you Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the session of government operations and fiscal policy. This afternoon we continue our discussion of Bill 16-24 Development Impact Taxes Amendments. That is the only thing on our schedule today. This is a continuation from last week's conversation. I think we had a very good discussion last week. We did take some votes on a number of items, but there were still others that we wanted to reflect upon and also get additional information, which the staff has provided in our packet today. So I think we are in a good position to walk through this packet today and hopefully we will get through everything so that we can move this forward to the full council with the committee's recommendations. I want to thank Councilmember Mink and Councilmember Abanas for joining the committee today. And I'll turn to my colleagues on the committee so you have anything to say. No. Everyone's good. All right. I will turn it over to staff then to walk us through the packet. Good afternoon, council members. So I am actually going to jump to the middle of page two here. As noted, this is about Bill 1624. There was a work session on October 10th. That memo is attached to the staff report at circle nine if you need to reference it. At the beginning at the bottom of page 2 we created a table that summarizes all of the planning board recommendations and notes the ones that you already voted on which we will not be spending time on today but I want to run through them quickly. First was recommendation 4.2 which was continuing the use of the cap and carryover system. Recommendation 4.4 to remove the desired growth in investment areas discount. Recommendation 4.7 to continue exempting bioscience projects. And then recommendation 4.8B, which is convening a working group. So those are the ones that committee had a unanimous agreement on. I also wanted to note that you'll notice some of these recommendations are not numbered correctly. We do know how to count the reason is we were trying to keep the same number we used at last week's work session. So I wanted to flag that. And with that, I'm going to pass it on to Mr. Oly. Thank you. good afternoon. So we'll just get right into the recommendations or at the bottom of page three. The first recommendation was to modify the calculation of standard school impact tax rates to reflect the true pursuit and cost of school construction to the county. Do this by adjusting the rates to account for the portion of funding for school capacity projects in the adopted 60 years, the IP attributed to state aid. There was vigorous discussion during the last work session. I think the committee generally acknowledged that given the implications of the carryover system and the desire to study this further, the committee seemed to indicate leaning towards not accepting the planning board's recommendation on this item. Great, thank you and I know we did receive a letter as we discussed last week from MCPS. meaning towards not accepting the planning boards recommendation on this item. Great, thank you and I know we did receive a letter as we discussed last week from MCPS. Ms. McWire also spoke to this issue at our last committee session. I'm ready to go vote on this, other people are good. All right, so I think we will move forward on this and not accept the planning board's recommendation on this one. Understood. Thank you. Moving on to recommendation number three, introduce a 50% transportation and school impact tax discount to single-family attached and detached units that are 1800 square feet or smaller. On the bottom page four, you can see what we originally outlined as potential options for your consideration. There was a desire to just unpack this question a little bit more and sort of what's the underlying policy question here. You can see figure one on page five shows the distribution of new town homes by size. Planning board had our planning staff had referenced the state before to basically make the point that there's a small number of town homes that are 1800 square feet or less. And in fact many of those that are this size are MPD use which kind of the overall distribution that are between 1,800 and 2,200 square feet. There was another question raised about, well, could you move to a system that was more sensitive to unit size? But interestingly, student generation rates don't neatly follow that trend. If the units smaller, there's not necessarily fewer students. Furthermore, council members in their discussion had also requested a better understanding of whether garage is basements in ADUs, count towards the living space of a unit. And just to leave you in suspense, we didn't actually explain that. So I'll tell you now what the answer is to that question. ADUs are not charged impact taxes attached residential garages are included in the gross floor area. Detached garage is an accessory structure and is not included in parking structures. The term is considered commercial unlike a residential garage specifically, and they are also excluded from impact taxes. So just wanted to provide that clarity. The discussion had also raised concerns about transportation impacts to the extent that there's an average number of students, is there also a similar impact on the needs for additional bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure. And council staff would just note that adequacy and as you know, implemented through LATR requirements and UPPs for schools mitigate directly the impacts a project makes whereas impact taxes would be collected but they may not necessarily be spent to support infrastructure serving the project that paid them. And so following the discussion, it did seem that the committee had indicated some support for Council's staff's recommendation to exempt single-family attached and detached units that are 1,800 square feet or smaller from transportation impact taxes, but maintain the full school impact tax rate. And we just note here, because we kind of repeat this theme throughout the staff reports. We'll just say it once. Our approach is more just that based on our understanding of the discussion, it seems like to the extent school impact taxes are more closely tied to average student generation and school construction costs that it not doesn't necessarily make sense to use them as an incentive whereas transportation impact taxes have a weaker basis for what the number is that's charged and so it may not necessarily make sense to apply them where an incentive is considered but we think the primary reason for eliminating them is just that weak basis which may have the effect of incentivizing this type of development. So we just wanted to get that out there. So we do continue to suggest what we recommended last time, which was way of the school impact tax, but sorry, way of the transportation impact tax maintain a 100% of the school impact tax or a single family attached and detached units that are 1,800 square feet or smaller. Great, thank you. And I know I'm gonna turn it to council member Katz because I know he was on particularly, I had the question about the ADUs and garages. Yeah, not so much the ADUs, but the garages. So if I