling for a public crisis that we're in in terms of childcare in terms of affordable housing. So anything that we're putting in the way of that is a problem. On the other hand, as I said earlier, and Councillor Juondo highlighted, these are some of the most intensive uses from an adequate public facilities standpoint. So, Department of Transportation's concern that Ms. Peckett raised about if we don't test for it at all, it's hard to solve a problem you don't know exists. That's a real issue. That's a legitimate concern that we need to work through. So I'll let you think about that for a moment. Let me turn it to colleagues for a minute on this. I do think it would be helpful to separate into those mitigation payment, exempting a test, and continuing an existing exemption for an extended period of time. Councilmember Dranda. Thank you. I appreciate the separating out. I do think they're different. The two that don't have the tests, though, that are the most impact. The three bedrooms as much as I love them. Again, I put stuff forward to try to get them. Not a lot of them are being built. And I'm not sure that not having the tests, or having the test requirements, you know, and the partial exemptions gonna change that. I will note on childcare, just I feel like I just put on my childcare education hat. This, folks who are going to be building a new center, which is what we're talking about here, are big, big companies. You know, you can push back and give me a list, but the ones I've seen, you know, like, you know, and so that are probably that many of them are turning profits. The problem with childcare is that the mom and pops are on razor thin margins. And it's really expensive. And so then you get the, you know, I won't name companies, but the big companies who are charging a lot to cater to folks who can afford it. Right? And I have four kids. I know very well about the expensive cost of childcare in this area. And we're not alone. This is a nationwide issue. So you have halves and halves knots in childcare. And so if you're going to build a new center and have these requirements, I think I want to see a little analysis around is my premise wrong about who's been applying for these and who's been applying for these and who's can afford or not to pay for the test. I just wanna, a little bit because I, yes child care, we need it, we absolutely need it. But someone who's gonna come in and have a application for a new center, it's a different type of child care catering to folks who can afford it. And that's a problem with the system. We're not going to solve that here, but I think it is relevant to the point of whether that this is this test in their payment or mitigation is going to get in the way of them building that center. Could I ask a follow-up related question? Because I don't think it's accurate to say it universally because there are a lot of examples of special exceptions where single-family homes on major state roads in particular are turned into childcare and I have a few in my district, a few in my former district that's now Kate Stewart's district and there are examples of some of the medium size and even smaller size that is turning, you know, it's not exactly a home-based childcare, but it's a little bit bigger than that and somewhat in between. But I question, if you don't make it universal, how many of those would qualify for LATR, just given the threshold of trips? Because it could be true that in order to get above the threshold of trips, that even those wouldn't be included. So my follow-up question to you of, I think part of what you said is accurate, part of what you said perhaps not, but I think the larger point is if I could, how many child care facilities, they're only 18 LATRs that happen, how many child care facilities are going through LATR? Well, that was one of the questions that I had. Yeah, specifically currently, and what did that look like? There's four, but a relevant question is how many do you go forward? Because the amount they have to expend on the LATR study exceeds their ability to move forward. I think is a big question. I would say that you'd probably don't have an answer to it. I can't have an answer too. Well, I mean, I think it would be helpful to come back with those four as like case studies to us in terms of like what was the size of those child care facilities. I mean, I think you'd add to the point there are different types of child care facilities that range from the zoning change that I put forward to make it easier to do home-based child care, which is much, much smaller to kind of the medium size ones where there's a special exemption in a single family home that's repurposed to turn into a child care center or maybe something even a little larger than that to the much larger that Councillor Moorjawana was talking about, where we're is really the only area that we're seeing the growth. Unfortunately, in Chalka, we want those two to be clear. I don't think there's anything wrong with really large Chalka facilities, but we need a much better ecosystem that serves everybody in the community. And right now, we're only seeing one type really expanding. So it'd be helpful to know, we have those look like. Right now, if you would like that. Sure. I would like to just make one clarification because childcare is a bit of a special use. And from a transportation