1
January 28, 2009
STATE OF MARYLAND
BOARD OF PUBLIC WORKS
GOVERNOR’S RECEPTION ROOM
STATE HOUSE, 2ND FLOOR
ANNAPOLIS, MARYLAND
January 28, 2009
10:08 a.m.
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January 28, 2009
P R E S E N T
GOVERNOR MARTIN O’MALLEY, Presiding;
HONORABLE PETER FRANCHOT, Comptroller;
HONORABLE NANCY KOPP, Treasurer;
LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR ANTHONY BROWN;
SHEILA C. MCDONALD, Secretary, Board of Public Works;
ALVIN C. COLLINS, Secretary, Department of General Services;
T. ELOISE FOSTER, Secretary, Department of Budget and Management;
JOEL LEBERKNIGHT, Chief of Procurement, Department of Budget and Management;
JOHN PORCARI, Secretary, Department of Transportation;
CHIP PRICE, POS Grants, Department of Natural Resources, Operations;
LUWANDA JENKINS, Special Secretary, Governor’s Office of Minority Affairs; and,
MARION BOSCHERT, Recording Secretary, Board of Public Works.
3 January 28, 2009
C O N T E N T S
Subject Agenda Witness Page
Bond Sale SEC Sheila McDonald 11 Resolution Item 3, Treasurer Kopp p. 5
Dental Benefit DBM T. Eloise Foster 18 Provider Item 3-S John Colmers p. 8B
USM Agenda USM Jim Stirling 19
Nationwide DoIT Elliot Schlanger 21 Mortgage Item 1-IT Sarah Bloom Raskin Licensing System
DOT Agenda DOT John Porcari 25
Harriet Tubman DGS Al Collins 27 Underground Item 4-AE, Railroad State p. 9 Park
BCCC Life DGS Al Collins 28 Sciences Item 19-LT, Caroline Williams Institute p. 42
Acquisition of DGS Al Collins 39 Land from MD Item 16-RP John Griffin Province of the p. 32 Senator Middleton Society of Jack Russell Jesus Bill Crouch Tom Mattingly Michael Gaines
Acquisition and POS Chip Price 76 Development Item 2A, Ken Alban Projects in p. 2A John Griffin Anne Arundel
January 28, 2009 Subject Agenda Witness Page State Public SEC Sheila McDonald 88 School Item 5, Luwanda Jenkins Construction p. 7 Nancy Grasmick Program David Lever Matthew Power
Frederick County 107 Linda Burgee Ray Barnes
Anne Arundel County 114 Kevin Maxwell Ned Carey
Baltimore City 128 Brian Morris Andres Alonso Keith Scroggins
Baltimore County 152 Joe Hairston Mike Sines Margaret Ward
Calvert County 168 Eugene Karol Jack Smith George Leah
Carroll County 178 Charles Ecker Ray Prokop
Caroline County 182 Edward Shirley Senator Colburn
Charles County 188 Donald Wade Charles Wineland HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) January 28, 2009 Subject Agenda Witness Page Dorchester County 194 Frederic Hildenbrand Senator Colburn Gary McCabe
Harford County 207 Patricia Skebeck Patrick Hess David Craig Delegate McComus
Howard County 226 Sydney Cousin Frank Aquino Ken Roy
Montgomery County 243 Shirley Brandman Jerry Weast Joe Lavorgna
Prince George’s County 261 William Hite Verjeana Jacobs Jack Johnson
Queen Anne’s County 277 Carol Williamson
St. Mary’s County 289 Michael Martirano
Somerset County 301 Delegate Elmore Karen Brofee
Washington County 313 Elizabeth Morgan Boyd Michael Ruth Anne Callaham HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) January 28, 2009 Subject Agenda Witness Page
Wicomico County 332 John Fredericksen Delegate Conway Rick Pollitt Robin Holloway Delegate Mathias
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P R O C E E D I N G S
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right, welcome ladies and gentlemen to today’s Board of Public Works meeting. Today is, all day, January 28th. Wow, already the entire month’s gone by. On today’s Board of Public Works Agenda will be the Hope-a-thon. The hopes and dreams we have for our children as demonstrated and expressed through the amount of dollars we’re able to pour into the bricks and mortar of modern classrooms, and new labs, and all of those sorts of things.
So what we’re going to do is first dispense with the Board of Public Works Agenda, with the exception of the school hopes. And then we’re going to go back and do the school hopes. Is there a, there’s a schedule, Ms. McDonald, that’s already been sent out for that?
SECRETARY MCDONALD: And the copy’s out front, too.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And what time are we trying to start that piece of --
SECRETARY MCDONALD: We can probably start it at 11:00.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: At 11:00? Okay.
SECRETARY MCDONALD: We’ll see what we can do.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Well by golly, we’re going to start going here. So what shall we start with? Secretary’s Agenda?
SECRETARY MCDONALD: We can start with the
Secretary’s Agenda --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’m sorry. Comptroller or Treasurer, any opening words?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Governor, no, thank you. I just noticed I got a very nice pin from, is this from the Secretary of Transportation?
MR. PORCARI: The, we made all of our employees as part of the inaugural effort inaugural ambassadors. So the transit people, BWI, MARC
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employees, patrol people all wore them proudly that day.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, it obviously had an impact. Because the roads coming down, amazingly, were clear. At least the ones you’re responsible for. So my compliments to your team.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And nice comments on the
MARC service and how it worked from Baltimore. Lots of, Congressman Sarbanes called me yesterday to say that he continues to get people emailing him, telling him how great the MARC service was into D.C. Madam
Treasurer?
TREASURER KOPP: The whole thing, John, I wasn’t going to say anything, but I have to say, the whole thing, John, went so, so smoothly. It is absolutely amazing, I think. And it shows the good spirit and the, I mean, it was a wonderful time to be, to be in Washington. Everyone was so positive. And to, even when there were glitches people were so understanding and I really, so --
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MR. PORCARI: And it clearly was a regional effort, Governor, as you know from the daily conference calls.
TREASURER KOPP: Was it, it was amazing.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: No, it was very good.
It didn’t happen by itself. These guys were, with all of their counterparts in Virginia and D.C. I mean, I got to swoop in on the conference calls and hear the updates every twenty-four hours. But the work that they were doing every day, their sort of battle rhythm and concept of engagement from the center with Mayor
Fenty and his staff, and everything out from it. I mean, there were --
TREASURER KOPP: And the crowd control, I mean, everything went, I just --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I don’t think one arrest, either, right?
TREASURER KOPP: -- commend everyone who was involved.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Well I, too, shall proudly wear my inaugural ambassador pin, then. All right, Ms. McDonald?
SECRETARY MCDONALD: Thank you, Governor, good morning. Good morning, Madam Treasurer and Mr.
Comptroller. There are six items on the Secretary’s
Agenda this morning. There are three reports of emergency procurement. Item 5 is the 2010 fiscal year
Capital Improvement Program for Public School
Construction, so we will hold Item 5.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right.
SECRETARY MCDONALD: Item 3 is the resolution for a bond sale at a future meeting, and I don’t know if the Treasurer wants to address Item 3.
TREASURER KOPP: Just to point out, Governor and Mr. Comptroller, that Item 3 authorizes a general obligation funding up to $515 million. It obviously will depend on the market, how we do. It’s going to be the first retail general obligation bond sale in recent history, at any rate, for the State of
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Maryland. And it includes potentially up to $85 million in refunding, although that depends on the market, too.
The resolution calls for, as you can see, potentially three series. The first being the retail, second the potential refunding, and the third if everything is not sold retail, the next day will be a normal competitive sale.
We can talk more about it as we get into it and get closer to the date. But it’s something we certainly want all the citizens to know about. We want everyone to be able to invest in their State.
And look forward to a great occasion on March 4th, if necessary, and March 2nd and 3rd, certainly.
The people standing over there, particularly that nice lady in the pink suit standing over there actually knows all about it.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay.
TREASURER KOPP: And I think we can just adopt that as the resolution as part of the --
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SECRETARY MCDONALD: You can, as part of the
--
TREASURER KOPP: Okay.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All righty.
TREASURER KOPP: I will be making a presentation to you all and the public at a later date on it.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Sounds good. All right.
So this is everything on the Secretary’s Agenda, minus
Item 5 which we will be coming back to very shortly, by 11:00 a.m. And so the Comptroller moves approval of the Secretary’s Agenda, seconded by the Treasurer.
All in favor signal by saying, “Aye.”
THE BOARD: Aye.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All opposed, “Nay.” The ayes have it. We move on now to, let’s skip Program
Open Space. I know we have a little, you don’t want to skip it?
SECRETARY MCDONALD: Well, no, because that’s on the Department of General Services Agenda,
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the one with the presentation. Program Open Space, I think we can get through pretty --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Do you?
SECRETARY MCDONALD: I think so. Chip --
MR. COLLINS: I have the one --
SECRETARY MCDONALD: The acquisition that the presentation’s going to be on is on Secretary
Collins’ --
MR. COLLINS: It’s on my agenda.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: But we could clear the room of all these other folks if we went and banged through the other ones.
SECRETARY MCDONALD: Go right ahead. Go right ahead.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right? Okay. Whoa.
(Laughter)
TREASURER KOPP: Well, that’s nice.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’m not sure how that happened or who leaned on it. Check your backs.
(Laughter)
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right. So here we go. Let me skip Program Open Space, go to the
Department of –
TREASURER KOPP: Budget and Management.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- Budget and
Management. Actually, there’s some news on this one today, right?
MS. FOSTER: No, I don’t think so.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: No? Okay.
MS. FOSTER: Governor, Madam Treasurer, Mr.
Comptroller, good morning. There are six items on the
Department of Budget and Management’s Agenda today.
And I’ll be happy to answer any questions.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: There might have been news on this today.
MS. FOSTER: Yes, there was supposed to be news. But --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: There was to have been a number of mid-year cuts. For any of you that are here, and I know there are people here from school
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systems and also from community colleges. Part of the mid-year cuts in order to balance the fiscal year
2009, there were a number of things proposed. None of them was easy. They were all painful. They were all difficult. One involved rolling GCEI, cuts to the
Geographic Cost of Education Index. Another one was reducing the community college grants and dollars.
And another one was health grants. A fourth one which we had not intended to do but nonetheless we hadn’t closed that loop was the cuts to local law enforcement block grants in mid-year. Because of the strong leadership of our new President Barack Obama, and the strong leadership of our Maryland delegation, including
Senator Mikulski, Leader Hoyer, Congressman Cummings, and all of the others, there will be today in the
House of Representatives a vote on the American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act that President Obama has proposed. Within that bill are some substantial dollars that will help us to stabilize our fiscal
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situation in Maryland. A situation which is actually far stronger than most other states. But will also allow us to, hopefully, possibly, if it is to pass the
Senate within the days after, allow us not to have to do mid-year cuts which I know were very painful for all of you who budget on personnel and classrooms and teachers, and would kind of lock yourselves in for the year. So that’s why I have asked that that item be pulled today. And we’ll reconsider its necessity on
February 18th, after which time hopefully President
Obama will have signed his first important piece of legislation, which would make all of us happy. So that’s the non-news that’s on the Agenda today.
MS. FOSTER: Right.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Any questions on these other items?
TREASURER KOPP: Governor, could I just say something about, I think that’s great. And I think the stimulus package, I happen to agree with the
Majority Leader of the House. If anything it’s going
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to be too small. But that’s on a macroeconomic level.
I think it’s important that people understand that while it may help us not make abrupt mid-year cuts to these important programs, no one should think that the
State isn’t still in the process of tightening its belt and cutting significantly back from prior expectations. The Legislature is going through the budget very carefully and is not going to stop doing that. That’s its duty. And I know your budget is an extremely, extremely tight one. And I wouldn’t want people to think that, as I’ve heard from some politicians from other states, that we’re just waiting for the federal government to come in and solve all of our problems, and essentially get us out of the position of serious responsibility that we are in.
And I’m sure you don’t mean that. But I’ve seen enough in the press to know that some people are interpreting --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right. No, the great thing about it is, and our President understands that
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states, if they are fiscally stable, and we are in a much stronger place than other states --
TREASURER KOPP: You bet.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- because of the hard decisions made by this Board and time and time again, which now enables us with the passage of this bill to be one of the strongest tools in the national arsenal for spurring the economy, the demand side of it, with projects like many of the school projects which if we had the dollars could go immediately into the construction phase. So we, you’re right, though,
Madam Treasurer. We still have a lot of tough choices, still have a lot of tough days ahead. But it’s wonderful to know we have a President and
Congress trying to help for a change. So.