understand what you just said, that if it's an attached garage, you do count it, but if it's detached, you don't. It's the same car, whether it's in an attached garage, you're not. Why is there a difference? I'll be honest. I don't know the reason for the difference. That's the answer that DPS gave us. It might be a question of what's considered a livable area or not, but that's just my guess why they calculate that differently. And I guess the other question becomes, if it's a detached garage, and how close does it have to be detached from the house? And if it's literally right next to it. Right, it's just that it's not sharing a wall. That's enough to consider it detached. I don't understand the logic for that. I really don't. I think I'm gonna turn to Council President Freeden who might have a suggestion on this. Yeah, I agree that it doesn't seem to be, I understand why the reason why is under the zoning code, those are two different things. If you're attached, it's connected. If it's not attached. It's treated differently, but I fully appreciate where Councilman Bracazza is coming from that it's really a distinction without a difference from a practical reality standpoint. So I'm wondering, would it be possible to change the language of what has been proposed to gross floor living area. So instead of gross floor area, gross floor living area, and if that's not the right language, if there is alternative language. So one suggestion I would have instead of using living area because it's still actually unclear to me if an attached would that might still be considered living area. One car garage is about 200 square feet and a four car garage is about 400 square feet. So00 with an attached garage. And that would cover that extra 400 square feet you'd get for the garage to make sure it's not counted. I would be amenable to them. All right, I'll make it unanimous and we will move forward with that change to the recommendation. Great. Thank you very much. So we're now on the bottom of page seven, recommendation five. Very similar discussion, sorry, let me just read it first, so replace the current school impact tax discount for multi-family units with three or more bedrooms in infill impact areas with a countywide impact tax exemption for both transportation and school impact taxes and the exemption would apply to multifamily residential units with three or more bedrooms and multifamily structures. The discussion was very similar to the last item, the last work session, which is that to the extent that these units are intended to accommodate families, it may not make sense to waive the school impact tax, but for the same reasons that we've suggested before it may make sense to waive the transportation impact tax for such units. It seemed that the committee had generally acknowledged that that approach would be appropriate here. And so that's what we continue to recommend. We would just note that technically there is currently a 40% discount for three bedroom units and infill impact areas and there's no recommendation to change that so that would remain. Do you have a question? No, I think this follows along with the conversation that we just had and I would take the recommendation of staff, but Council President Frieson, you would like to get a question. No, that's fine. I'm happy to go along with the recommendation of staff. Council Member Dranda. Thank you very much. Thanks for letting me join. The, we had discussed last time, and you kind of alluded to the question I was gonna ask, overlapping credits that might apply, is that in the pack? Is there a dendum on that? I think you had requested that specifically with reference to the parking, the process of no parking. So we do explain that in part of that recommendation. Okay. But we can speak to it now if you'd like or just wait a minute. No, no, wait, I just wanted to make sure and because you made me think about it. So thank you. Yeah. Thank you for answering that. Great. So we're moving along. Thank you for moving us along. So I think on this recommendation, we will take the staff recommendation. And I thank the staff for clarifying what is currently in the impact tax to make sure that we don't forget that. So now we can move on to the next item. Sounds good. We're now on page 9, recommendation 6. Examped Office to Residential Conversions from Transportation and School Impact Taxes when the building is adaptively reused or renovated for multifamily housing offer a 50% school impact tax discount for Office to Residential to residential conversions when demolition is involved in the conversion of office to residential to multifamily or single family attached housing or town homes. Council staff laid out three options to either support the planning boards recommendation, exempt both office to residential conversions and demolitions and redevelopment from both schools and transportation impact taxes or exempt both the adaptive reuse and conversions were demolition involved from the transportation impact tax but charge 50% of the school impact tax rate. During the discussion members of the committee had asked for some additional information about the office market which we described. We have a link to that analysis and a table here which I won't go over right now. But I think there is a general agreement that to the extent that converting to housing through demolition or just through conversion would take a building that has zero students to potentially a lot of students. It would not make sense to waive the school impact tax, but for the same reasons as has been discussed before considering waiving the transportation impact tax. Our suggestion would be slightly modified then from what we explained in the packet last time, although we didn't catch that edit due to a copy and paste error on the top of page 11. It should say for office to residential conversions when demolition is involved, exempt them from transportation impact taxes, but charge 100% of the school impact tax rate. And I think that language is reflected in the draft bill language that Miss Nidoo additional information and time to reflect on this. And I think consistent with how we've been moving along, I'm good with the staff recommendation. And I do want to acknowledge the planning department staff is here at any point. If there's anything you would like to say please just wave. But I think so far it's all been consistent with what we discussed last time. So I'll turn to my colleagues to see. We're good on this one. Council President Friedson, did you want to? No. We're good. Alright, we can move on. So something related to this at the bottom of page 11, the office of the county attorney noted that demolition is not defined in this chapter. So there is an additional amendment at the top of page 12. The definition that council staff chose is the exact definition that's used in chapter eight, which applies to all buildings. Great. So recommendation 8.8, update the county code to allow credit for capacity improvements along state roadways. This one was one that was inadvertently combined last time. The committee was sounded like they were leaning towards agreeing with this one. Members of the committee