perspective, one, there's a lot of trips. Many of them are coming all at the same time. It's all on the network at the same time. The second point I'd like to make is that child care trips are often what we call pass-by trips. They're already on the network. If you you're you're going to work and if you have a kid that's in daycare you're stopping to drop that kid off. Your trip might be a little bit longer but you're already on the network and you're you're stopping to drop that kid off. Your trip might be a little bit longer, but you're already on the network, and you're stopping to drop them off. So when we think about how different sites are evaluated, as we've said, we evaluate frontage improvements, we evaluate access improvements. Neither of those are governed by the APF. They're separate requirements. We also require off-site improvements. So what we're talking about today is off-site improvements, frontage improvements and access improvements like the turn lane that was referenced earlier. Those are required by separate sections of the code, not the APF. All right, appreciate that, Clevver. So one of your arguments that I don't think was well articulated in the policy to be perfectly honest with you is that these trips are actually different types of trips than most other uses. Whether folks agree with that or disagree with that, I think that's up for discussion and debate, but that is a legitimate point of view. And I appreciate you articulating here. I don't think that was shared as a rationale besides, these are things we desperately want. So we should exempt something that costs too much money, which is a different rationale than this is different. And we should treat it differently. Councillor Marigrandeau. Thank you. Oh, okay. Miss Peck, do you have any comment on this conversation? Particularly the trips being let that point I agree that's the new that's a new thing we had heard that. We when we talked about this in a work session we would say that I think that that pass by trips may have been more true 10 or 20 years ago I think that now with telework there's probably an argument that parents are dropping their kids off that may be generated just by daycare. But we don't have full data on that, so I'll put that aside. I will note that for adequate public facilities, chances are the segments and roadways and sidewalks and infrastructures immediately surrounding the daycare, those are going to be used at a different intensity because the daycare is, regardless of whether or not a car is entering the road or somebody is leaving to go to work or not. I'll leave it that. If we get used to it. And that's what we want to happen, obviously, too. Sure. With the policy that we're moving towards. Just last thing I'll bring up, and I know Council Member Fanny Gonzalez has the questions. I'm sensitive to the point that's been brought up around like I don't want none of us want I can think I speak really confidently like someone who wants to do a childcare or there be small medium any size to not do it because they can't afford the payment for the study. Is there a way to one question I had I think I saw it read it somewhere last night or today, the relationship of impact taxes to this and what's already being exempted. It would be helpful to, it's hard to keep it all in my head at the same time of the array and it was mentioned of incentives and things that are already applying, but couldn't that be a way to like a credit towards impact tax or something to get at this issue without getting in touch with the adequate public facility? The cost to pay for an LATR study is an upfront cost. The credit would come after the fact. Okay, so yes, but you're worried about the upfront versus later. Okay. Just to clarify, there is no exemption for daycares from impaying impact taxes. Neither existing nor proposed in taxes. No, yeah. Yeah, I got it. Neither existing nor proposed. Yeah, it's Jenny. Okay, great. Well, I know in some other scenarios, there are things that are happening at the same time and I try to keep all that together, but thank you for that clarification. Okay. How are you, old, for now? Customer funding is all. On the childcare question, I think it will be a huge mistake to differentiate any of them based on size. The childcare sector is very unique because of the workforce. If you're working one of those high-end childcare centers, the workers still make minimum wage. I think we should treat them the same and I do agree with the exceptions that the planning board and even council staffs. I think that's the only issue that they get started in agreement. The only one and I'm with you on that one. On everything else, the council press and mentioned, I think we need to post now and come back with further analysis on things that can happen and not happen based on each of the uses, 3.12, 3.0, you know, other ones that we have at least a year, and move on. Appreciate that. We have two weeks, so here's by suggestion. I will throw out another option as well to raise the vehicle trips for childcare to a higher threshold, so it's not a full exemption, but would be higher so that proportionally the entry point would not harm, you know, would not be out of whack in terms of a kind of a medium size or smaller facility potentially. I leave it up to planning and council staff and DOT to perhaps come up with what would be a