TREASURER KOPP: It’s terrific.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. Anything else on these items? Department of Budget and Management?
Comptroller? Treasurer?
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TREASURER KOPP: Could I, one, just because
I ran into the Secretary yesterday, Secretary Colmers about the dental benefit provider?
MS. FOSTER: And he’s here.
TREASURER KOPP: Just, like, two minutes. I mean, about what a terrific groundbreaking program this is that you’re embarking on.
MR. COLMERS: Thank you very much, Madam
Treasurer, Governor, Mr. Comptroller. On the budget today is one of the commitments that we made in response to the tragic death of Deamonte Driver almost two years ago. We formed a Dental Action Committee that proposed some radical changes in the way in which the Medicaid program provides dental services. The contract before you today is to create a single administrative service only contract with an outside vendor, carving dental services out of the managed care organizations into a single vendor. And so we’re delighted to be able to move forward here, and move
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forward on this commitment that we’ve made to make dental services more affordable.
I want to commend the work of the staff of the Department, in particular Susan Tucker who’s here today and others for getting this contract going. You will note that there’s an early start date on this so that we can assure a smooth transition as we go from one system to the next. And I believe that’s under two minutes.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s good stuff, John.
Thank you.
TREASURER KOPP: It is.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Stuff we all did together. It’s good. All right, the Comptroller moves approval of the DBM budget items, seconded by the Treasurer. All in favor signal by saying, “Aye.”
THE BOARD: Aye.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All opposed, “Nay.” The ayes have it. University System of Maryland.
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MR. STIRLING: Good morning, Governor, members of the Board. I’m Jim Stirling for the
University System. We have three items on today’s agenda. I’d be happy to answer any questions.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I see a $30.4 million contract with a 29 percent MBE participation. That’s great. It exceeds the 25 percent.
MR. STIRLING: I’ll take that compliment and hand it back to Mr. Evans, seated right behind me.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good. Any questions on this? The Comptroller moves approval, seconded by the
Treasurer. All in favor signal by saying, “Aye.”
THE BOARD: Aye.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All opposed, “Nay.” We now move on to, thank you, sir.
MR. STIRLING: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: The Department of
Information Technology. DoIT.
MR. SCHLANGER: Good morning, Governor,
Lieutenant Governor, Madam Treasurer, Mr. Comptroller.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good morning, Elliot.
MR. SCHLANGER: Elliot Schlanger, Department of Information Technology. We have three items on the
Agenda this morning. And I’ll be happy to take any questions at this time.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Elliot, tell me about
Item 1 in our ongoing fight to try to save every possible home we can from foreclosure.
MR. SCHLANGER: Absolutely. But in order to do that I’m going to ask for some help. And I know we have a contingent from DLLR. So if I may just tap on your shoulder, please?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Just give us a two- minute explanation of this, if you would?
MS. BLOOM RASKIN: Sure. This item --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And your name is?
MS. BLOOM RASKIN: I am Sarah Bloom Raskin, the Commissioner of Financial Regulation.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And you’re a busy person?
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MS. BLOOM RASKIN: Very busy. This item is a contract for the State to join the nationwide mortgage licensing system. This is a federal mandated system that all states are required to join. It is an online, web registration system for mortgage lenders and mortgage originators that is going to have a benefit of permitting all states to track enforcement actions and activities of mortgage lenders and originators more effectively across state lines.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great. Good. So this will allow us to --
MS. BLOOM RASKIN: This will allow us to have better enforcement and it will permit the mortgage lenders and mortgage originators to have a unique identification number that they will use as they proceed with their lending activities across state lines.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And that allows us to serve people who are in danger of being foreclosed by?
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MS. BLOOM RASKIN: This is a system of an enhanced, an enhanced regulatory system for mortgage lenders and mortgage originators. If these mortgage lenders and originators of, as they join the system and they are required to --
(Laughter)
TREASURER KOPP: I never have the sound on so I didn’t recognize it.
(Laughter)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: She thought it was
Anthony’s little ringy tone.
(Laughter)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right.
TREASURER KOPP: Sorry. Sorry.
(Laughter)
MS. BLOOM RASKIN: This is enhanced, this is an enhanced regulatory system for the mortgage lending industry. It will, it should improve all facets of the mortgage lending relationship.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mr. Comptroller?
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes. I was speaking at a conference recently and one of the panelists was
Bob Johnson, who’s a very successful entrepreneur and he has a proposal at the national level for dealing with some of the foreclosure crisis. But he mentioned in his presentation that there were 15,000 foreclosures in Prince George’s County. I hadn’t heard that figure, but I, pending or something. I thought that was high. But what are the figures?
MS. BLOOM RASKIN: We can actually get the most latest figures to you and to the Board. We, in our office because of the legislation that the
Assembly passed, we are able to track foreclosures through a Notice of Intent to Foreclose process. So those numbers we can, we can break them down by county for you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Let’s bring, let’s have an update on that next, at the next, Ms. McDonald, can you make a note? And ask, ask Secretaries Perez and
Skinner to give us an update on our foreclosure
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prevention efforts? We had a nice, for a while we saw a downtick and now we’re seeing an uptick again. So let’s, and perhaps we can also get an update on some of the things that went through the Barney Frank bill, the $4 billion, and figure out whether any of those dollars have come to hit any families in terms of providing some relief.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And just as an add on to that, would you ask Secretary Perez or perhaps yourself, if you could just communicate with Mr.
Johnson’s office and find out. It’s not a state proposal. It’s a national proposal.
MS. BLOOM RASKIN: Sure. Sure. I’d be pleased to.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: If you could just help us understand that a little better. Thank you.
MS. BLOOM RASKIN: There are many foreclosure proposals being discussed and we should take a look at his as well.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Thank you.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay.
TREASURER KOPP: Governor?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yes.
TREASURER KOPP: I’d just like to thank Ms.
Raskin and commend you for the leadership you’ve taken in some of the banking and finance issues on behalf of all the states on the Hill. You do us great service and I appreciate it.
MS. BLOOM RASKIN: Thank you. Thanks very much.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thanks very much for your hard work, and all of your regulators. Okay.
The Treasurer moves approval, seconded by the
Comptroller. All in favor signal by saying, “Aye.”
THE BOARD: Aye.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All opposed, “Nay.” We move on, thanks, Elliot, to the Maryland Department of
Transportation. MDOT.
MR. PORCARI: Good morning, Governor,
Lieutenant Governor, Madam Treasurer, Mr. Comptroller.
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We are presenting twenty items for your approval today. We are withdrawing Item 20-RP and we’ll be happy to answer any questions.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. Any questions on
MDOT? None? The Comptroller moves approval, seconded by the Treasurer. All in favor signal by saying,
“Aye.”
THE BOARD: Aye.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All opposed, “Nay.” The ayes have it. We move on now to the Department of
General Services. Al Collins.
MR. COLLINS: Good morning, Governor,
Lieutenant Governor, Madam Treasurer, Mr. Comptroller.
The Department of General Services has thirty-two items on our Agenda today. We have five revisions.
And that would be, we have revised Item 14-GM, 16-RP,
18-LT, 19-LT, and 30-CGL. We have one supplemental item. Governor, I’d like to point out, if you would, a number of significant accomplishments on our Agenda today. First of all, items, just for the sake of the
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record I want to just say, Item 2-AE, 3-AE, 4-AE, 5-AE we have significant MBE achievements. I just want to point that out to the Board.
Also, Item 4-AE is the Harriet Tubman
Underground Railroad State Project, State Park
Project. I was very pleased to bring that forward on behalf of DNR today. That is the development and the construction of the State Park devoted to the history of Harriet Tubman. And we’re bringing that forward on behalf of DNR. It’s a great accomplishment. There we have over 30 percent MBE on that particular project.
Item 16-RP, I think which is the one with some discussion this morning. 16-RP is on the DNR land deal for the purchase of over 4,478 acres from the Corporation of the Roman Catholic Church.
Secretary Griffin is here to speak on that.
I want to point out Item 19-LT which is a significant lease on behalf of Baltimore City
Community College with the University of Maryland
Medical Park. Dr. Carolina Williams is here from the
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Baltimore City Community College. Again, an outstanding project we bring forward this morning.
And Item 32 -- Item 19-LT is the last one that I’ll point out, Governor. So we’re happy to answer any questions on any of these items on our
Agenda.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. So that was, Item
32 is the one that the President of Baltimore City
Community College is here for?
MR. COLLINS: Yes. She’s here, sir.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Madam President, you want to tell us what this one is? Item 32. 19?
MR. COLLINS: I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Item
19.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I apologize, Item 19.
MS. WILLIAMS: Good morning.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good morning.
MS. WILLIAMS: This is a very interesting project and one I think the State, is going to benefit the State in the long term. Being one of the oldest
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community colleges in Maryland and being situated in
Baltimore City, the BCCC Life Sciences Institute is uniquely positioned to be a major player in stimulating long term economic change. Not only in the City, but throughout the State.
To quote you, Governor O’Malley, in your moving forward speech you said, “coordination and collaboration among State agencies, educational systems, and the business community is a central component to an effective and efficient workforce creation strategy.” Therefore, this partnership between Baltimore City Community College, the
University of Maryland at Baltimore, Vivien T. Thomas
High School, and the biotech companies located in the
BioPark is the beginning of an economic stimulus plan that we believe will have a positive long term effect on building an educated and highly skilled workforce, growing our business infrastructure, strengthening our communities, and developing our human capital.
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Because there will be a critical need for technicians in the biotech industry, the BCCC Life
Sciences Institute plans to offer a variety of degree and certificate programs including biotechnology, environmental science, green careers, medical technology, animal care and handling, and forensics.
And because there’s no such thing as a spare
Marylander in this plan, in addition to recruiting high school students --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: She’s hitting them all.
MS. WILLIAMS: Yeah. I did my homework.
(Laughter)
MS. WILLIAMS: BCCC is actively, we’re actively recruiting for this program people who are unemployed and underemployed who are looking for not just a job but a career.
Also, since financial concerns are extremely important we are working with the University of
Maryland and the City of Baltimore, and we have designated twenty fully paid tuition, fees and books
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scholarships designated solely for the bioscience career. And also we’ve made three other designations that have been identified by the State Workforce
Investment Board.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great.
MS. WILLIAMS: I also think it’s important to note just in closing that 98 percent of our
Baltimore City Community College student graduates live and work in Baltimore. So therefore, I think projects and collaborations like this are just truly key to not only building the Maryland of the future, but also creating and preparing the workforce that is going to sustain us in the future.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: This is really exciting.
This is great –
MS. WILLIAMS: It’s great.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- to see you running with this, and to see it happening. And it’s really terrific. Now, so explain to me, when it talks about
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the six-year, what do they call it? Lattice work?
Lattice program?
MS. WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: A career lattice.
MS. WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: So does that mean that high school students, high school students feed into this program --
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- from Baltimore City high schools?
MS. WILLIAMS: Right.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: So there may be a number of high schools that have the requisite requirements to get a student to this point, and then you run with it from there?
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes. It’s a two plus two plus two, the way we’ve designed it. So that the two years in high school will fit nicely into the two years of, you know, Baltimore City Community College.
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And then if students choose, they can go two years on to finish their degree, or go directly into the workforce and then finish, maybe decide later on while they’re in the workforce that then they want to go on and pursue their degree, they can still. So it’s open to any entry type of situation. They don’t have to go directly to the University, but they can go eventually.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great.
MS. WILLIAMS: And again, it’s not about just having a job. It’s about building a career.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And having that ladder to continue to go with it. What is the, so are there particular high schools? Or, it’s really any high school --
MS. WILLIAMS: Any high school.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- if they should choose to then come?
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MS. WILLIAMS: Any high school. We do have a, sort of a mentorship with the Vivien T. Thomas High
School because they’re right down the street.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right.
MS. WILLIAMS: And of course, they’re a medical arts academy. And so we have already used them and been in cooperation and collaboration with them. And it’s really serving as sort of a pilot, so that we can then extend those benefits to all of the other schools in the City.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Got you.
TREASURER KOPP: Is this going to be open to non-recent high school graduates, too?
MS. WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. The unemployed, underemployed, returning student. Anyone, and that’s, that’s really why we looked at those designated scholarships. Because many times people may be working but they’re underemployed. But they’re, they may have too much money to qualify for certain federal
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grants. And we want them, if they’re interested, to be able to do it.
