About Last Night

There was no way I was going to sit at home last night and watch this historic council meeting on my laptop. I had to be there to witness it in person.

I wasn’t the only one.

Ilana Bittner was there doing a video report for HoCoMoJo. She told me that her ten year old son wanted to come too. He had to settle for watching it at home with dad. It was a school night after all.

David Yungmann got his mom to watch the kids so he could come, at least for a little while. I think he was there for the vote on CB58 but by the time CB59 came up for a vote he was home tucking his kids in for the night. It was a school night after all.

I soon as I walked in I saw Tim Sosinski and he was all smiles. Apparently the council members, the housing advocates and General Growth Properties worked through the weekend and right on up to last nights council meeting on an eleventh hour compromise on affordable housing. They essentially agreed to go back to the housing trust that GGP originally proposed and drop the MIHU requirement that replaced it.

There are lots of details that still need to be worked out with this housing trust but the basic deal seems to have made the housing advocates happy. I couldn’t help but think that would also make them less than enthusiastic about any referendum drive to further delay the development. At least three of the council members used the words “full spectrum housing” when describing the benefits of the trust. Full spectrum housing is the big thing in affordable housing circles these days. It sounds pretty psychedelic to me.

And speaking of pyschedelic, the eleventh hour housing dealing seem to take its toll on Jen Terrasa. She often appeared dazed and confused with the proceedings. While Calvin, Greg, Courtney and Mary Kay seemed to be able to move through the amendments with relative ease, on more than a few occassions Jen appeared to have trouble keeping up. This caused a little open friction between her and the council chair. Courtney runs a pretty tight meeting and her patience wore thin at times with her council colleague.

I felt a little sorry the staff at Ellicott Mills Middle School. They were being honored by the council for their recent recognition as a Maryland State Blue Ribbon School. The last minute deal on housing caused a one hour delay for the start of the meeting. Thankfully they were at the top of the agenda and were out of there by nine o’clock.

It was a school night after all.