reasonable threshold. I think taking into account expectations for already on the street grid, being a different type of use, that argument, if that is your view, then that could be coherent with a policy that has a higher vehicle trip threshold. So if that is, you know, as a compromise here, I think that would be something for us at least to entertain, not having a full exemption, but having a higher threshold, based on a number of factors. And I would also like to have explored whether or not and what the vehicle could look like for an LATR to occur for mixed income community and possibly for childcare as well if we don't raise the trip threshold or decide on that as being the path to have an LATR happen but have it happen concurrently and by county government. So that we're still as part of the public facility's ordinance expecting for us to test for the adequacy of our infrastructure, but we are not putting that burden on a use that needs to be subsidized in order for it to happen. So, it can come back on that, and then we have, do we wanna dispose of the exemptions for the mitigation payments? If there's an interest in that, and on the extension of the bioscience, if we're ready to do that, we can. I'll yield to colleagues to see if they're ready, if they're not, then we can bring that back as well. Okay, why don't we, without objection, it's, I heard from all colleagues, the bioscience seemed fine to extend and the executive is in concurrence with that as well. So there seems to be consensus there just in the interest of trying to discard as much of the consensus as we can as quickly as we can. So let's accept that as a consensus acceptance of the recommendation that came from the planning board to extend the bioscience and let me hear from council staff quickly. One issue the council staff had raised in the package just for your consideration was the timing issue which was you know if if they're going if the intention is to speed up bioscience development, is it worth considering some kind of time limit, recognizing there isn't one now. Well, there is one. There is one now, so the proposal is to know eliminated. We would recommend potentially reimposing that three year or four year limit, potentially. So essentially getting a mending recommendation three 14 to get rid of the second sentence. To 2029. Extending the deadline. We would extend to 2029. But retaining the three year time limit to file a building permit. So they don't hold the capacity. Either three or four year, you could sink the building permit timeframe to the growth and infrastructure policy and the same, you know, I think we should do it to the same timeline as the growth and infrastructure policy if we're going to do that but let's hear from planning on their views on that. I was just going to clarify and then I'll ask Ms. Buckley to explain. Really, so there are two things there. One is extending the exemption for four years to January 1st, 2029. Stop. The next one then is whether there's currently a requirement that any bioscience project that's approved would need to pull a building permit within three years, otherwise they would have to go back and do this. And so that is the second part of this, is do you want to, we were recommending removing that requirement that you have to pull the building permit within three years. There's been a suggestion to keep that in there or to extend that to four years, give them four years to pull a building permit. To file, yeah. Right, so yeah. All right, and council's staff is saying maybe extending that to four years instead of three years to align with the policy that we have to revisit anyway, maybe appropriate and it sounds like planning thinks that's a policy decision that's before the council and we can decide. Right, it's based on when that project is approved. So it's not tied actually to the four-year period of the review of the exemption expiring or. Sorry. Yeah, right. If a project is approved on December 31st, 2028, they would have three years under the current three years to pull a building permit to file for a building permit. Or it could be four years or we could just completely say you can file your building permit whenever you're ready. Councillor Drona. Yeah, I'm not for the last one. We've talked about this before with current approvals and other contexts of like we don't want people just sitting on things. Like you get this, let's create a sense of urgency. I understand your point that it wouldn't be tied to the consideration of the GIP, because if they apply it in year two, it's gonna fall three or four year window after that. So in that sense, I'm fine to just do what we did and keep it at three years just to be consistent with what we did last time. But colleagues, I wanna do four years, that's fine. But I do think we wanna create some emergency. And if you're gonna use this, get it done. I also would like to see analysis on since we did it four years ago, on what was this used, how was it used, and what happened? Like I just, I get, it's very frustrating to me to make these decisions in isolation with little to no analysis on what did or did not work. And I know that can be hard, but we gotta try, I think in just, in at least say, we have this and we don't have that, and that has to be part of the argument. Otherwise, we're just kind of again. You know, the CIP, I've told you guys