noted the public's expectation that improvements are made to support development and it's nice to have those improvements up front and to the, it doesn't matter if it's a county or a state road. So council staff just reiterates their support for the planning board's recommendation, which means no amendment to the bill is introduced is required, which is why you don't see language here. Great, and I just wanna say thank you again to on the conversation we had on this last week, I think it was really helpful to walk through and Ms. Buckley, particularly as you walked us through, like some of the decisions people are making. So I appreciate that. Any conversation on this one? Nope, we can continue. I'm going to take yes for an image. I know. So next, this is recommendation 8.b in the packet. This is the recommendation about forming a working group. So what you have before you on page 13 and into the top of page 14 was under issues to be studied is just a list of all the items that have been recommended so far for the task force. This would of course be word-smith and could be a little stronger and cleaner and draft resolution. Council staff also suggested a timeline and a composition. Things you'd want to think about when forming a task force. But I do want to note here that this is not part of the bill. It is a separate resolution, so it does not have to be decided on today, because I think this could be its own work session probably. Mr. Dew, I'm going to agree with you. And thank you. Also thank the planning staff for submitting some language on the goal of the task force. And I know last night we did also get comments back from the Department of Transportation that we all received. Given that I think there needs to be, you know, a good thoughtful process to think about what this work group is going to be tasked with from the committee before we pass this on to the full council. I'm going to recommend to my colleagues that for today's purposes and moving forward with this bill in our recommendation to full council that we hold on the conversation of the work group and that we will schedule a go session to dig into this much deeper and move on quickly because I know that given the some of the timeline that was looked at here, we don't want, we need to move forward with this but that was one of the questions I had whether or not this is something we could talk about doing in a short timeline, the pluses and minuses of that. So I think we can all reflect on that, talk to our colleagues, and then move forward with a resolution soon, but not today. Good with that? All right, we'll continue. Okay, thank you. So we are now in the middle of page 14, our recommendation 9, maintain the Opportunity Zone Impact Tax Exemption for projects located at Opportunity Zone designated Census Tracks regardless of the status of the federal program. There was a lot of debate over this. You can see Council staffs recommended options here. Or there was discussion anyway. We recommended potentially considering alternative geographies that have a data-driven approach. I think council staff's primary concern with the opportunity zone designation was just how those census trash came to be chosen and to the extent that it was going to expire. It was just more of a discussion point and I think it was pretty clear that I wanted to take a cautious approach and not add any uncertainty to deals that may be in the works based on these designations which can be significant. And so we sort of thought about a way to acknowledge the existing program as it structured today and has been operating but also call out the specific census tracks and really just provide the council a chance in the future to transition away to a more thoughtful geographic approach. And whether a geographic approach at all is appropriate and that could be a discussion that's a part of the larger working group. And so we recommended language that would keep the term acknowledge the census tract boundaries. And at this point I would turn back to the chair because I believe Councilmember Mink may have a comment here. Great. And I just want to say thank you to the staff for this recommendation. I think you did hear the committee loud and clear that we, as we think about the impact act, I think we all agreed, making sure that we're not causing more instability or frustration on the part of folks who have projects in the pipeline is really important to us. And so I think from my perspective we strike the right balance here. I'm moving forward, but I can turn over to Council Member Mink, who is the District Council member for the Opportunity Zone that is of most interest that we've been talking about. Yeah, absolutely. So first off, I support the council staff's suggestion, the first amendment that they've suggested here, which keeps the opportunity zones and names, the name's the census tracts. I think that that adds clarity. Absolutely, do not support the sunsetting, which is coming at momentarily here because I think to the point that we all have been discussing around the stability, the predictability, that that would undermine that. I do have some thoughts about the White Oak area in particular. They're also relevant to the next question that's coming up right after this. So I'm happy to tackle that question in either place. I just wanted to make sure that I didn't muddy the waters with this particular question of how do we want to identify the opportunity zones and whether or not to impose a sunset. Great. Let's deal with this one first, because for whatever reason, this has caused a lot of discussion amongst folks. So I want to make sure it is clear what we are doing here. So what we have on page 15 is the staff recommendation of talking about including our reference to the opportunity zones and including the census tracks just in case there is something that changes with the federal program so that it is clear the areas we're talking about. Any questions from colleagues on the committee? No, I think we are good on that. So we'll take the staff recommendation on that one. So next is amendment one, which is including all of WITOC in the Red Policy Area. So when discussing this item last week, the committee first requested a list of which projects would actually be impacted by this, the removal of White Oak from the orange policy area, and the removal of the White Oak downtown from the red policy area, which as we know the last week would be consistent with PHP's recommendation as to adequacy. You will note on here, I lay the subject property we've been talking about is Viva Whiteoke. They're the ones who had requested this change and they are in an opportunity zone and so there are exemptions that would go with that already without taking up this amendment. So for that reason, Council staff reiterates our recommendation that the committee not support this requested amendment to include all of White Oak in the Red Policy Area because the subject property is in an opportunity zone and as discussed last week, the sense has been that White Oak does not quite meet the criteria for a Red Policy Area right now. And I do want to just note, Mr. Do, if I'm correct, we have now addressed