TREASURER KOPP: How are you making the transition from community college tuition to four-year tuition?
MS. WILLIAMS: Tuition?
TREASURER KOPP: For the students.
MS. WILLIAMS: Well, you know, by saving on the, the way we, since we have no, we really don’t have any say in the University tuition --
TREASURER KOPP: Right. So --
MS. WILLIAMS: -- what we try to do is offer the first two years --
TREASURER KOPP: Right.
MS. WILLIAMS: -- as very efficient and very economical. And then that can, that helps them then be able to afford the four-year university. But many of our students do get scholarships or aid packages to the University. Especially in fields like the biosciences.
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TREASURER KOPP: Right.
MS. WILLIAMS: Because they’re so difficult.
TREASURER KOPP: Where the companies make --
MS. WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm.
TREASURER KOPP: Just, I mean, this is something we’re facing at Shady Grove, also, when students come from Montgomery College into Shady Grove it’s terrific, but there is that tuition bump.
MS. WILLIAMS: Right.
TREASURER KOPP: And so the question is whether you can actually get sort of transition tuition somehow so that it’s more level. And I would love to talk to you about it at some point and how you are doing it.
MS. WILLIAMS: And sometimes through grants
--
TREASURER KOPP: Uh-huh.
MS. WILLIAMS: -- we can build in those transitional tuition dollars. And we have a similar program with Towson University. It’s a science
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research. And there’s money in the grant to help our students transition to Towson.
TREASURER KOPP: That’s terrific.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We’re so --
TREASURER KOPP: This is wonderful.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yeah. Compliments to you and all your colleagues. I mean, I know Baltimore
City Community College is a little different than some of the other community colleges, in a sense, just in terms of, you know, the formulas and the like. But one of the things that we were really proud of in the first couple of years of this administration, especially given the Lieutenant Governor’s background involvement in Prince George’s Community College, is the degree to which you took the added investment that we put into your budget and really made it go. In this recent budget we’re looking at flat funding. But
Lieutenant Governor, you want to talk about what we were talking about this morning?
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LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BROWN: Yeah. This morning the Governor and I were, you know, acknowledging the fact that particularly in these difficult economic times your enrollment is going up.
It’s going up at the community colleges across the
State as students are looking for a more affordable educational experience and opportunity, as workers are looking to retrain, looking to get back into the workforce. So it is certainly our hope, and I think the Governor, by taking the reductions off the table today for the community colleges, it’s our hope that as we go forward we can continue to invest in the community colleges to help you keep your tuition affordable. So while we enjoy that flat tuition at the four-year institutions we’d certainly like to be able to see that at the two-year institutions as well.
MS. WILLIAMS: Well, sure, sure.
LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BROWN: I’d also like to make another point, Governor, that, you know, as we all know two weeks ago our public school systems went
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from number three in the country to number one. And when you look at the categories where we were evaluated and rated where we ranked very high is the alignment of our educational programs with the needs of the workforce.
MS. WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm.
LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BROWN: This two plus two plus two program fits neatly into that. You recognize that life science is a growing sector in
Maryland. You’re responding to the needs of the workforce. You’re working with the public K-12.
That’s a real good win-win all the way around. So I want to commend you and your colleagues across the
State that are looking to do more of these two plus two plus two programs.
MS. WILLIAMS: Thank you. And I agree with
Treasurer Kopp. I think all of us in community colleges are looking at ways we can be more efficient, ways that we can leverage the funding that we get with
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other departments and other businesses in order to help students succeed.
TREASURER KOPP: You’re doing a great job.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yeah, it’s great.
MS. WILLIAMS: Thank you. Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. And it’s great to see that Biotech Park continuing to march down the street, as it were. To your board members who are here, thank you very, very much for your service.
MS. WILLIAMS: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. Any other items?
We could vote on that one by itself, couldn’t we? And then you all could go, huh? So --
(Laughter)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- Item 19-LT, the
Comptroller moves approval, seconded by the Treasurer.
All in favor signal by saying, “Aye.”
THE BOARD: Aye.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All opposed, “Nay.” The ayes have it. It’s unanimous. Congratulations.
(Applause)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Go forth and educate.
Thank you.
(Laughter)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thanks for your leadership, Madam President.
MS. WILLIAMS: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right. What else do we have we want to go to? Is now the time for the
Open Space and the Corporation of Roman Catholic
Clergymen?
MR. COLLINS: 16-RP, Governor.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: 16-RP? So you really didn’t have much under your Open Space? Is there anybody else here on the Open Space Agenda as opposed to the Roman Catholic Clergy Agenda? Anybody to testify? Just want to try to clear the room. Okay.
Those that are first shall be last.
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MR. GRIFFIN: Governor O’Malley, good morning. Lieutenant Governor Brown, Comptroller
Franchot, and Treasurer Kopp, I’m pleased to be here again. John Griffin with the Department of Natural
Resources. I’m pleased to be here again this morning with you to offer for your consideration another of what we consider to be a fantastic opportunity to preserve part of Maryland’s natural and cultural and historic heritage for future generations, and current residents. The acquisition before you this morning is titled by preference of the owners the Maryland
Province Properties.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Mr. Secretary, if I could just interrupt. I see Senator Middleton here --
MR. GRIFFIN: No, I was just going to --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- but I’m not familiar with the person right over your shoulder.
MR. GRIFFIN: Yes, I was just going to introduce them. Thank you, Mr. Comptroller. First of all, a man who needs no introduction, Senator Mac
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Middleton. Mr. Bill Crouch is here. Bill is the head of the Maryland Office of the Conservation Fund, which negotiated this transaction and executed an option with the seller. He has with him, all prudent people bring attorneys to these meetings. Ms. Jodi O’Day,
Jodi, do you want to? Jodi is the Vice President and
Regional Counsel for the Fund who did a lot of work on this transaction. Mr. Jackie Russell is here with, he’s President of the St. Mary’s County Commissioners.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good to see you, Mr.
President.
MR. GRIFFIN: And Jack is here with a colleague of his, Commissioner Mattingly. How would you like to proceed? Would you like to allow the elected officials to say something first, given their busy schedules?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I would always defer to Senator Middleton, but it’s the Governor’s choice.
SENATOR MIDDLETON: Thank you very much, members of the Board. It’s a pleasure for me to be
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here to add my support and the support of the Southern
Maryland delegation to this purchase of property. You know, and you’ll see pictures of it. It’s absolutely beautiful as you look at it. But you really miss the beauty of it unless you actually take a visit there.
I first got elected in 1986 and one of the first things we did, we had a retreat at the Loyola Retreat
House. And it’s just such a beautiful, beautiful place.
And I don’t have to tell you about the growth that Southern Maryland is experiencing. We are one of the fastest --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Is the Loyola Retreat
House on these properties?
SENATOR MIDDLETON: It’s not part of it but it’s --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It’s in that area?
SENATOR MIDDLETON: In that area.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I see.
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SENATOR MIDDLETON: It’s just absolutely beautiful --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I thought it was --
SENATOR MIDDLETON: -- the area of Charles and Southern Maryland. But you know, we’re experiencing so much growth in Southern Maryland. And there’s going to be a whole lot of land that comes up for sale and once it’s gone, it’s gone forever. And if it’s not purchased by the State to preserve it for future generations then it will be growing houses.
So I’m here to testify in full support of the project. I understand that times are tough, the demands on the Program Open Space. But this is such a very, very worthy project.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Senator, thank you.
SENATOR MIDDLETON: Thank you.
MR. GRIFFIN: Commissioner Russell will speak at this point, if he can get through.
MR. RUSSELL: Thank you, Mr. Griffin.
Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Madam Treasurer,
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Comptroller. Thank you for having me up today to say a few words with this. I think this is a once in a lifetime opportunity, and looking at this from a person from St. Mary’s County, it will serve us wonderfully in two folds. Not only with the historical value of Maryland having been started in this area, but also from the economic impact that this will leverage for St. Mary’s County, and our economic engine of Patuxent River Naval Air Station and related industries. So a once in a lifetime opportunity. I thank you all for having us here.
Thomas Cornwallis settled one of the pieces of land at St. Inigoes. Thomas Gerard initially settled the piece of land on Newtowne Neck. It is historically significant. We beseech you, Tom
Mattingly and I, and the rest of the folks from St.
Mary’s County, implore upon you all to bless this project under Open Space. Thank you very much.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you, Mr.
President. Have we Tom Mattingly here in the room?
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Commissioner Mattingly? Thank you very much for being here.
MR. GRIFFIN: We’re just going to run through this power point presentation.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great.
MR. GRIFFIN: I think then Mr. Crouch wanted to say a few words just to emphasize some of the historical values that are present on these properties.
Next slide. This just shows you the four properties, moving from the south to Mr. Russell’s county, St. Mary’s. The first one you see at the far bottom is St. Inigoes, followed by Newtowne Neck.
Those both are in St. Mary’s County. Moving north, west a little bit, Cedar Point, which is in Charles
County. And lastly up in Cecil County, the fourth property, is Old Bohemia. The total acreage involved in these four properties is 4,473-74 acres, again located in three counties. We believe this transaction offers a unique opportunity for the State
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to preserve diverse natural habitats, safeguard wildlife habitats, protect the quality of the
Chesapeake Bay, conserve substantial sustainable forest lands, and provide extraordinary opportunities for environmental interpretation of historical cultural preservation, and recreational access via twenty miles of shoreline. Including, of course, the historic travels of Captain John Smith. He traveled extensively in these areas.
Most of these properties have been in continuous ownership since 1638 and have direct importance, as you just heard from other speakers, to the earliest colonial --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It’s good to save money on the title search.
(Laughter)
MR. GRIFFIN: Pardon me? Of the State of
Maryland. Just to get into the record a couple of other points, the Maryland Province was actually actively pursuing the sale of these properties for
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development. They had to do so, they told us, because of the pressures for a greatly increased cost of caring for their elderly and infirm clergy.
Thankfully, later in the process they decided that it might be better if they could conserve these properties given their attachment to them, given the historical cultural values of the land. So they approached both the Conservation Fund and another land trust to see if a negotiation were possible.
We looked at the current zoning on these properties, the zoning entitlements are equivalent under current zoning to 378 building lots, 121 of which would be waterfront. So you might think, I know you had before you a fairly extensive waterfront proposal, wetlands proposal a while back in Charles
County at Swan Point. You might want to think of these if developed as perhaps three smaller Swan
Points.
I was just going to -- oh, a couple of other points. The purchase price, and I know Secretary
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Collins and his staff will address this, is $56.9 million, which is $12,700 roughly an acre. That’s $2 million below the DGS recommended value of $58.9 million. And it’s $5.250 million below the highest of the three appraisals done on this property.
In a conversation yesterday with Treasurer
Kopp, we do want to note, and I think a letter was distributed this morning from the Navy, the United
States Navy, we are interested in pursuing with them on St. Inigoes, and the same would be true later with the Army on Cedar Point, the possibility of selling back to them protected buffer easements around both of these properties. As Commissioner Russell mentioned, there’s a growing concern in Southern Maryland with the military bases -- I see the Lieutenant Governor nodding.
LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BROWN: Mm-hmm.
MR. GRIFFIN: And elsewhere to protect by way of buffers those installations from encroachment from development for a lot of security and other
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operational reasons. And so we have the opportunity here, as was true with the other acquisition we brought before you the last time, this one isn’t firm yet. But the Navy has $2 million in their current budget and is seeking another million. This is something the House Majority Leader Mr. Hoyer is working on to allow us to sell back a protective easement buffer around some of these lands to them, and then hopefully to the Army.
Let me just run through these properties very quickly. In the interest of time, Board members, we have some videos as well, aerial shots of these properties. We can dispense with them or not --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Didn’t you take these shots from your DNR helicopter?
MR. GRIFFIN: Well, we figured we better get a lot of use out of it before July 1, Governor.
(Laughter)
MR. GRIFFIN: The first one is St. Inigoes.
It’s 985 acres, 8.4 miles of shoreline. Again, a lot
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of activity here by Captain John Smith that was documented when he did his historical mapping of the
Bay. This was originally acquired as part of a large tract by the Maryland Province, a larger tract of
4,000 acres in 1634 on a grant from King Charles I of
England. If this is approved we would plan to designate this as a State Forest. Do you want to show a little bit of the video?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Why is it called -- we’re seeing the video. Why is it called St. Inigoes?
Is this where the church is, too? Wasn’t there a church down there called St. Inigoes? No?
MR. CROUCH: Excuse me, good morning. St.