know this, how hard the CIP is, how strapped for revenue we are, and to take stuff off the table for just kind of a hope is not enough. So I would just reiterate that. But that being said, so we did this before, I'd be happy to do it one more time with the hope that you can also bring back that analysis. Yeah, Mr. Harris. Or is there a good way? Yeah, we hear you. We have some, but in order to make it accurate, we'll bring back that analysis. We were talking about a little bit the other way, about there are some. If you could share with us like within the week and then we'd have it in advance of the next work session which is two weeks I think that would be great so if the next seven or eight you know days if you could get that five or six business days if you could get that to us that would allow us to process staff to include it in the packet I think that would be helpful, is that, I mean, it will, any views on this. So I guess we will come back to this. It seems like there is a difference and I hear what you're saying between the project and the policy, so aligning those. We don't have to be married to four years as the year should it be three years, should it be five years, should it be in perpetuity, should it be four years, I think we can come back and decide that it seems that there is an interest to extend or we've you know essentially made that decision and the question is when should the You know should it be the recommendation on perpetuity? For the expiration or three years to pull the building permit or some number in between three years in perpetuity, which is essentially what would be before us next meeting. Just to make sure, just to wrap up and make sure we have our work straight for the follow-up on these items. Considering a proposal to raise vehicle trips, raise the vehicle trip threshold for daycares, exploring opportunities for the county to pay for LATR studies for the mixed income housing communities, and for daycares, having different options for that time horizon for biotech facilities, and then for the affordable housing extending from mitigation payments to improvements, and for the multifamily units with three or more bedrooms. Just the committee want to decide on those. Now we'll just reconsider those in general in the October 7th work session. We'll take that up. We'll take that up in October 7th. Great. If I may, so just to make one point that was referenced in the packet, it may be relevant for your consideration, which is that the impact tax bill does go before the GEO committee starting October 7th, 10th. Sorry, they've collided in my head. And I just mentioned that because historically, the impact taxes have been used as an incentive. And so the discussion of utilizing the portion of the GIP as an incentive will be part of that discussion as well just for your awareness. Yeah, thank you. And yes, and different in their nature, they're connected to a certain degree, but it is traditional impact taxes are frequently used, not just in Montgomery County, but elsewhere, you know, in waivers of impact taxes as an incentive tool. There is a broader question that council staff has raised of whether adequacy tests and the waiver of adequacy tests should be similarly used as an incentive or whether or not there is a better vehicle through impact taxes or other types of functions or other public subsidies. So very legitimate conversation for us to have and somewhat at the heart of much of this conversation. So we've disposed of zero items there and I got close to disposing of one until it was snatched from us. But we're at least beginning descent on landing that plane. And the other ones we still have outstanding to come back with some additional information. Let's continue to the packet. Great. Moving on to the section on non-auto driver mode share. Shorten the acronym being NADMS. NADMS goals are used as targets for the counties, for various county policies, most notably the county's transportation demand management program. That program is not contained within the GIP, although the NADMS goals impact how that program is implemented. The, these goals are also, as you may recall, used in the LATR proportionality guide calculation as basically a multiplier for, the improvements or mitigation payments required in different policy areas or in different areas of the county. So the 2024 GIP update identifies three gaps in the current list of goals. The first being the three new policies recommended to be created in the 2024 GIP update. The second being several policies that were inadvertently left out of the 2020 update. And three new NADMS goals set in master plan since 2020 that are now being incorporated. So the text of recommendation 3.15 reads establish NADMS goals for new policy areas and other areas without goals, update the NADMS goals to reflect recently approved master plans. So these new and updated NADMS goals are listed in tables 10, 11 and 12 with table 10 referencing goals for new policy areas, just moving toward what would be reflecting the updated color code goals for areas without goals currently. And the three new goals that were set in master plans that's in table 12. The council received testimony from the county executive in support of this recommendation. Council staff suggests the committee support this change. And today the committee received a memo from Council Member