all of the recommendations from the planning department and planning board and we've moved into now other recommendations or considerations that we've received from the public. Is that correct? Yes, that's correct. I just wanted to If my colleagues on the committee are okay, I thought I would turn over to Councilmember Mink as the district councilperson. All right. Thanks. Yeah, so I just wanted to, so there's wanted to note that as we look at the White Oak Master Plan area, one, I appreciate the PHP committee for establishing consistency on the adequacy side and there are conversations which we voted on and counsel previously on the impact tax side because of the opportunity zone designation and the way those lines are drawn at the federal level as opposed to at the local level. There is a little sliver of the White Oak master plan area that's not included in the Opportunity Zone designation, which creates inconsistency across the master plan area. This sliver is obviously, it's part of the same community, that's why it's in the master plan area. And I strongly believe that it's important to have that consistency. So we have the consistency with the late tip, right, if we're looking at the adequacy side again. That aligns with the white oak master plan area. And so we've been having some discussions about the best way to establish that consistency, whether there should be looking at whether it should all be a red policy area, which there are downsides to that. And it doesn't quite do the job. So I think that the best way to do this would be to add that one census track that's liver on the side and I would ask my colleagues on the committee to add this to the language that was just voted on to include that one little sliver within the opportunity zones at the county level. This is a unique situation across the county. Obviously, the late tip was established just for this one area across the master point area, establishing that consistency. And the opportunity zone covers almost the entire area, except for this one little piece. My colleagues have any comments on this or questions? Council President Freetzin? I appreciate the district council member and I will support it. I do think it's important for us to take a step back and think about what essentially we're saying here. And that is acknowledging that impact taxes are an impediment to investment. I mean, that is the clear acknowledgement of what this means, and ultimately, I think it requires some reflection here, you know, from a more global sense. Is this really an appropriate and reasonable way for us to generate revenue, to fund transportation, and to fund school capacity, to ask a housing community, a new housing community, to pay for benefits that are received by the broader community. And so I just, I think it's important as we make these decisions that we take a step back and think about what these decisions actually mean and what they are saying and not saying. And I do think it's important that we note that in the decisions that we make, it is not a sustainable model for us to expect that only developments in certain parts of the county pay certain things and development in other parts of the county don't. So I just, I think, you know, we ultimately are going to have to grapple with that. We have a task force or a working group or some group that is going to address this, but there is the transportation side of this conversation and there is the school side of this conversation. And the reality is, as much as we desperately want investment in certain areas of the county, if we have set up a dynamic where we're looking at student generation that doesn't change based on a census track. And so I just I think you know it's why I think that this is a bad model and why I think we should get out of it and why I've been saying that consistently since before I got elected and since I've gotten elected but I just think it's important that we acknowledge that as we make these decisions that this is the point that we are making the loud and clear signal that that impact taxes are an impediment to investment that we desperately want and we especially need particularly in areas of the county that have been historically under invested. That is a huge challenge. That's why I'm supportive. But ultimately we are left with a piecemeal network where we're only expecting these fees to be charged in certain parts of the county and not in others and that's not a sustainable model either. So supportive, but I just think it requires being said as part of the conversation. Great, thank you. And I want to thank Council Member Mink and the staff for puzzling through this one because I do think given where we are in this area with the master plan, again, going back to like what we want our tax system to be, you know, stable, predictable, and fair. I do think in this area, if we had that one area that was not consistent with the overall area in White Oak, that could lead to confusion and be detrimental to projects moving forward. So I am also supportive of this as is council member cats. And so the recommendation that was moved forward was to add, I believe it's census track, 1505 to the amendment that we made just before this one. Okay, great. All right. Okay, so amendment number two on page 17. This was a request from testimony to create an extension for impact tax credits. The way this would work, it would be for projects with the credit filed between 2016 and 2022 for at least $3 million, and it would expire 16 years instead of 12 years after. The committee asked for a list of potentially affected projects, which is on page 17. There were six projects we found. MCDOT actually sent a spreadsheet of all the credits we had and what council staff did was pull out all the ones that are over $ 3 million and in that date range that the amendment would affect and that's how we came up with the six projects. You'll see from the final column it also includes what those funds are to be used for. Great. I appreciate the additional information and conversation on this and I support this recommendation. Any? No, we are good to move. Full support from the committee on that one. Next amendment three, another requested amendment from testimony. So I'm going to rewind slightly here. So under section 5247 of the county code, you can get a credit for providing additional transportation capacity or reducing traffic demand. One request was to remove the requirement about increasing capacity. Blood are explained that this measurement can be difficult with non-vehicle facilities and that even for vehicles, there may be safety or maintenance needs. Council staff's recommendation is, this would be a pretty big amendment. And based on some The way it's drafted currently is based on a lot of our just long-standing policies about transportation So given the breadth of this change council staff's recommendation is to save this one for the task force Sounds good to me and some saying heads not on the committee. Let's put this on the list for the task force. Because I need something to do. Right. They're not going to be busy at all. Amendment 4 is this is the amendment noted earlier about exempting projects