Ignatius Church is adjacent to the property. It’s not part of the transaction.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. That’s the old, old one, right? Wooden, wooden and that, and there’s a little boy going up to the, in a, but I remember going up with my little brothers to the choir up there.
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MR. GRIFFIN: Are we done with that video?
Okay. Next --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We just saw a video.
MR. GRIFFIN: That was St. Inigoes. The next, in St. Mary’s County again, is Newtowne Neck.
That’s 776, roughly 776 acres, seven miles of waterfront. And this was purchased by the Maryland
Province Society of Jesus in 1668 from a William
Bretton for 40,000 pounds of tobacco. And we would plan to make this a future State Park. You want to hit the video quickly? Oh, it’s running now? So you can see some of the, as Senator Middleton and
Commissioner Russell mentioned, some of the beauty of these peninsulas. The Maryland Province protected most of this shoreline with a lot of unstructural or living shoreline improvements. So those funds have already been expended.
It’s likely, probably, Governor, you had remarked, I think when we, after we presented these at your announcement of GreenPrint in December that there
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seemed to be a lot of runoff in the photos from, and it was pointed out to me, I talked to our staff, that’s actually the Bay bottom. I guess it’s really shallow there so you can actually see the bottom.
It’s not necessarily runoff.
TREASURER KOPP: John, sea level rising.
MR. GRIFFIN: Right.
TREASURER KOPP: Yes.
MR. GRIFFIN: Right.
TREASURER KOPP: Do you look at those sort of things when you --
MR. GRIFFIN: Yes, we do.
TREASURER KOPP: -- look at these properties?
MR. GRIFFIN: And it’s a tough issue. Yes, we are. We’re spending a lot of time with the
Governor’s Climate Change Commission.
TREASURER KOPP: Right.
MR. GRIFFIN: We had the lead with the
Department of Planning on the workgroup that dealt
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with adaptation and response to sea level rise. It’s obviously something very much in our minds. And the difficulty is balancing the need for more access to the Bay and its tributaries, which has been a longstanding goal established in all the Regional
Chesapeake Bay Agreements with this issue. I guess the only thing I can say here is that a number of these properties, as I mentioned, are improved to guard against erosion. But at some point well beyond our years here I think that –
TREASURER KOPP: We hope, yeah.
MR. GRIFFIN: -- we may start to lose some of this land, you’re right. Bill, did you want?
MR. CROUCH: I need to note that on Newtowne
Neck there’s been almost $10 million of shore erosion control, there is in place at the property today.
MR. GRIFFIN: Well, I mean you’re right, though. At some point --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: But if we reverse climate change that won’t happen.
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TREASURER KOPP: Right.
MR. GRIFFIN: Right. It will be less.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s good. Nobody in the room laughed. We can do it.
MR. MATTINGLY: And there’s erosion control on that project just recently completed just in the past year. So the entire property at Newtowne has shore erosion control mechanisms already in place.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great.
MR. GRIFFIN: The next property is in
Charles County. That’s Cedar Point and that’s 1,737 acres, including 4.2 miles of waterfront, shoreline.
The original lands, about 4,000 acres, were granted to the Maryland Province by Lord Baltimore in 1649. We would plan to use this as a Wildlife Management Area if approved.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Is that near Swan Point?
No? It’s in Charles County, but it’s not near Swan
Point?
MR. RUSSELL: It’s just above Swan Point.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yeah, that’s what I thought. Right. So it’s just a little bit east of
Swan Point?
MR. RUSSELL: It’s northwest of Swan Point.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Northwest of Swan Point?
MR. RUSSELL: From Swan Point itself, and then the Potomac River Bridge. So --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right. Okay. All righty. I thought Swan Point was south of it, but that’s okay.
MR. GRIFFIN: There’s some video of that --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Did the Jesuits always plow right up to the water’s edge like that?
(Laughter)
MR. GRIFFIN: Well, speaking of that, of course they leased this land. Some of this land is agricultural land leased to farmers. You may have noticed in the Board item we’re going to carry over the leases for a year and then give the tenant farmers the opportunity to extend for four years. We’re going
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to be working with them. We have the authority under a POS law, as you know, and it’s reflected in your background, to add 10 percent of the purchase price for stabilization work. And we had, we’re working on a restoration plan now to restore some of these properties from an environmental standpoint. And we’ll be working with the tenant farmers to do that.
The last one is up in Cecil County, Old
Bohemia. That’s 975 approximate acres.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And this was also
Jesuit?
MR. GRIFFIN: Yes. This is the last one of their holdings. This was the first Catholic establishment on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. We would, if approved, like to use this as a Wildlife
Management Area.
I might add in terms of management of these properties, we get this question as resources decline.
How are we going to manage these? One of the things we’re looking at, and you noticed that with the Foster
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acquisition the last time we were here, is contiguity to other properties we own that makes management and oversight a lot easier. There are properties that we currently manage next to these properties, number one, which makes that a lot easier. And number two, we are in the Department making this very much a priority.
So even as staff declines we are increasing our staff allocations to be able to provide reasonable access to these properties. Thirdly, of course, all these properties lend themselves to primarily a lot of passive use. We don’t view any of these properties as being used for active recreation, which I think really should be the rule for State lands that we manage, for more passive recreation.
So anyway, that’s the property there. In terms of the ratings we’re doing on these, we treated them as a whole, all four of these parcels, as you know. 61 percent of all these properties in the aggregate were in the overall target ecological area.
39 percent in the annual focus area. We’ve
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established a threshold where we consider a very good acquisition on this rating scheme that you see there, but you can’t probably see it very well. I hope it’s in your books. Of 80 this received an aggregate score of 92.
I also want to mention, I’m pleased to report since at your urging, the Board’s urging, we did the new targeted POS Acquisition Plan and the rating of parcels. In fiscal year ‘08, 86 percent of the acquisitions that Board approved were in the targeted environmental areas and 36 percent were in the annual focus areas. This year thus far, excluding these properties, 98 percent of the acquisitions you’ve approved are within a targeted environmental area and 82 percent are within a focus area. So I think we’re collectively doing a pretty good job to honor the targeting plan we developed.
The last thing I’d like to say is that I noticed in a number of the letters of support that you received, many of them ended with a thought that I
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would leave with all of you. And that is that speaking of history, President Abraham Lincoln protected Yosemite Valley and the National Park there despite the pressures of an ongoing Civil War. And so the thought is, because I know the issue of why are we spending money to preserve land is coming up at a time when, you know, we have an economic downturn and reduced revenues. But the thought that was expressed in many of those letters was the hope that the Board would also move to protect these unique lands, not unlike Lincoln did years ago, even though we have the pressures of a declined economy. And I don’t know whether we have time. If you’d like to have Mr.
Crouch, maybe we should answer questions. He did want to indicate --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Is he prepared?
MR. GRIFFIN: -- a few of the other historical assets.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay, sure. And then we’ll open it up to questions.
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MR. CROUCH: Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Governor, Mr. Comptroller, Madam Treasurer, Lieutenant
Governor. My name is Bill Crouch. I’m the Maryland representative for the Conservation Fund. Over the past two decades the Conservation Fund has helped to preserve 150,000 acres in the State of Maryland with our varied conservation partners.
Real quickly, I’m going to try to summarize
300-plus years of history in my one minute. At St.
Inigoes, the property was acquired in 1634 as a grant from the King of England. To this day, some of the gravestones are identical, the names on the gravestones are identical to those on the roster for the Ark and the Dove.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Hm.
MR. CROUCH: At Newtowne Neck we can establish that on July 11, 1608 when Captain John
Smith in his shallop was hugging the peninsula, he never landed. And he never landed because his, his
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guide, Mosco, gave him the tip that he might not be welcomed with open arms by the locals.
In Cecil County as part of the educational efforts that the Province and the Jesuits put forth there, not only was it the first permanent Catholic establishment on the Eastern Shore, but Daniel Carroll was educated there. He was a writer of the American
Constitution. John Carroll was the first American
Catholic bishop. And Charles Carroll, the only
Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And they were all what?
Educated there?
MR. CROUCH: They all were documented as being students there at one time.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: At the same --
MR. CROUCH: In Cecil County, at Old
Bohemia.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Got you.
MR. CROUCH: Cedar Point was actually originally part of a larger 4,000-acre tract which
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would have included Chapel Point State Park on the other side of the Port Tobacco River. And it was because of John Smith’s friendly relations that he made with the Patapsco Indians that allowed Captain
John Smith to travel further up the Potomac and up the
Bay. So this, the thing that stands out about the property is the multiple conservation uses values that it possesses. Not only the ecological, the cultural, the recreational, the historical. This is a once in forever, not a once in a lifetime, a once in forever opportunity to protect these lands. Not for us, but more importantly for the future generation of
Marylanders. Thank you.
MR. GRIFFIN: Questions, Board members?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mr. Comptroller?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes. Mr. Secretary, thank you.
MR. GRIFFIN: Thank you.
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And I appreciate you having Senator, or Senator Middleton came earlier, and
I haven’t had the privilege of visiting these sites.
MR. GRIFFIN: I’d love to take you there.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: But it was good to hear from him and also from, sorry, your name again is?
MR. CROUCH: Bill Crouch, Mr. Comptroller.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Bill Crouch about the historical significance and the ecological quality of these acquisitions. And I want to compliment the
Governor and, Mr. Secretary, yourself and your team because I think these are once in forever, I guess, as you say, acquisitions. And I respect the judgment that you’ve displayed today. And Governor, I salute you for getting these items under State ownership.
But I do have a process question.
MR. GRIFFIN: Sure.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: It’s not a question that goes to the merits. And I have great respect for
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the Conservation Fund, so just use that as a context.
I’m concerned about the payment of $606,000, I guess it is now, to the Conservation Fund as reimbursement for various services. This apparently includes
$64,000 as reimbursement for the appraisals, and
$500,000 for administrative fees. And I understand those figures are substantially lower than what was going to originally come before the Board. But I just have some process questions about that. If you could explain the role that the Conservation Fund played in this acquisition, and how it and other nonprofits assist you in other property acquisitions?
My understanding has always been that it’s your responsibility to prioritize and acquire these targets. It’s DGS’ job to oversee at least two independent appraisals and negotiate the sale. So the question I have is why would the Conservation Fund or any nonprofit oversee appraisals, conduct environmental reports, and even handle the title work for this particular transaction? And I say that, once
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again, I have nothing but respect for the Fund. But they have no fiduciary responsibility to the taxpayers. And I guess why are we allowing them in this, and I think on the Foster acquisition at the other Board, why are we allowing them to, in effect, be our agent when in theory their agenda is different from, or more, could be described as different from our agenda? In the sense that they really want to acquire this land for preservation. We do, also, but we also have a responsibility to the taxpayers.
MR. GRIFFIN: That’s a good question, Mr.
Comptroller. I guess maybe a little history is appropriate. For a number of years we at the
Department, in cooperation with the Department of
General Services, have felt it very appropriate to try establish, and I think this new targeting plan is probably the perfection of this idea, to establish sort of the parameter of the areas where we’re interested in buying land. Since we don’t condemn land, except in a rare circumstance, we have to rely
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on willing sellers to come forward. So that’s an important thing to keep in mind.
Secondly, therefore we rely on a network of people and organizations when we say these are the areas that we’re interested in preserving to work more at the local level to generate interest, to deal with willing sellers who might come forward. And that’s been the pattern we’ve used. We felt it, when I was here before, very desirable to try to get land trusts established. Not just some of the national ones we work with, as you’ve mentioned, but there are, I think we’ve helped establish about forty local or regional land trusts around the State going back ten or fifteen years.
And the reason for that is several. First of all, they know the local conditions better. Number two, oftentimes if the State is a little at arms’ length in the transaction believe it or not we get better prices. If we go immediately as the State to a property owner they immediately view us as the deep
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pockets. So it’s good to keep some arms’ length from the transaction. And I think we could probably show you, certainly, over time if we went back and looked at it that the values that the land trusts, whether it’s national or local, bring to us are probably better negotiated. This is no offense to any of us at the State level. It’s just the dynamic that they don’t know necessarily, and this was the case here, who an ultimate buyer might be. If they know it’s the
State there’s always the tendency to, you know, want to hold the State up for a deep pocket, it seems to me.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: The school superintendents here gathered don’t believe that’s true at all.
MR. GRIFFIN: Well, I guess the next issue, as you know, we have guidelines that we’ve worked on with the Department of General Services that land trusts have to follow. They have to select their appraisers off the approved general services list.