Balkham on some of these recommendations, which I'm sure you would speak to, but are referencing the rural east, rural west, and Damascus policy areas, and the NADMS goal set for them in table 11 and that memo is provided to the committee. Thank you. I think the committee members are gonna defer to the district council member to share her feedback and weigh in here and let's have a discussion. Great. Thank you. And it's a surprise appearance. I was in another committee then we ended right on time. So I appreciate that. So I just want to ask about the rural east, rural west, and Damascus. Those are the, those are three new areas. And I understand the others, the Montgomery Village, Great Sanaka, North Bethesda, but just want to ask where these numbers came from, from the perspective of those three, the rural areas. Anyone wants to? Sure, so for those three, those policy areas, they didn't have goals created for them in 2020. So for this update, we were trying to create goals for all areas that didn't have them. And for this we used the American Community Survey data, the five-year data pool from 2019. And we took what was in there about the non-auto driver mode share and then added 5% to create a goal that was slightly above the existing condition in 2019. We didn't use more recent data because right now there isn't like a clean five-year set that doesn't include 2020, which completely upended all transportation patterns. So we're waiting to reassess the data once there's a clean five-year set. So we use the same data that we used in 2020 to create those. Essentially, the goal of this is seeking countywide and a 5% increase. The goals being 5% higher than where we were in 2019. If we took, if we were able to take more recent data in a clean way, these goals would likely be a lot higher due to increased telework, you know, creating that higher goal or those higher current figures and that adding 5% to that. So part of this review recommended in this recommendation is to take a look over the next four years on whether the increased telework due to the COVID-19 pandemic will remain consistent, whether it will plateau, and this is our new normal to set goals against, or whether it will normalize, and we should set goals based on more of what we saw before the pandemic. Okay. Thank you. And thanks for that clarification, because when I read the policy, it looked like it took into consideration. So I question these goals for two very important reasons. And the Transportation Environment Committee is currently looking at the TMD regulations, and we've done a really deep dive into those regulations. So we're looking at that right now. But these goals are just, in my learned opinion, just simply not attainable for two reasons, right? So when we look at options, alternatives, we don't have transit options in these rural areas. And when we look, we do have a mark train and we do have a bus that goes on during the week days. But the majority of people who are using the existing transit for commuting, they're commuting out of that area so the employers in that area if the employers are being held responsible which is how the TMD operates the employers in that area don't have transit going to people aren't coming certainly on the mark mark, on the mark train, they're not using mark to go to these areas. So that's one aspect. But the other aspect is the number of employers, there's a small number of employers in these areas. And so when you think about the overall goal of a policy area, you're only looking at a small number of employers and most of the employers will not have any telework happening even prior to COVID because we're talking about industrial industries, the labs, through the NIH facility out there, or hospitality, or farming. So I just don't see how a goal, when you look at the 26, 27%, and you look at other areas that have a 26, 27%, the employers are are completely different and the rural areas are different, purposefully different. And so I just don't see how these goals are in any way attainable. Um, just to, I think one point here, my understanding, perhaps, our colleagues from MCDOT can clarify, but my understanding is that the TDM legislation applies to red, orange, and yellow policy areas only and not to green. Royal West and Royal East are recommended to remain green policy areas. Damascus is currently a green policy area and the planning board straw recommends it to be yellow, so it would apply. Except for the size of employer that does translate with the T-M-Ds, T-DMs. So there is some overlap. And so I would then ask the question of then why are we setting a goal at all? So the goal still applies to developments, essentially. So through the LATR proportionality calculation, these goals are still modifying, essentially because these goals are lower than, for instance, in Silver Spring, there's less required in LATR improvements, that's part of that calculation. So, and I miss that part of the conversation, but from that perspective, not only is there not transit existing, but there's not transit planned in the vast majority of that. So I just think that there's a disconnect of putting this goal that is not achievable? I think, so we would look at recent data as well and it's pretty close to these. It's not that far off. I think these probably are achievable. It also has to do, you know, because there are