that provide no onsite parking and are located near transit from impact taxes. There was a lot of discussion last week that there are a lot of benefits right now already provided. And the committee asked for a full list, particularly accounts on Rdwondo, on the range of policies that already applied to these projects. Also, I want to note that DOT had noted that within a half mile of Metro, you're almost almost almost always in a red policy area. So we're gonna split this one, but I'll go first, because the first one is the ZTA. ZTA 2310, which was passed last year. Developments in red policy areas and half mile from transit are not required to provide a minimum number of parking spaces, which is a huge cost savings. Planning included a letter of recommendations and note as well that the ZTA is already doing much more than this impact tax credit could provide. And with that, I will move it on to Mr. Oly. Thank you. There are a few other sort of transportation related incentives here. So there are lower impact tax rates in red policy areas as the rates are currently implemented. So there are the lowest rates in red policy areas, which suggests that, you know, it's related to the fact that there may be less transportation impacts in those places due to the presence of transit, but also the savings is less in those places. There's also reduction of impact taxes for specific uses, so there's a sliding scale if you provide more MPD use. You get a reduction of impact taxes up to a waiver, 25% rather you get a waiver of impact taxes. And there's also the reduction for the school impact tax rates for three bedroom units. And then if that red policy area is also an opportunity zone or an enterprise zone, then there are no underlying impact tax rates. I think we would note that just to be consistent with our approach, we would say that, it might make sense to not wave the school impact tax, maybe wave the transportation impact tax, but they're already low here, with respect to the question that was asked, so we'll just leave that discussion back to the committee. Great, thank you so much. that was asked, so we'll just leave that discussion back to the committee. Great, thank you so much. And I do want to note the letter we received from Ms. Peckett at DOT, the position of our Department of Transportation, is not to move forward with this amendment and keep the status quo that we have. And I will say, given thank you for compiling this information. Since some of these things are somewhat new, just being put in place, my inclination for the time being is not to move forward with any changes and not to accept this amendment, but I'll turn it over to my colleagues on the committee. Council President Friedson. Yeah, appreciate it. I definitely think the school impact piece is hard to justify the nexus. I do personally think that if we're being consistent, if three bedroom is something that we want to incentivize and have given a transportation impact tax waiver, then certainly no parking for the environmental standards of it would, you know, to me be worthwhile. I appreciate I'm sitting next to my colleague. I worked very hard with for months and months and months on the zoning text amendment where we reduce the mandatory minimums and government imposed standards that were inconsistent with our broader public policies, including parking minimums specifically. And so my view would be, if we're going to do this in one area and provide these types of exemptions, then I really do think that this is a worthwhile public policy. I recognize that the transportation impact tax in these areas are the lowest. That's a mixed bag. On the one hand, maybe it makes the least impact. I'm pleased to see planning and everybody agreeing that our zoning tax amendment will have a much greater impact than just about anything else. Always good to hear as the co-lead sponsor of legislation. It also points out that the amount of revenue loss here is fairly insignificant as well in the broader scheme of things. So to me, the most consistent thing that we can do if we're saying hold schools harmless on some of these important public priorities, but we are using it as a tool to advance other public priorities. I certainly think having fewer cars in areas that are in very close proximity to transit is a broader public policy that we have and so it would seem to be consistent for us to support that particular aspect. You gotta tell me which you're good with, because we actually did we disagree also. I'm good with what you said earlier. Okay. Thank you. So I think that we can mark that down as two to one on not making the change, though I think overall, the points we're making is we're more agreement than disagreement on this point, and that this is not one where we are going to see significant impact. And I agree with Council President Freetz in that, you know, overall, I think the message we're sending with all the changes that we're making today is that we want to incentivize development and we see that there are some real issues with how we do impact access. So all right, but that one's two to one. We will move on then. Undergrounding Utilities. This was part of public hearing testimony. Council staff received a request from Miles and Strockbridge's Land Use and Zoning Practice Group to provide a transportation impact tax credit for the undergrounding of existing utilities. As the letter notes, master plans have encouraged projects to underground existing utilities as a frontage improvements noting the benefits to pedestrians. It's like, let's, we'll just go through some of our analysis on this because it wasn't raised at the last work session. Not always, but under grounding utilities can have some impact on the delivery of adequate infrastructure or providing capacity to the extent that those under grounding utility helps to accommodate, you know, bike and pedestrian infrastructure or high capacity transit as the case may be, not always, it's unclear to what extent it adds capacity, but it certainly could in theory. I think the other thing though with underground utilities is they're very expensive and the cost can be unpredictable depending on the site and what the conditions are of the overhead utilities. And so, you know, to the extent that frontage improvements or what constructed improvements are provided are a choice if there's ever sort of a negotiation to sort of make that project work. Somebody might be less inclined to do undergrounding utilities if it doesn't come with a credit and another improvement is. And so we were also thinking a little bit about the working group in the future of transportation impact tax is thinking about what we think is weak here, right? We think the weakness is a developer pays an impact tax, but that impact tax is not necessarily spent to mitigate or support any infrastructure in that project area. Well, if they underground utilities and it does increase transportation capacity, then that would have been an appropriate use of those impact taxes. And therefore, it might make sense to provide that credit for that reason. We think it's just a stronger connection between the policy bases as it is today and the