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All their work on evaluation has to be reviewed and approved by the Department of General Services.
Anything they offer has to be approved by the
Department of General Services. So there’s, it’s not as if they’re sort of out there on their own operating. They do so under the active guidance of the Department of General Services.
In this particular case, as you pointed out, the guidelines we have for land trusts allow them to recover costs and then the 3 percent, up to 3 percent, for costs of all their staff time and everything involved in doing these. Both the transaction the last time and this one, as you mentioned, the 3 percent, both organizations originally decided on their own to reduce that to 1.5. Mr. Erdmann, who is not here, who is General Counsel and Executive Vice
President for the Fund, called me Monday night, I guess it was, to say they were thinking about it more and realizing the tough times the State is in and suggested to me that they’d like to reduce their fee
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even more, as you noted. Which I think is a good thing.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Right, I got a copy of that letter. Okay, so what --
MR. GRIFFIN: So I guess what I’m, overall I think, I guess the last thing I would say, even in better resource times for State agencies, which is to say even when we were more, had more staff, I still think it’s very desirable as a general rule to try to use land trusts when we can. That always isn’t the case, of course. And particularly now when our resources are very limited it’s really a force multiplier for us to be able to use land trusts to do a lot of this work. To generate interest, carry these acquisitions to us, and do a lot of the work.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Okay. So we’re paying $500,000 with the reduction, I got a copy of the letter also, which is terrific. I –
MR. GRIFFIN: Right. And they did that on their own initiative.
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- I appreciate that.
But what exactly are we, what did we get for the
$500,000? Is there, what are the services, I guess, that we’re reimbursing? I don’t know whether someone else from the Conservation Fund wants to --
MR. GRIFFIN: Yeah. Jodi, do you and Bill want to? Okay.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I mean, I’m not sure whether this is a reimbursement or just a fee that we’re paying.
MR. CROUCH: I think the fee from the guidelines is intended to allow us to recoup staff time and overhead. I, we have been pursuing this project for the better part of a year and a half. And we’ve been, we have numerous staff of the Conservation
Fund that are, have been involved for that period of time at different levels. As we approached and as we were able to negotiate with the Province we’ve put the project under contract. That included an extensive contract negotiation on four separate parcels,
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significant complexities, the magnitude. We conducted all of the due diligence, coordinated the reviews with our State partner, title work.
So basically, we handle all of the elements of the actual real estate transaction. The negotiations with the contract, and we hopefully, if approved, closure. And if you total that up and estimate staff time and overhead, it doesn’t, it’s more than validated the amount of time that all levels of the Conservation have put into this project.
I would like to add that it is an objective of the Conservation Fund to whenever possible deliver a project, based on our purchase price, plus all the costs associated with the transaction, to still deliver that project at below the fair market value as established by the Department of General Services. So in effect the State of Maryland is able to realize those savings and we’re able to complete a transaction at below that approved fair market value. In this case, we’re $1 million below --
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Okay.
MR. CROUCH: -- after all the costs are factored in.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Okay. And I, once again, I have every confidence in the integrity of the process. I’m just concerned that, and maybe Secretary
Collins you could comment, if we have some policy in place where we’re allowing up to 3 percent reimbursement for administrative costs, and we have these third parties involved, isn’t there some kind of an appearance of a problem to the extent that we’re reimbursing them on a percentage basis, depending on the cost of the project? Is that a, something you could comment on?
MR. COLLINS: Yes, sir. Let me ask
Assistant Secretary Michael Gaines to come forward.
As the Secretary pointed out, we have, in this particular case there are a number of associated agencies that we think bring added value to the process that work under our guidelines and our
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approaches, and can do this easier and quicker than if we attempted to do it without these more appropriate agencies.
MR. GAINES: Yeah. I don’t want to repeat, well, first of all, Michael Gaines, Assistant
Secretary, Department of General Services. I don’t want to repeat all of the reasons for it. I believe the process makes sense. It is an efficient way of accessing resources and minimizing the cost of bringing these properties to the State. The issue that you raise in terms of the fee, you know, frankly
I think it’s a valid fee for the work that they do.
And in many cases --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, let me just interrupt for one second. Because the whole mission of a group like the Conservation Fund, for which they solicit funds and get grants and are supported, are to, I take it, do exactly what their staff were doing, which is to help protect and acquire properties. I’m just concerned that A, we’re reimbursing based on a
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percentage of the cost so there seems to be a conflict there. Not something specific to this but an abstract conflict that I think should be addressed.
I would much prefer that we reimburse, if we have to, these third parties for expenses incurred in these projects. But have DNR and DGS do the actual legwork here. Because I don’t feel comfortable when we get, particularly when we get these big ticket items, in having a policy where we’re reimbursing percentages.
MR. GAINES: Well, the value of having them is extra feet, hands, eyes, and bodies on the ground to get all of this work done. If it were left to DGS to negotiate all of these deals on behalf of DNR at the very high level of intense negotiations and involvement, fewer deals would get done. And, you know, I question whether they would be done at the level of proficiency that these folks have. Because they have the relationships. They’re on the ground and that’s a very, very valuable tool.
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, maybe you could think about somehow addressing some of the concerns I have about --
MR. GAINES: Sure. We can take that under consideration.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- what could happen down the road. And get you back in more of a buyers’ mode rather than overseeing third parties, which once again, I’m not implying anything about this transaction. But it is, you know, we’re including here $500,000 for the Conservation Fund. And I obviously appreciate the fact that they unilaterally reduced that. But I think there are some concerns that hopefully you can move to make some adjustments on.
MR. COLLINS: Yes, sir. I understand the question, Mr. Comptroller. We do think that these organizations bring the appropriate level of added value. And we will certainly respond on more definite terms of getting some figures in front of you. But
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it’s a longstanding approach. We think it’s valid.
But we’ll certainly get on it.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, it’s, if you could revisit the percentage rather than reimbursement.
MR. COLLINS: Okay.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Because I’d feel more comfortable if we had a --
MR. COLLINS: I understand.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- bill that we were responding to rather than a lump sum.
MR. COLLINS: I understand. And I just want to add, sir, and we will do that, that we, these organizations certainly follow the directions and policies that we have. We train them in terms of
State policies.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yeah, but they also –
MR. COLLINS: They’re not out there freelancing just without, you know --
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I agree. But they do not have a, the same agenda that we do.
MR. COLLINS: I understand.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: They have a commendable agenda. It’s a great one. I support it.
But it’s different. So, thank you. Thanks, Governor.
MR. GRIFFIN: Let me point out one more --
TREASURER KOPP: Can I just say for the record, I think this is, in fact, a good process that we have. I wouldn’t want you to think that we all thought otherwise. The question of the basis of the repayment --
MR. COLLINS: Yes.
TREASURER KOPP: -- as a percentage of purchase as opposed to some other mechanism does seem to me worth looking into if it casts any sort of a shadow on either the Fund or the State.
MR. COLLINS: We’ll be glad to revisit the policy.
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TREASURER KOPP: But I think bringing in extra expertise in things like this, considering the resources the State has itself, is a very prudent thing to do.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: If I could also just add, Former Speaker Briscoe communicated with us, and a number of outstanding environmentalists. And I, I was very impressed by that --
MR. GRIFFIN: Thank you for mentioning that,
Mr. Comptroller.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- support that you marshaled for this.
MR. GRIFFIN: Sure. I might just mention, tying together the discussion we just had with the one we had at the last Board meeting that the Treasurer mentioned, we are working with General Services and other agencies they serve who buy land, and the Board regulations that prohibit us now from offering lower than the lowest of the appraisals. And I would just say, and I’d be happy to go back and document this for
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all of you. The other thing that working with third party land trusts do, generally speaking, is they’re able to negotiate better deals. I know I said that before, but I mean it sincerely. If you have a third party out there so that the seller doesn’t know exactly, you know, what the State might do, it’s often better, and they can often, and the Conservation Fund in particular over the years has gotten discounted sales for us that way. Which --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It reminds me of, I was sharing it on the side with the Treasurer. I had occasion to talk with some of the conservators of the
Star Spangled Banner. And the Smithsonian was doing the same thing, is they were trying the various scraps that had been clipped off of the national icon over the years. And they said that we never, when we try to recover these scraps, we never do it directly ourselves otherwise we end up paying ten times as much. So they have sort of folks that they have a relationship with, but they appear as private
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collectors, interested people, rather than telegraphing that it’s the Smithsonian. And I imagine it’s the same sort of human nature that allows, you know, us to gain a better price when people don’t know that we’re the ones standing behind the interested party.
MR. GRIFFIN: And of course in this particular case, which happens frequently, not always, the Fund executed an option contract with the understanding that they were assuming the risk that the State would take it out.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right.
MR. GRIFFIN: Which, you know.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And now with these dollars we pay them in fee they’re able to go out to do more of this, looking for other valuable pieces of property that might be lost and gone forever.
MR. GRIFFIN: Yes.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. That was a good conversation. We’ve got to get in, we’re a half hour
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behind on our school stuff. Any other questions on this?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Not on this. On just one other item. I wanted to note Governor, I think
Governor Mandel was out there in the audience somewhere, and I just wanted to recognize him, and --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Hello, Governor, how are you?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Nice to see you.
GOVERNOR MANDEL: Good.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: You look like you stepped off the canvas.
GOVERNOR MANDEL: One time when I was sitting in your chair we had a crowd like this and I asked someone why they were here. And they said they wanted to see democracy in action.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, that’s it.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Huh.
GOVERNOR MANDEL: This is democracy.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Governor, thank you also for your, Governor recently completed a tour of duty on all of our behalfs on the Board of Regents for
University of Maryland. So thank you for especially all the strides in recent years. Thank you very much.
(Applause)
GOVERNOR MANDEL: I certainly appreciate what you all are doing here today. I went through ten years of it and enjoyed every minute of it. I appreciate being here today. Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay, thank you,
Governor. Okay. The Treasurer moves approval of the
Department of General Services items, seconded by the
Comptroller. All in favor signal by saying, “Aye.”
THE BOARD: Aye.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All opposed, “Nay.” The ayes have it. We move on now to --
SECRETARY MCDONALD: We still have Program
Open Space.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Oh, we forgot Program
Open Space. Program Open Space. What do you have after that? What can you follow that last bit with?
MR. PRICE: Well we have, Program Open Space has twelve items today. There’s seven acquisition and development projects and five with the State. And we have, I’d be happy to answer any questions you might have.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Tell me about Bay Head
Park.
MR. PRICE: Bay Head Park? We have Mr. Ken
Alban here today from Anne Arundel County.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That looks like a beautiful, what are we doing at Bay Head Park? Are we expanding the size of the park, Mr. Alban? Thank you.
MR. ALBAN: Mr. Governor, Madam Treasurer,
Mr. Comptroller. My name is Ken Alban. I’m the
Capital Projects Administrator, Department of
Recreation and Parks, Anne Arundel County. I appreciate the opportunity to be here today with you.
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County Executive Leopold sends his appreciation to the
Board for all the support of Program Open Space.
We’re pleased with what we read in the paper. And we really, we know you know that Program Open Space is extremely important to Anne Arundel County as well as the citizens of Maryland and we appreciate your efforts.
Bay Head Park is a twenty-five-acre facility. It’s currently in operation. It’s the home of the Children’s Theater of Annapolis. It’s also the home of the Cape St. Clair Cougar football squad. We have three lighted multipurpose fields. We have the opportunity to acquire fifteen acres around Bay Head, which will take significant pressure off of our existing parking lot. We will be able to access the park via East College Parkway, as well as the existing
Bay Head Road. We’re actually --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: You’re not going to pave it, are you? You’re not going to pave it, are you?
MR. ALBAN: The parking lot?
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: No. The, the, what is that? You say it’s going to take parking pressures off.
MR. ALBAN: Yes.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Is that because you’re going to pave the woods?
MR. ALBAN: We will be able to expand our parking areas. But we are going to make every effort to utilize pervious surface in the parking area. And we will have access off East College Parkway as well as the current access off Bay Head Road. There also is additional acreage there which will help us accommodate the connection for the Broadneck Peninsula
Trail. You’ll notice that the map I passed out to you, Sandy Point State Park, is also close by and the
Broadneck Peninsula Trail is eventually supposed to connect to Sandy Point State Park. So we feel this is an excellent opportunity to add property to Bay Head.
As you know, real estate values are down. We have an excellent opportunity to compete with developers and
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secure properties now that several years ago we probably would not have been there in time. And we would appreciate the support of the Board to move this forward.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Questions? We really hate impervious surface.