a lot of people who live out in these areas who don't travel or don't travel for work. So it's not that far off. During the last update, there was a requirement to create or through the TDM legislation. There was a requirement to create goals for all policy areas. With enthusiasm, we created ones for rural east and rural west during this update too. Because there are also areas that we do have goals for and wants for and we don't want everyone in those areas to be necessarily driving by themselves to work. So in order to be like every other policy area, they also have these goals. Because I think that those are also our policy goals. And I think that those are great goals, but if they don't, if there's, if there's not an alternative to driving by once, it's just difficult to, it's great to have a goal and it's great to have goals that are similar to other areas. But if there are no, the point is non-auto driver mode share. And if there's not an alternative to driving, there's a disconnect here. And I think that I'll pass it over to the committee on this. Those are my thoughts. So just to go back to a point that Mr. Kenney made, I think the idea behind wanting to provide not only to drive remote char share goals for all policy areas was the current planning board approved LATR proportionality guide requires it. So when the planning board created the LATR proportionality guide, we used the same approach to come up with the relevant factor as is shown in the planning board draft. That was the original intent behind it. And so why is there a disconnect between Damascus and rural east and rural west? That's all based on the current numbers, the current non-auto driver mode share as we receive from the census data, which because it's from 2019 is likely lower than what it is now. So these areas are likely manifesting much higher non-auto driver mode shares solely due to telework than these goals that are set here. Can I quickly add from the DOT perspective? Yes, please. So I want to first of all confirm Dave was correct that if you are in a green policy area, first of all, we have no transportation management districts in green policy areas. So there's no developments that would have to go through the TMD plans, and there's no employer requirements in the Green Policy area either. I do think it is important to set goals. It's helpful for us, the same way we were talking about LATRs, to be able to collect this data. I will note that we don't really have the ability to collect data for every single trip countywide. We rely on census data. It's imperfect. So we did workshop some of these goal methods and basically decided that the way that we're setting goals, the way that planning recommended setting goals in the GIP was consistent with how they are being set for other areas. I would say from the DOT's perspective, we share some of council member outcomes concerns that we may not be able to meet some of these goals. This is where we defer to council in terms of your responsibility to set the goals. But in terms of how they're setting the goals and the data that they're relying upon, we agree with that. The one exception I think is Damascus, like you said, because that's proposed to be a yellow policy area. This would support our comments on recommendation 3.1 that we don't think Damascus is appropriate to move to yellow at this time because of the lack of transit service. So I will defer to the committee on this. I just think that there's a disconnect between this, the GIP, and we're setting these policy area goals, and we have a separate transportation demand management process, and we're not looking at how those two interface. And if we're going to use the same number for two different things, then they should jive. And so to me, that's the disconnect. And so when we're looking at non-auto driver mode share in the TDM, it's basically putting a responsibility on employers to meet those goals. And if they don't meet those goals, there is, I know there's a difference in nomenclature, but a penalty attached to that. And so, and I understand that at this point in time, employers aren't required to meet these goals in rural, rural east west and Damascus yet, but it's kind of, you know, we're, we're using this number as if this is, if this is a goal that we expect this area to achieve. So for the purpose of the GIP and the LITR, that may be the number that the committee goes with. When we get to the TMD discussion, TDM, they're both, there's a TDM and a TMD, right? This won't fly. As a sneak peak, we've got some great analysis, including some financial analysis that we'll be able to share. And it really focuses far more on the red and orange policy areas in terms of the TDM regulations, because that's where there's a lot more implications. I just wanted to make two notes that the employers, we would not frame it as a penalty. I know you're reluctant to use that word, but it's something that they're investing in their own staff. But I would also note that in the green areas, there would be no requirement from employers. And even if Damascus was yellow, it would only apply to employers 200 or more employees, which is Probably a lot for Damascus in the next four years at least there are none. Yeah, okay. I Rest my case And thank you all I know this has been a long discussion for many of you at the table Thanks, truly noted do I know