implementation of it. But it might be interesting to know whether or not you know DOT truly considers those to be a capacity adding projects and whether you know we use impact taxes towards that that'd be an interesting test but that's an unknown at the moment. Thank you and I think since we did not have the opportunity to really talk about this one last week, I know Ms. Peckett, you have feelings on this, our opinions, if you want to come down and share those with us, I appreciate the letter from last night, but I think Ms. Ellie just laid out the staff thinking on why they were recommending it and just want to hear from DOT's perspective. Yeah, thank you so much, Hayley Peck at DOT. So, first of all, thank you. I appreciate some of the things I really agree with that, Mr. Arley said, which is that it is very, it can be very expensive and it also can be very variable in terms of underground and utilities. But what I just want to emphasize is there's not a nexus with transportation capacity. You might have a more lovely pedestrian environment, or you might not, we just don't know that. So we're not actually providing more capacity, nor are we necessarily encouraging mode shift, but we could be standing to lose quite a bit of money because they're so expensive to the degree that we're getting zero impact taxes without any transportation benefits. More of an aesthetic and urban design benefit, but we're talking about adequate public facilities here. So we're losing the ability to build adequate public facilities, and there really isn't a direct transportation connection. In many cases, not even an indirect one. I do have a question, Ms. Peckett, because you know, thinking about undergrounding utilities, I will say that, especially in some of our older areas where sidewalks aren't as wide as we would like them, you know, having been the mayor of a city that has some issues with utility poles and other things, and that really impeding pedestrian walkways and things like that. So I'm just, I think when Mr. Ali laid this out, I was really thinking of pedestrian safety and places. And the fact that, unless I'm incorrect from what I understood from Mr Ali saying is that this would be something that would be project specific versus, I hear what you're saying about the adequacy, but that is not project specific to this. So I appreciate the points, but I think I'm leaning towards including this and taking the staff's recommendation on that. So I think that what I would just respond to and encourage that is I think I agree with you on the project specific. I don't think that we could say in all cases or in, in I don't have language drafted right now, but I would want to have the opportunity to think about if there are specific cases where you have an inadequate sidewalk and the undergrounding of utilities would specifically lead and the sidewalk would also be replaced with the adequate public infrastructure and you would actually lead to that transportation improvement whether in additional capacity or just like a much safer environment, then I see the transportation benefit. But as written right now, there's no nexus between the undergrounding of utilities and any improvement to the pedestrian realm or to public access. Okay. Thank you for that. Council member Katz. Thank you. I actually agree with DOT. I would, would Pethco allow any new construction without undergrounding it? Yeah. I will talk. Yeah. Where is it again? It's all the time. Well, but any of the larger developments all would be undergrounds from what I remember. And so I don't, I believe that this does not increase the capacity. And so I'm in agreement with Dio too. I have Council President Freetzin and then Council Member Jwanda. Yeah, I appreciate where Department of Transportation is coming from here in terms of capacity. I will say we kicked over a capacity question of whether or not we have a standard for capacity or not in the previous conversation to the working group. So I just would, you know, throw that out there and note that. This is a broader question of infrastructure improvements that are not necessarily capacity improvements, which is not just involved in undergrounding of utilities. I also think that there is a very interesting conversation that we have had in every recent master plan about undergrounding of utilities. And we note two things. One, the overwhelming majority of people want utilities to be underground. Number two, it was made very clear by planning and that it's their view that undergrounding of utilities plays a much more significant role than aesthetics. That undergrounding of utilities is about connectivity. It's about public safety in terms of pedestrian and bike access. It's a broader category and especially as we're talking about some of the changes that were made that we are, you know, four years ago that we are continuing today, a lot of the, a lot of the transportation infrastructure we're focused on is less about road capacity and more about level of comfort. It's more about pedestrian safety. It's more about creating the livable, walkable, accessible, urbanized communities if the transportation network is a part of. So, you know, and then the last piece that I'll say about this is there is a difference between something that is optional and something that is required. And that's where I think, to me, is the bigger area of this getting dicey because there is part of the master plan language that we have debated of exactly what does it mean to require the undergrounding of utilities because there are a lot of times where it isn't practicable, where it would overwhelm the cost of a project and where is the line where the impact tax is an appropriate charge and where is the line that it's not. So I agree in theory here that if you are making an optional decision to underground utilities, the benefit of undergrounding the utilities is more than just aesthetics, and you should get a credit for that. Because that is in the spirit of all the other changes that we are making with pedestrian level of comfort and vision zero and all the other issues. On the other hand, it's not clear to me exactly how you make that distinction based on project approval and based on master plan language. So perhaps my suggestion here is we may need to get some feedback on exactly how this would be implemented and what would be determined to be optional versus what would be determined to be required. Can I make two quick clarifications for my colleagues? So first of all, any improvements in central business districts are required to underground utilities, new developments that are green field developments are required to underground utilities. that are green field developments are required to underground utilities, redevelopments are not required. However, would be required to bring the sidewalk to the full standard width, whether or not the developer chose to underground utilities or movie utilities would be part of that calculation. Anyone else jumping in? Okay. Great. Not the subject matter expert. Any development in a central business district, that's not everything. Correct. That's exclusively in a central business district. Correct. But this