MR. ALBAN: I understand that.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We think using Open
Space to create more impervious surface is contrary to the spirit of Open Space. And it’s akin to, you know.
It’s just bad stuff.
MR. ALBAN: I couldn’t agree with you more.
In fact, Mr. Price said that you certainly would have some concerns along that line. I did some homework this past week. I’ve been working with folks at UMBC who are doing a great deal of research with impervious, or with pervious concrete. I got quite an education from them. We’re going to gather more information from them. We certainly need to be able to control parking at our parks. We have limited
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space to put parking in. We need to designate parking spots. We need to keep people in line, so to speak.
A lot of the pervious materials do not allow you to put down wheel stops and striping, et cetera.
Pervious concrete, however, gives us that opportunity.
We think that’s a technology that’s certainly going to help us out a great deal. We will do everything we can. We’re going to pass it on to our design consultant that we would like them to take a serious look at pervious surface. And we think we can come up with a suitable surface in this application within budget constraints that we have.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good. The other, you know, MES, Jim Harkins, whatever that’s called. Is that an agency? Is that an office? What is MES?
MR. ALBAN: Maryland Environmental Services.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Maryland Environmental
Services. Their headquarters, they have a, they’ve done some really good things over there to create almost a little model campus in terms of not only a
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giant solar array which they just installed but also the cisterns they have on top of the buildings to have zero runoff in essence. And the other things that they’ve done in the design of their parking lot, which
I don’t believe has the pervious concrete, but it does have the sort of, you know, rain garden types of things that can be done. And everybody knows how to do them. So I appreciate your doing that. And hopefully you’ll be a leader and show everybody else that it can be done. Sometimes what we get back is,
“Well, that technology isn’t very well known.” Well the only way to make it known is for people to know about it and start to use it. So I appreciate your forging ahead and making sure that there’s no impervious surface in this.
MR. ALBAN: We’ll do our best. Thank you,
Mr. Governor.
TREASURER KOPP: Can I just say that the
Deputy Treasurer just pointed out to me that the pervious concrete surface that we visited in Queen
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Anne’s County was actually constructed by a company in
Anne Arundel County. So --
MR. ALBAN: Interesting.
TREASURER KOPP: -- I think you might want to --
MR. ALBAN: I have had discussions with the
County Administrator in Queen Anne’s County, and I do believe they have a sample area in one of their parks where they have put down --
TREASURER KOPP: Yes, they do.
MR. ALBAN: -- three or four different types of pervious surface. We will definitely be doing a field trip over there to take a look. We certainly want to monitor how that turns out over time and see which one performs best. And it should run right in line with the project we’re working on.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Can we do, do you think it would be helpful for the future to do a sense of the Board, or some sort of resolution, that we’re not using Open Space dollars anymore for impervious
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surface? I mean, don’t you think that, can we do that?
TREASURER KOPP: On a preference. I mean --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Preference? Okay.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I would, I would --
MR. ALBAN: Some of your roadways you may have to use impervious.
MR. PRICE: In some applications there are, a pervious surface can’t be used because of the soil type. And so, but certainly every application that comes through their office I review. And every time we have anything that’s impervious I always tell them that it needs to be looked at as an opportunity here to --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Well, we have a new standard that we’re developing called, go ahead, John?
Speak up to the microphone. John is the Uber
Secretary of the Bay Cabinet. He was named the Uber
Secretary yesterday.
MR. GRIFFIN: Thank you, Governor.
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(Laughter)
MR. GRIFFIN: I was just going to say, and you just hit on it, I think what you might want to consider doing is we can get back to the Department of the Environment. Because they’re just developing under the new stormwater law the regulations that will speak to what’s called low impact development environmental site design. And that’s a process where they have to adopt the regulations, local governments have to go out and do their thing. So we’re talking about a year to a year and a half after MDE adopts their regulations. My suggestion would that we borrow from that work, present a resolution to the Board, that embraces those. Because sooner or later they’re going to be required anyway.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right. We’re moving, the world’s moving a lot more quickly than, you know, our typical evolution of law and regulation. You look at two years ago when we were all talking about green buildings everyday. And for some of the school
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superintendents it was kind of a new concept. Now they’re way ahead of us because they realize the savings that come to their own operating account greatly offsets in terms of energy savings whatever the additional up front cost was.
And similar with this, it would be really terrific if around the State, or at least at both ends of the metro regions, and east and west, we did some workshops taking the sort of scary “we’ve never heard of this sort of thing” out of it, bring contractors of all hues and stripes, and townspeople, and commissioners together and say, “Hey, look this is what it is. It’s not that hard. In other countries they’ve been doing it for thirty years and nobody gets, you know, dirt on their tires because of it.”
MR. PRICE: We’ve actually initiated these workshops.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good. Way ahead of us.
Great minds.
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MR. PRICE: And based on the terms of the
Board, or response of the Board, we had a workshop on that. And we intend to have more. I’m working with the Recreation and Parks directors that MACo, Maryland
Association of Counties. And we have to have more of that not only for impervious surfaces but for green building techniques overall.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yep. Great.
TREASURER KOPP: I thought, does, didn’t, you were talking last week with Secretary Wilson?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Secretary --
TREASURER KOPP: Wilson.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And she agreed she was going to be doing this?
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah, I thought she had a draft or something.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’m getting old. I can’t remember the things I’ve --
MR. PRICE: Yes, she is. But I think we can
--
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TREASURER KOPP: To sort of put into effect before this other thing goes through –
MR. GRIFFIN: Right. And maybe put some newer --
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah. So you all --
MR. GRIFFIN: I mean, there, you know, there’s a distinction practically between the acceptance of these generically speaking with private developers versus government. And I take it there might be a sense that government might want to try a little bit more by way of example.
TREASURER KOPP: As Uber Secretary you’re working with her on the --
MR. GRIFFIN: Yeah that’s just, Secretary
Wilson has the responsibility. We’ll get with her and get something back with you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It’s the Irish word for over.
TREASURER KOPP: Yes.
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, just to follow up and underline, Governor, what you were saying earlier, the impediment to a lot of these innovations always is that there is an added cost. And I think what the school systems and others are finding is that the private sector, once they get comfortable with these new designs, the premium that they heretofore have been charging disappears.
MR. GRIFFIN: Right.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And so we’re saving money and saving the environment, and I agree with the
Governor. I hope that you’ll bring some policy before us which is flexible enough to take care of certain situations, but establishes the rule that wherever feasible we’re engaging in these green priorities.
MR. GRIFFIN: That’s great. I’m going to see Secretary Wilson shortly and we’ll get back to you. Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. I’m looking forward to it. And we’ll draw up, you’ll draw up some
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sort of resolution of the Board on this? Good. What is our standard? It’s woods in good condition? Woods in good condition. All right. The Comptroller moves approval of the Program Open Space Agenda items, seconded by the Treasurer. All in favor signal by saying, “Aye.”
THE BOARD: Aye.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All opposed, “Nay.” The ayes have it. We’re going to take a very short pause for the cause, and then get right into the school stuff. Thanks very much.
(Short recess taken)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome back. This is the moment that you’ve all been waiting for. This is Item 4 and --
SECRETARY MCDONALD: Five. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) 102
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’m sorry, Item 5. Not
Item 4? We already did Item 4? It’s already resolved. And Item 4 allowed six counties to move funds from previously approved projects to eligible approved projects from last fiscal year into this one.
State law requires that local systems use these fundings within two years of authorization. Counties are allowed to redirect funds for other eligible projects with IAC and BPW approval, which we just did.
Let me talk a little bit about the overall context as we head into this, just for the record.
And the O’Malley-Brown administration with all of our partners in the General Assembly and the Board of
Public Works are very proud of the amount of dollars we’ve been able to invest in school construction after many years of seeing those dollars at best stagnate and some years actually really precipitously decline.
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
For the first time in our State’s history we have invested over a three-year period of time over $1 billion, we will have invested over $1 billion in a three-year period of time. That’s the first time that we have ever done that.
The amount that is in this very lean budget, which saw cuts all around of very worthy programs that we would otherwise not have chosen to cut, nonetheless saw $260 million in school construction in general funds taking us over the billion for a three-year period of time.
As anticipated, and as he had said and telegraphed many times in his public remarks, our new
President has proposed to Congress, where they are voting on right now -- and Liz, if you could monitor the satellite. Let me know when that vote goes down.
In the President’s Recovery and Reinvestment Act that’s before Congress and is going to be voted upon HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) today there is the potential, potential of another
$191 million in school construction. So -- hello,
Chairman Morris. So what we’re going through today, I mean, we were required, the Lieutenant Governor and I were required to submit a budget on time two weeks ago. It was a really, hard disappointing budget filled with a lot of cuts and tears. And I hope it will be better by the time we vote upon it in April because I’m hoping Congressman Hoyer, Senator
Mikulski, Congressman Cummings, and all concerned will rally behind our President and we’ll be able to get additional dollars. And even in this recession we may see not only a record year of total dollars invested in school construction, which will be a help to the education mission, but it will also be a spur to our economy.
So anyway, that’s the overall context. This is a our first cut through this. And this is not all HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) of the 260 initially proposed million dollars. But this is a cut at those. And then if we’re fortunate enough to take another run at this with help from our
President and our Congress, that would be welcome news indeed. So let’s begin. And as we do, Dr. Grasmick, if you could address -- actually, let me have Luwanda address a couple issues. And then Dr. Grasmick’s going to address progress that we need to make on MBE goals with this huge amount of construction, which in the past has always received the largest amount of waivers on MBE. This is our school construction dollars.
So we want to talk about what we need to do to get our MBE goals up. We also wanted to talk about some of the things I know Dr. Grasmick has to update us on green building technology, energy conservation, and permeable surface and the like. Luwanda, could you give us sort of the one-minute update from your HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) perspective as Director of Minority Business
Development, and where we are with trying to do a better job on MBE?
MS. JENKINS: Sure. Good morning, Governor,
Mr. Comptroller, Madam Treasurer, Lieutenant Governor.
Luwanda Jenkins, Governor’s Office of Minority
Affairs. For the past year our office has been working very closely with the public school construction office in an effort to achieve greater accountability and more inclusion for minority businesses with the impressive expenditure that the
State is making in public school education. And with that, we have been working to really update the guidelines and procedures that we need to hold our local county partners accountable for MBE participation. We have updated those policies and guidelines. They were approved over the summer by the
IAC. And through the support and direction of Dr. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
Grasmick they were approved unanimously by all twenty- four school systems this fall.
What that means is, at this point in time as of October 1 all twenty-four school systems throughout the State of Maryland have agreed to adhere to the
State’s goals and guidelines for MBE participation.
And starting immediately once today’s budget is passed with school funding, those school superintendents and jurisdictions will submit project proposals for the use of the funding which will include thorough minority business enterprise requirements. And that’s what our offices have been working on, to ensure that those guidelines are met and that the local county school programs are certainly supportive and compliant with the State’s MBE goals.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Let me point out that
Kevin Maxwell is here from Anne Arundel County
Schools. And Dr. Maxwell, thank you along with Dr. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
Weast you had the two highest levels of MBE attainment at 11 percent. That gives you a sense of how much room there is to grow, the potential here if 11 percent is as high as we got in two jurisdictions that are both in, you know, major metropolitan areas with a lot of diversity in its subcontractor pool. Dr.
Grasmick, take it from there. I’m sorry, Mr.
Comptroller?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Could I just,
Secretary Jenkins, what is the, the Governor mentioned
Montgomery at 11 percent. What is the MBE achievement currently, and what is the goal?
MS. JENKINS: Currently statewide for the public school construction program as of fiscal year
‘08 it’s 12.5 percent statewide. Individual jurisdictions have their own kind of goal attainment within that, but it all rolls up to an overall aggregate figure of 12.5 for the State. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And what is your estimate of with your new policy, or your new partnership with the locals, what do you think we will, can we realistically view as a one-year, two- year goal?
MS. JENKINS: That’s a good question. What we have put in place is we’ve challenged the public school construction program in the local counties to strive for the maximum participation that they can achieve. Realistically what that means is the metropolitan jurisdictions where there is a larger availability and pool of minority firms should really strive for higher than 25 percent. Baltimore City has a 35 percent MBE goal and so most of the projects in
Baltimore City jurisdiction should strive at higher goals. The rural areas --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s their goal, but last year they did 9.2 percent, right? HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
MS. JENKINS: Last year they did 9.2 percent. So realistically how far are they going to go from 9.2 percent towards 25 percent? We are certainly challenging them to be as aggressive as possible on individual school construction, renovation and building goals.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: One of the buildings, I mean, we’ve been riding the higher education institutions here most of which, I mean not all, but many of which are located in major metropolitan areas.