it? Councillor Councillor majority you have anything to ask? Good question. So the, appreciate Councillor Mjordon for joining us and raising these issues. So there was mention that, by, I can't remember who from planning, but I think you mentioned that the night, so you have the 19% proposed for Damascus, the 26 and 27% for rural east and rural west. You said those were probably close to where it's actually at. Something to that effect. Could you just that just kind of like sure? I could you could you expand on that? I like glacier for the record. Montgomery planning. So the way these numbers were calculated is consistent with how the other policy area numbers were calculated using, taking essentially a union of the policy area boundaries and the underlying census tracts using the five year 2019 census data, essentially summing up the total population that commuted by non-auto modes, dividing by the total population to get the non-auto driver mode share, and then adding 5%. That was with 2019 data, so 2019 five years into the past from there. If you look at 2022 five-year ACS data, these areas likely meet or exceed those goals from 2019, largely because of the COVID-19 pandemic and tell people what happened. Exactly. So it's difficult at this point to say, like when we get the 2026 or 2027 ACS, where we're more fully removed from the immediacy of the 2020 pandemic time, what the telework mode share is in these areas now, but I think we're fairly confident that it will exceed what we saw in 2019 in the ACS. So it's hard to speculate on that, but that sort of the methodology is consistent with all the other areas. And we've seen an increase in telework since then. Yeah, and obviously we're all for so many reasons in many areas, we're trying to figure out what the new normals gonna be. And once as things reset and shift. Is that part of the reason why you're saying here, you noted that you'll do a more thorough review and overhaul in the 28 to 32 is that embedded in kind of what you just said. Exactly. Yeah, we'll have data that's more removed from this sort of discontinuity of COVID. So I think we're hopeful that the numbers will be that new normal at that point. So we, I think we did have a conversation internally when we were talking about these policy areas about, well, should we use the more current ACS numbers from 2022, or should we be consistent with the previous policy area definitions that were in the GIP, and we opted to be consistent with the past. So we didn't have to... It's the the yeah, it's the NADMS from 2019 plus 5% to create the goal that it's just to be clear So Damascus would be was a 14% than you added 5% as to as a stretch goal or it's a goal Yeah, it's a goal that was sort of consistently added in places where there was not a master planned goal for the policy area. Okay. Well, I share the concern about the consistency with TDM and TMD conversation and also appreciate that, you know, obviously we all aspire to move in this direction, but we are, we just are talking about the challenges of, we had this conversation in the last meeting, where are we gonna change a policy area based on transit that may be there in 10, 15 years, or maybe if it's funded. I think those are fair conversations to have in the context of these goals. So, all right, thank you. Appreciate it. I also really appreciate Councilmember Bacchum raising these issues are very important, very legitimate issues. It is absolutely not fair for businesses to bear almost exclusively the cost of us not providing enough transportation options to enough residents, particularly in rural communities. That's something that we need to step up and do. And it's going to require a lot of commitment in order to do it. We're starting to do it, but we're behind, way behind. It's going to take a long time to catch up quite frankly and proving why she's the champion of the Western County here and always. I do think that there are some really important points here to note. The data seems legitimate and there's a agreement between the Department of Transportation and the Planning Department that the data that's been used in the methodology here seems sound, that we need to revisit this, that there are broader implications. I do think that we need to be consistent. There are a number of different aspects where we're looking at these same targets, and we should be reading off the same song sheet, no matter what decision we're making. We can have different expectations or different goals or different approaches, but you know, we all should be reading off the same goals and the same data points and the same methodology and agree to that. So unless there are any concerns with that or any specific suggestions, I think this is something that we need to just continue to monitor. I also do think that, you know, one in five people and Damascus working from home that seems reasonable to me given the changes in the workplace. You know, there are the work from home dynamics and probably in rural communities that's happening a lot because it is so attractive to work from home and it is so competitive now to be able to work from home. So this is something that we're gonna have to continue to monitor of how much is work from home, a reality in our more urban communities, how much is it reality in our more rural communities? Is it similar, is it reality in our more