is not suggesting exclusive to central business district. So it's a little bit of a slight of hand. I think that would be honest. What DOT would recommend is that we maybe workshop a bit more to see if we could, we're not necessarily supporting the credit here, but recognizing that given what I'm hearing, there might be situations where there was a clear nexus than what is presented right now. Yeah, I think this could use a little bit more work from my perspective, the only other thing that I would say on undergrounding of utilities, the benefit of undergrounding utilities is oftentimes more important for my experience to the broader community than it is to the applicant based on the cost. So if you were to ask most residents who had a new development project coming in of how important it was for the utilities to be underground in, they would rate it much, much higher than if you asked most applicants in terms of your costs and the value that this is to your property, how important is it for you to underground the utilities. Those are not equal. That is why incentivizing it in some way is so important because left to its own devices, if the interests among the public for all the reason stated earlier, is to have utilities undergrounded to the extent possible, because there are a lot of benefits to that. Then we have to figure out ways to make that happen, and it's not going to happen on its own. Turn it to our colleagues in a minute, but I'm going to put a suggestion on the table and then I'll turn it to my colleagues that this may be a really good place for the work group, one, because you're hearing interest to undergrounding of utilities. But if before this goes before full council, if council staff and DOT come to some agreement on this is a way that could be worked in, we can take that up at full council. Otherwise I would suggest this gets put to the working group to work through some of the complexities on it. Is that so? Good. All right. Councilmember Joondo, Mink and then Council Member Auburnos, did you want this too? Okay. The full committee here. Thank you. And I think that's a really good suggestion. I was going to just remind, I know Council Member Freetz and we'll remember, Council President, we'll remember in PHP, we had an extensive discussion, it comes from a link about undergrounding in the White Oak Master Plan, where the points about in that area where it is, obviously, a town center approach and its dense and it's very dangerous to cross major, you know, some of those major 29 and other artilleries where I think there is a big public benefit to folks. Now I think I know there is there to your point, Ms. Peket, that that's a place where I would make sense. And we, you know, I've argued very vigorously that that should be born a part of the requirement there because of, you know, for that section because of that it's needed. But I could imagine that there's other places where it's less related to safety and more aesthetic. So I think there's a mixed bag there. The question of who should bear that cost is always the the is a different question and in that case we said well if you're going to build you're going to require this would say you get a credit. My question I do have a question in that the credit is worth what's the credit worth? How much is the credit? I don't know, that depends on the project, but what's the relation? I think it would be the cost of, is it the cost of doing the thing? Well, I mean, I think that, or undergrounding the utilities, the order of magnitude, I think that there's a lot of times that the undergrounding utilities would exceed the amount of impact tax that the project required to pay. Yeah. So it would be, I mean, it's not clear, but probably not to exceed the level of impact tax. So could you have a situation where it would just eliminate the impact tax? That's basically what it is. That would be the net effect. It's not a credit. It's tantamount to a elimination of whatever the impact tax is okay so I just think that's something to think about and I do think there's difference narrows and and because it's so expensive if it did have an excess to safety then I think maybe we considered in certain instances I don't think a broad general exemption would be appropriate that'd be my view but agree with the council vice president chair that maybe having the workshopping that you suggested and or kicking it to the work group would be something to do. Thank you. Okay Council Member Mink. Not much to add here we have had good conversations about this and it's clear that this is a priority not just for the public but also for the Council but obviously this is a balance and so it would be great if we could have some compromise options to look at at full council and you know I'll note one of the benefits that I don't think that we have named yet to undergrounding as climate resiliency which is becoming increasingly urgent and you know undergrounding obviously on the front end is much preferable to trying to deal with it after the fact and you know I think that Council President Fritz and made a lot of compelling points as well. We also are balancing the cost of, we're looking at cost to developers or the value to developers versus value to the public, but there's also the value of the cost of the impact tax exemption that they would or the credit that they would receive here, versus what we would spend that money on somewhere else. the impact tax exemption that they would or the credit that they would receive here versus what we would spend that money on somewhere else. What would the public rather have us spend that funding on? That's a vague question, but I think that really is the question that we have to weigh as we move forward. So, thanks very much. Thank you. Council Member Ava. Thanks. Yeah, this has come up in just about every master playing conversation we've had over the last six years. And it is a tough issue because it's something we all want. But it's very expensive and adds a lot to the cost of projects, which we've heard from developers and especially developers in areas that we really want to develop that it adds too much cost and it's a deterrent. So finding that sweet spot's important. I think it makes sense for there to be a group to take a closer look at this. I'm starting to worry about the depth and scope of everything that's going to be on this task forces because this is one of those complex issues. And so I know we've talked about getting it started as soon as possible. And I know we're not going to talk today about who's going to be on it. But the more we add to it, the more people are going to need to be on it because of the scope of the work that it's going to have to pursue. So I will be back for that conversation as well because that's actually why I came today in case we were going to discuss that because I have some thoughts on that. But I'll yield back to you, Madam Vice President. Thank you very much. All right, so I think we, oh, Councilmember Katz went to discuss this. I agree with the task force, obviously. And I can tell you when they've had infill development, as the former mayor mentioned, I went through that too, with infill