And they’re starting to do some great stuff. Today we had one that was 35 percent, I think, MBE.
MS. JENKINS: Absolutely. And to my point, that’s what we’re, we’re really striving for the concept that 25 is not the ceiling. It can certainly be the floor. And so to the extent that the metropolitan areas can carry a higher MBE goal to kind of balance out some of the rural areas of the State HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) like a Garrett County where you’re not likely to get higher than 5 or 10 percent on an individual school project, we’re hoping that the State overall will get much closer towards 20-25 percent, which is the State goal, 25 percent.
TREASURER KOPP: Could I, I’m sort of confused because, now first of all I’m not sure I’ve got the right numbers. But the large counties, obviously, have much larger programs also.
MS. JENKINS: Mm-hmm.
TREASURER KOPP: A small county could have one program, or two. So I, so I would think if they could get a couple of MBEs, a couple of MBEs, a small county can have a tremendously high percentage.
Whereas the larger jurisdictions may in fact have larger pools, but also have much higher numerical goals. I’m not quite sure I understand what you’re saying. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
MS. JENKINS: Well, that’s correct. And to the point of, the flexibility of the MBE program is that it’s on a project by project basis. We look at each project individually and try to maximize minority participation. So you can take a smaller county that may only have a couple of school projects a year. If they’re successful in getting minority subcontracting on both of their projects the they’re likely to have a higher overall percentage goal than, say, a metropolitan area that’s doing a large number of school renovation projects on a larger base of spending.
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: You know what, I was reading off the wrong column. I apologize. And Brian
Morris was giving me these eyes that say, “Oh, we were much higher than that.” I have Baltimore City at
11.83 percent. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
MS. JENKINS: 11.83, correct.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I have Anne Arundel
County at 16.37 --
TREASURER KOPP: And Montgomery is 8.5.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Oh, I had Montgomery only at 8.5.
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Oh, I was giving Jerry
Weast too much. I never want to do that.
TREASURER KOPP: On the other hand, Prince
George’s.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Oh, the high one is actually Baltimore County, Joe Hairston, at 21.22 percent.
MR. HAIRSTON: That’s what I thought.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great.
TREASURER KOPP: So I mean, it seems to me, isn’t it fair to, when you’re looking at this, to look HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) at not only geographic but also compared to large counties to each --
MS. JENKINS: Right. And it’s consistency on all of your projects. And if you look at Baltimore
County, they did twenty-seven total projects. But they had, on each of those projects they had a total of, say, ninety-seven individual MBE subcontractors.
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah.
MS. JENKINS: So what that means is that on each and every one of their individual school projects they consistently brought in MBE subcontractors. So in the aggregate at the end of the year they have a pretty high overall participation level.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Let’s get --
MS. JENKINS: So you have to do it at the end --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Could I just ask one last question, Governor -- HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
MS. JENKINS: Sure.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- if I could,
Secretary. So of the projects that we’re looking at today, are they, have they gone through your encouragement to maximize? Or are they --
MS. JENKINS: I would defer that to Dr.
Lever. It’s my understanding that the projects that are being approved today under fiscal year ‘09 are projects that will be bid out shortly after today.
And as part of that bidding process, the local school jurisdiction will need to bring in their MBE package when they apply to Dr. Lever’s office for their funding reimbursement.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. Let’s have Dr.
Grasmick, and then we’ll get into, Frederick’s going to be first. Frederick, you’re on deck.
DR. GRASMICK: Well, good morning, Mr.
Governor, Mr. Comptroller, Madam Treasurer, and our HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
Lieutenant Governor. First of all, thank you for your commitment to the school construction program. It is so important for our students and we just thank you for your commitment to this. We have enjoyed the work with Secretary Jenkins and it has been extremely valuable. And I make, and I punctuate that point by saying when you look at a county like Wicomico County, where they have one large project, but because of the preparation, the procedures that have been developed, they have an 18.70 percent minority participation.
That is a huge change. Huge. And so I think we are seeding the efforts here that are really beginning to reap benefits. We look at Dorchester County. Again, a number of small projects, but 21.66 percent minority participation. And I think --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: My goodness, that’s higher than Baltimore County.
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DR. GRASMICK: It’s very significant. So I think there’s a level of awareness and commitment by all of the local school systems. And I would tell you that of the 507 contracts that have been approved, 379 of them have minority participation. And a few others have it, but that have not provided the documentation to us yet. So I just want to say, elevating this, the work with Secretary Jenkins has been outstanding.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. Success. Good.
How about the, you want to update us quickly on the green technology --
DR. GRASMICK: Yes.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- as well as the permeable surface --
DR. GRASMICK: Again, because this has been elevated to a level of very, of great importance, and the recognition of our school systems in terms of the cost savings and certainly concern for the HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) environment, you have a booklet before you that details all of the areas and what the various jurisdictions have done relative to these high performance buildings.
But I want to say something from an educational point of view. I know, Mr. Comptroller, you and I were together in St. Mary’s County for the groundbreaking for the Forever Green School.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: It was very chilly, as I recall we were freezing.
DR. GRASMICK: Yes. But it, but the point is that school not only will be saving dollars as a result of this high performance consideration, it is a total environment for children for learning about protecting the environment, what the environment has to offer all of us in terms of the design of that school. And I think that is also a benefit of this.
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
I’m going to ask Dr. Lever, if I might, if he wants to just highlight a few projects here.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Madam Superintendent, if I could, Governor, that was as part of the curriculum? Or just because of the facility?
DR. GRASMICK: It’s also part of the curriculum. And so they intend to use every dimension of that school as part of the curriculum and learning in each separate area.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Good.
DR. LEVER: Good morning, Mr. Governor, Mr.
Comptroller, Madam Treasurer, and Mr. Lieutenant
Governor. I want to repeat Dr. Grasmick’s thanks for the high level of school construction funding. It’s having an enormous benefit across the State. I see it happening. Work is going on in every part of the
State. And to achieve the level of funding that we
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) have achieved in these difficult fiscal times, I think it’s an extraordinary accomplishment.
The report that you have in front of you is up to date information that we’ve received just within the last few weeks from each of the school systems.
Every school system is participating in this broad cultural movement. If you turn to the table of contents just inside the front cover, we’ve ranked the categories from those that are least costly and in a sense easiest to implement towards those that are most costly and most difficult to implement. So it starts with the change of human behavior. And a number of school systems are doing this on their own. Others have engaged consultants to help them so that it comes down to turning off lights, turning off taps, and changing the culture within a school, including the maintenance and the custodial personnel. Many are engaged in conserving natural resources by changing HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) out light bulbs. Many are involved in energy procurement strategies to lower the cost of their purchase of energy. There are improved practices that affect, for instance, the use of environmentally friendly custodial products, which have less of an impact on the natural environment. Preventive maintenance is tremendously important, not only in deferring the day when we have to go in and do a major renovation of a school, but also in terms of day to day operation so that equipment is operating at maximum efficiency. And that has an impact on energy use as well.
A great deal of exploration of alternative energy sources, particularly geothermal, is becoming a conventional, in fact I should say it has become a conventionalized alternative to our other mechanical systems. As the Comptroller mentioned earlier, in some parts of the State we’re seeing that the fear of HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) risk that’s involved in it from the contractors’ perspective has disappeared and first costs are coming in that are comparable or even better in the cost of the conventional systems. That means savings accrued from the first day that the system is turned on.
Capital improvements, particularly windows, roofs, and energy systems, mechanical systems, have a huge impact on energy conservation. We have in place now a law that will require every new facility to be a high performance school starting this July 1st.
However, a number of school systems have already initiated this. They can access additional State funding. We have fifteen school projects that have been submitted that are, we believe, eligible for the high performance funding. And three of those are recommended today. And then we’re seeing across the board innovations in policy.
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
Specific projects, on the cover you have the
Great Seneca Creek Elementary School in Montgomery
County, the State’s first Gold LEED school. An extraordinary school, and one in which the building and the educational program are linked together in a very enthusiastic way.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I visited there.
DR. LEVER: Okay.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It’s great.
DR. LEVER: And then I’m sure today you will hear from the St. Mary’s County, I’m sure, but Dr.
Martirano will speak about the progress on the
Evergreen Elementary School in St. Mary’s. I’m happy to take any questions you might have.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. Well, let’s go right into it. These folks have been very patient.
Frederick County, the green wild hills of Maryland, land of Barbara Fritchie. We are joined by Senator HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
Brinkley, and the delegate is, Delegate Bartlett is with us as well. Anyone else? Okay. Hi.
DR. BURGEE: And my apologies, good morning, from our Board President, Jean Smith, and Vice
President, Dr. Borsa, could not be here because of the road conditions where they live. But good morning and thank you for this opportunity. I want to start off with a thank you for your commitment to public school construction. And because we see day in and day out the difference it makes in the lives of children. And
I appreciate your work on that. I also don’t envy you the difficult decisions you have overall in public school construction and other areas of your budget, and don’t envy the decisions you have to make.
I do appreciate the opportunity to give you information to help you make informed decisions. And part of that is to, again, appeal for construction funds for Frederick County Public Schools. And HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) specifically we’re asking for repayment for some projects that are recently completed that are under construction or in design that our County has asked, has forward funded. And we’re asking for the State for their share of that commitment. Oakdale High
School opened this past August. The Governor was able to visit that wonderful facility completed in August.
Linganore High School is now under construction and is on track to open in 2010.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I got my sweatshirt.
DR. BURGEE: And then also -- yes. And then also West Frederick Middle School renovation. These are key, cornerstone projects for us, addressing aging buildings and capacity issues in Frederick County.
In addition we are requesting construction funding for two elementary addition projects, Carroll
Manor and Walkersville Elementary. They are under, they have State planning approval and are under HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) design. And we plan to go to bid on those projects this spring. And then our last request is planning approval requested for additions to Oakdale and Yellow
Springs Elementary School, and Oakdale Middle School, again to address serious over capacity issues.
You have in front of you in our packet the list of our projects in priority order. I’m not going to take your time by going through those. I know that you will. We do have significant capacity and renovation needs throughout our system, but particularly at the elementary level. And even though we’ve been very aggressive in building schools in
Frederick County, we have spent our money well, we spent it wisely, we spent it timely, and we’re ready for that federal stimulus package. There are nine projects in the queue that we can put the shovels in the ground tomorrow if necessary. We do have 101 portables at twenty-five of our elementary schools. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Hm.
DR. BURGEE: In closing, Frederick County supports the State priorities on energy conservation and green school technology. We’ve implemented a
County-wide comprehensive program of energy conservation across the school system. We saved 5 percent last year, we intent to save an additional 5 percent on top of that this year. Our Earth & Space
Science Lab is going to be unique in the State of
Maryland. It’s now under construction. It does include a geothermal HVA system. It’s a relatively new technology, but a growing technology. The solar panels that were donated to us by Solarex and BP Solar in Frederick County will actually heat the aquariums, power a lot of that facility. In the renovated
Lincoln Elementary --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: What school is that?
Excuse me? HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
DR. BURGEE: That’s our Earth & Space
Science Lab.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And where is that?
What school?
DR. BURGEE: That’s located on the same campus as the Lincoln Elementary School in downtown
Frederick City. The renovated Lincoln Elementary
School, which is on the same campus, is now under design and will be designed to be a LEED Silver certified project. And we are making LEED, this project in advance of the State’s requirement because we do see the value and support the goals of this program.
We recognize your funding is limited and you have unprecedented challenges this year. And we support your efforts to keep as many projects on track. We do need the State’s support to continue to do the construction that’s required for our students HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) to get a first class education and that’s our goal.
Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. Senator, anything to add?
SENATOR BRINKLEY: She did great.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yes, she does.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: She did good.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Well, thanks very, very much for your leadership. We appreciate it. Thanks for your patience today. Do me a favor. Call your
Congresspeople and your Senators and urge them to support the Recovery and Reinvestment Act. We put 260 in the budget. It has the potential to be, have another $191 million added to it to reinvest in our schools.
DR. BURGEE: The State’s superintendents are all actively lobbying --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
DR. BURGEE: -- our federal legislators to keep it on track.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good.
DR. BURGEE: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mr. Comptroller?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Delegate Bartlett, did you want to say something?