rural communities? Is it similar? Is it different? You know, is it community context dependent? Is it individually dependent? You know, depending on the age and the family situation of a worker, are you more or less likely to want to take advantage of work from home or want the camaraderie and the benefits of working in an office. I mean, there are there are reasons for that. I'm in a household where we have one work from home and one work on site. So I can speak to this dynamic and I see the benefits and the drawbacks of both on a day-to-day basis. So it seems like we'll continue to monitor this, Council Member Bauchem will continue to hold us accountable to it, but I think we can accept this and move on. Right, thank you. Moving on to the section on policy revisions. It's part of this 2024 GIP update planning staff reviewed the policy text of the growth infrastructure policy. The recommended revisions include substantial edits to address ambiguity, streamline language, enhance clarity, remove outdated or relevant terms, references and provisions, etc. So recommendation 3.16 is to revise the GIP resolution text to reflect updated county plans, policies, laws, regulations and guidance. The executive, the council received written testimony from the executive in support of this recommendation. Council staff suggests the committee support this change. That objection. Thank you. Moving on to the section on implementation. These contains two different recommendations. The LA, the LATR guidelines serve as a reference for development reviewers in Montgomery planning and partner agencies, developers and community stakeholders. However, these guidelines have undergone many revisions and are sometimes unclear. There are a lot of FAQs from stakeholders that planning would like to address and make clearer in the LATR guidelines. So recommendation 3.17 would reorganize and update the LATR guidelines. The revised version will reduce duplicative and contradictory language, address frequently asked questions, and include example documents and directions for common challenges, the county executive submitted testimony in support of this recommendation and council staff suggests the committee support this change. Found objection? Finally, the recommendation, there's a recommendation, The recommendation is 3.18, which is to continue to work with SHA and state delegates to codify SHA review times, clarify mutual expectations in the development review process, particularly for projects in red policy areas where motor vehicle analysis and mitigation are not a county priority. These come out of conversations ongoing conversations between planning MCDOT and SHA as well as through the development review process work group in these recommendations will be considered as a part of this recommendation. Council received testimony from MBIA and NAOP in support of this recommendation and Council staff suggests the committee support this change. Yeah, just to be clear, obviously, we don't control through the growth and infrastructure policy, the timelines, and requirements of the State Highway Administration, the State can control us, we can't control the State. Having said that, this was part of the development review work group that delegate Leslie Lopez chaired previously that the planning department played an integral role in it that our council staff was very much involved in as well as the executive branch staff as well. And it continues to be an ongoing conversation and an ongoing concern and something that we'll continue to push for to have as much alignment between State Highway Administration, Department of Transportation, our planning department as possible, as well as Department of Permitting Services, I will reiterate that many of the concerns that we hear about development review are state processes that we need them to help us with and we continue to ask for their support and I know that although much of the focus has always been on the planning side of things that's only part of development review and Department of Permitting Services, Department of Transportation, a number of other entities are involved as well. And we need everybody part of the effort to expedite the review process. And so appreciate the interest in collaborating in order to move these processes forward. And we hope and continue to expect the State Highway Administration to be part of those ongoing conversations. With that without objection we will support this recommendation. I was reminded by my colleagues that we did get a number of consensus items here. I think it's important that we clear the deck of the things that we agree on that we give some guidance to the team here so that Council staff and planning staff and the Department of Transportation can come together to think through some different recommendations and thoughts for us. We've given some breathing room so we're not coming back for two weeks, specifically, so there could be some time for staff to do a little bit of additional work. Everybody has a legitimate point of view here. We just need to figure out how to get to the right outcome and balance the significant public policy priorities that we have with the need for adequate public facilities and infrastructure in order to facilitate that type of growth and development. So with that, we are adjourned for today and we will reconvene on October 7th.