development for undergrounding. And it is just the side of a nightmare. Because you have to figure out how you're going to get the service for the various buildings. Now it's coming in with off of a telephone pole or whatever it's coming in. And then you have to figure out how it's going to be in there for the property that it's affecting and who's paying for that service. So I think that the task force makes a lot of sense. I think they need to look at this. As council member Amarama and I said in total and I'll come back with a good suggestion how we can have it and do it right. Thank you. Great. All right. So I think the consensus from the committee is that this will likely be something the working group looks at but if there is some language you would like full council to consider then we can look at that when this goes to full council. Sounds good. I mean we'll work with DOT to come up with some precise language, I guess, to figure out maybe what the parameters would be for when a credit applies potentially. Okay. Thank you, Ms. Beckett, very much. Can I just make a follow-up point on that briefly? Just looking forward to working with them, I think the one comment we were trying to make here was that, like, to the extent that, you know, as everyone's acknowledged, these are an imprecise method. And this is an imprecise policy. And so there's, to the extent that we can be precise about whether underground and utilities are adding capacity, there might be a question about how precise is the allocation of impact tax collections to projects for that reason as well. And that may need to be a consideration with whatever we come back. So I just wanted to state that. Okay. So amendment number six is about the definition of high rise residential units. There are two parts to this amendment here. First is a technical correction. The planning board had recommended removing one bedroom low rise units from the definition of high rise units, which makes a lot of sense. In the bill is introduced that was noted in the transportation section, but not the school section. So the first box at the top of 22 just makes that technical correction. The second piece of this amendment though is, learner enterprises reached out opposed to this change. The reason being that for projects that are already in the pipeline that have these garden apartments, this would increase their rate. And so that would throw off a lot of the numbers they've already calculated. So council staff's proposal was to keep planning boards change the definition because it's a sensical definition, but to do a grand fathering provision for the projects in the pipeline. In the staff report, council staff had recommended if the building permit was approved. And speaking to stakeholders, a request that's been made is to actually change us to when the preliminary plan was approved. Because by preliminary plan, they've already done a lot of that math and figured out what their costs are going to be. And you also should have received a letter from Councilmember Balkham supporting that change. Okay. Councilmember Pazin-Freetzen? Yeah, I just wanted to make sure and appreciate acknowledging the main project. Black Hill is in Councilmember Balkham's district. She sent a memo on this. I think accomplishes what Council staff was attempting to accomplish, which is if you've already put a significant amount of investment towards a project that this was never intended in terms of its proposal to prevent projects that are already moving forward to actually be able to complete. And so I think this is a good approach. And I support the district council member in her suggestion and request of us here. So hopefully we can support it. Yep, I as well. So that's the committee accepts the change with changing this to the preliminary plan. So from here on out we're getting into all the really technical corrections. So first amendment, meaning they're all council staff. So first amendment seven. Right now the bill has a transition clause to make an effective January 1, 2025, which is before the effective date. So the recommendation is to make this an expedited bill. Any objections? No, make sense. Go forward. The second one, amendment eight is to amend section 50 to 59. I know this whole time we've been stressing that PHP and go are different, that the policy and the tax is different. This is the one tiny exception where the policy recommends allowing funds collected as UPPs to be used for capital projects, adding capacity at schools adjacent to the school for which the funds were collected. This amendment would actually need to be in the code. So that language is on page 23. Council staff talked to the relevant departments about this and the language we came up with was for capital projects adding capacity at any school, adjacent to the school for which the funds were collected. adjacent schools must be determined using the planning board's annual school utilization report. Looks good. All right, we can move on. Next is amendment nine, which is to clarify the definition of stacked flats. The county attorney's office noted that the definition uses the term adjacent, which in the zoning ordinance just means nearby. So the amendment here is to clarify that it's within a single building. So stack flats would be defined as dwelling units and a stack of two or more, where each dwelling unit is above or below an adjacent unit and a single building. That's four stories or less to visualize this. You picture a door. There's two units on the left, two units stacked on the right, but all in the same building, that is a stacked flat. Great. That was good. And next, there is, let me see. Oh, so this is a amendment you discussed earlier actually about the 1800 square feet. It was corrected earlier in the staff report, but I wanted to note here that in the bill, it says detached residential or detached single family, and it should say attached or detached. And then very lastly, I did not list them all here, but there's a couple places where things need to be capitalized and underlined. We do not need to walk through all those. Thank you, Mr. Dair. And that is your full staff report on 624. I appreciate all the staff's diligent work. Looking at the planning departments or anything from your perspective, all good? You're good. All right. Well, thank you for your excellent work on this. And continued work. Thank you to the Department of Transportation, who's here, representative from MCPS. And we have OMB and Finance in the House. Everyone came over. I'm glad to give you back the rest of your afternoon since we finished this up. I want to thank my colleagues on the Government Operations and Physical Policy Committee and our colleagues who are visiting us today. Thank you everyone and we will move this on to full council and that we are done for the day. We are adjour today. Thank you everyone and we will move this on to full council. And that we are done for the day. We are adjourned. Thank you. Thank you. Good. Good. activities do you offer? Of course. So the Ellen Chai has various programs. We have a couple of them that we work with the school systems. We have an asthma management program that focuses on,