DELEGATE BARTLETT: Oh, no, I’m just here to lend support also.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good man.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Could I just ask Ms.
Smith about West Frederick Middle? What is the status of that facility? The age and --
DR. BURGEE: We are on track. West
Frederick Middle is actually a forty-nine-year old building who had never had significant renovations completed there. And we are in a phasing of renovating that building. It’s going very well. It HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) should be open for its students not this coming school, September, but the following.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And the capacity will be?
DR. BURGEE: Ray, do you have the capacity?
Ray Barnes is our Executive Director of Facility
Services.
MR. BARNES: It will be just over 900 student capacity building when completed.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Tell Jan Gardner we said hi, too.
DR. BURGEE: I will.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. We move along now to Anne Arundel County Schools, Dr. Kevin Maxwell,
Ned Carey. Anne Arundel County Schools has requested
$53.4 million. In the IAC recommended action there is
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
$19 million which represents 9.8 percent of the overall. Dr. Maxwell, the floor is yours.
DR. MAXWELL: Thank you. Good morning,
Governor O’Malley, Comptroller Franchot, Treasurer
Kopp, Lieutenant Governor Brown, and Dr. Grasmick. I am Kevin Maxwell, Superintendent of Anne Arundel
County Public Schools. I’m pleased to be joined this morning by several members of our Board of Education,
Vice President Ned Carey, Teresa Milio Birge, and
Michael Leahy. While Mr. Leopold and members of our
County Council are unable to be here this morning, I believe you have received correspondence from them attesting to their strong support of our capital requests.
An adequate physical plant is vital if we are to provide safe, vibrant and functional facilities conducive to teachers teaching and students learning.
Governor, I would like to thank you and this Board, as HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) well as the IAC, for your generous support of school construction in Maryland and of our past efforts.
These projects have provided many needed upgrades to our building infrastructure and helped us to replace antiquated and overcrowded facilities.
While we, too, recognize the fiscal constraints at both the State and local levels, we cannot allow this to cast a shadow on what I view as the most important responsibility that society has entrusted to us: the education of our children. We must, therefore, continue to offer facilities that best support our young people in a cost effective and efficient manner.
We have done our due diligence in Anne
Arundel County and developed a comprehensive capital budget program that will afford our district the ability to provide critically needed instructional improvements. Our program includes provisions to meet HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) the new high performance building standards, and an aggressive plan to support and encourage minority and small business participation.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you for that.
DR. MAXWELL: You’re welcome. Anne Arundel
County also stands ready to fully participate and make good use of any federal stimulus funding that may materialize from our nation’s capital. We ask you for your continued support and assistance in accomplishing our foremost responsibility, that of providing an appropriate and conducive educational environment for all of our students.
We are extremely grateful for your support of the fiscal 2010 projects that have already been recommended for approval by the IAC. The $19 million allocated toward these critical projects will allow us to continue the good work that has already started in
Anne Arundel County. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
As our number one priority, we are requesting the remaining portion of construction funding to renovate open space areas at Central
Elementary School, Crofton Woods Elementary School,
Hilltop Elementary School, Bodkin Elementary School, and Oak Hill Elementary School. These funds will allow us to provide educational environments that are conducive to learning and that meet the current educational standards.
Second, we seek the balance of construction funding for a kindergarten addition at Windsor Farm
Elementary School, which has numerous relocatable classrooms in place to accommodate the all day kindergarten mandate. This funding will allow us to construct permanent facilities that meet current educational standards.
Next, we are requesting construction funding to address the needs of Overlook Elementary School, HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) which is fifty-four years old; Vice President Ned
Carey’s alma mater, Belle Grove Elementary School, which is fifty-seven years old; and Northeast High
School, which is forty-five years old. All three schools will be renovated with modest additions to support today’s educational delivery model.
We are also requesting construction funding for an HVAC project at Glen Burnie High School. This necessary systemic project will replace an aging and inefficient HVAC system while improving both energy efficiency and indoor air quality at the school.
Finally, we are requesting local planning and construction funding for Annapolis Elementary
School, Germantown Elementary School, Folger McKinsey
Elementary School, and Point Pleasant Elementary
School, as well as local planning authority for the
Phoenix Annapolis Center. At Germantown Elementary
School we will be building a replacement school and HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) modernizing the existing facility to accommodate students currently attending the Phoenix Annapolis
Center, an alternative and special education school.
The condition of the existing structures at Annapolis,
Folger McKinsey, and Point Pleasant Elementary Schools permits us to modernize the current facilities and provide programmatic additions in a cost effective manner. These proposed modernization and addition projects will allow the functional equivalent of new schools for the students, staff, and their communities. On behalf of our 74,000 students, their parents, and the Board of Education of Anne
Arundel County, I thank you for the opportunity today to discuss our fiscal 2010 capital improvement program and how it supports our educational goals in Anne
Arundel County. At this point we’d be happy to answer any questions that you may have.
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: The Lieutenant Governor and I announced at Germantown --
DR. MAXWELL: Yes, sir.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- with a whole bunch of temporary trailers behind us looking like a more modern take on Stalag 17. We were really hoping that after being the Governor and the Lieutenant Governor to put $1 billion in three years into school construction, that we’d see those temporary trailers go away.
DR. MAXWELL: And we are here with that request to move forward on that dream, Governor
O’Malley. We share that dream with you, and as I said, we’re thankful for the --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Are they all in use? Is it overcrowded and --
DR. MAXWELL: Yes, sir. They are all in use. And there are eleven trailers there. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yes, sir. Mr.
Comptroller?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I’ll just ask a general question. What, how is it possible for you to itemize which of your requests are BRAC related and which are not?
DR. MAXWELL: We’ve been paying, you know, close attention to the area of the County closest to
Fort Meade when we talk about the actual construction.
But we’ve been doing a lot of work in the County to be attractive to BRAC. So it is a little hard to distinguish. We have just opened in recent years
Seven Oaks Elementary School. We are currently working on Pershing Hill, combining that with Meade
Heights Elementary School. Nantucket that we just opened this year is a little bit farther away. But again, that, the possibility of relocation. So we’ve been working on capacity there. We’ve done an HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) addition at Meade High School and at Arundel High
School and science labs. We’ve also done some programmatic work. We’ve added a Homeland Security
Signature Program at Meade High School and a Science,
Technology, and Engineering and Math Program at North
County High School, all again in that general area to, you know, help beef up the need for employment that we have to support BRAC.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Good. I also obviously applaud the leadership of the Lieutenant
Governor on all those issues. But could you just tell me what renovations you’re planning for Southgate, is it Southgate Elementary School? Additions?
DR. MAXWELL: It’s a comprehensive renovation with some additions to accommodate the students that are currently in portable classrooms.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And what is the timing of all that? HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
DR. MAXWELL: The design is completed, the bids are in.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Good.
DR. MAXWELL: So the Board’s ratified it, we’re just waiting for the final things.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And so, Mr. Carey, you’re a graduate of Belle Grove?
MR. CAREY: Yes, sir.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: What’s it like to go back there?
MR. CAREY: Well, I live in the neighborhood.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Right.
MR. CAREY: I live in the house that I grew up in, which is across the street from the school.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Really?
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
MR. CAREY: And I’d just like to point out that the school was over two decades old when I left -
-
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Wow.
MR. CAREY: -- a long time ago. And there’s a lot of revitalization that’s going on in that community up there, and this would just be another piece of that modernization pie.
DR. MAXWELL: We understand you’re going to be visiting that school with us on Monday, is that correct?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes. Great, thank you. Yes, and I’m looking forward to it.
DR. MAXWELL: We are, too.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. Thank you --
TREASURER KOPP: Can I ask --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Treasurer?
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
TREASURER KOPP: -- Mr. Lever? Can I assume, you’ve noted here BRAC under your notes in all of these. I mean, where appropriate for all of the projects there is an, is that the same? If we ask each local jurisdiction for their list of BRAC related projects would they be not the same?
DR. LEVER: We have specific criteria that we’ve developed with the Maryland Department of
Planning that involves a distance time factor from the fence and the gates of the facilities, as well as the requirement that BRAC related projects must be in the funding area. And this opens up the possibility of reimbursement at a later time. There are certain policies that IAC has approved to further the BRAC effort.
The local designation of a project that might have an impact on BRAC might be different from the very strict State designation. So there might be HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) discrepancies in the descriptions. But you do have a list of all the projects in the nine counties that are
BRAC related, and do meet this requirement for the --
TREASURER KOPP: These are, these are, so the, if the Comptroller were to ask his question of each jurisdiction the list would be different than the list that we have because there are different criteria. DR. LEVER: We have communicated with them. They know which projects we’re looking at, that we consider to be BRAC related. But in terms of actual impact they may see it differently. A more distantly related school that’s receiving an addition may relieve a school that’s closer to a base, it might be eligible under our requirements, for instance, if it’s outside the BFA. But under the local policy it might actually serve to relieve the overcrowding that’s anticipated at the base. You can have that kind of situation. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
TREASURER KOPP: A lot of, a lot of that?
DR. LEVER: No, not a lot.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: In the interest of time I’m not going to ask each jurisdiction. But --
(Laughter)
TREASURER KOPP: No, it’s a good question.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I was more interested in just how you reach your decisions in prioritizing, and how big a factor the influx of new families from
BRAC plays in --
DR. MAXWELL: Well I think, you know, that’s certainly part of it. But we did a study in Anne
Arundel County in 2005 where we had MGT of American do an audit of school facilities. And we did an alignment of our priorities that we had at the time, and aligned those with the priority one schools from the MGT audit. Now certainly, you know, within that, you know, Pershing Hill, for example, it meets a HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) number of criteria. It’s both up on the MGT audit, but it’s also on Fort Meade. And we made a decision there to combine the two schools and make that even larger in our request because we know that BRAC’s coming. So it was on our list, BRAC’s coming, and so it affects the request that we’re making relative to that.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. Thanks very, very much.
DR. MAXWELL: Thank you, again.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. I’ve enjoyed my visits to your schools. Thank you, also, for the
MBE.
DR. MAXWELL: You’re welcome, sir.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Very, very good.
DR. MAXWELL: Thank you for your commitment to school construction.
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. And we’ll look forward to getting back together with you all after you work your congressional delegation over.
Mr. Carey, Colm O’Comartun has something for you but I don’t know where he is. If you wouldn’t checking with, before you leave, if he has it printed out he can give it to you. It’s on an Anne Arundel school matter that we were contacted about.
Okay. We now move on to Baltimore City.
The City of Baltimore making tremendous strides.
Children reducing the achievement gap by leaps and bounds never before seen in the history of modern
America. Land of the free, home of the brave, the people that Frederick Douglass and Johnny Unitas loved. Mr. Chairman, how are you, sir?
MR. MORRIS: Thank you. And the place where we do MBE business a lot more than was represented here. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Go ahead, lay it on me.
MR. MORRIS: Mr. Governor, Mr. Comptroller,
Madam Treasurer, Lieutenant Governor. Dr. Alonso is going to present the case for the system. I just wanted to make sure that we address this issue of MBE participation. I am now in my sixth year on the
Board, so I’ve had the opportunity to be in this --
Dr. Grasmick, Dr. Lever. Be at this for, now, six years. In that six years --
TREASURER KOPP: How time flies.
MR. MORRIS: Yeah, how time flies. There has not been one scenario in that time period where the Board of School Commissioners in the City of
Baltimore has allowed a waiver for MBE in terms of addressing initially the letting of a contract. There have been instances where it has not been met. But our goal is clear and stated up front. And there are instances specifically with requirements contracts HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) that are for specialized work in the school system where there may not have been the full participation.
But it’s very clear that our Board takes it very serious. MBE participation, we get an annual report from the system. Just a few weeks ago we were going to undertake an increase in our MBE participation in terms of our goals. We decided to stay aligned with the State and with the City. And so
I just wanted to put that on the front before we got to the issues that Dr. Alonso is going to bring to appeal. Because it’s a snow day, school’s out, we’re having difficulty finding people who are actually in the building and can corroborate our story. But I feel very, very confident in the fact that we have not been in the position of waiving. And I would think that once we get the official numbers we would be in the mid-twenties.
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. We have you at
11.83. Call me back.
MR. MORRIS: Will do. Thank you.
DR. ALONSO: So good morning, Governor
O’Malley, Lieutenant Governor Brown, Comptroller
Franchot, and Treasurer Kopp. On behalf of the Board of School Commissioners, thank you for the opportunity to address the Board of Public Works about the capital priorities of the Baltimore City Public Schools which
I will refer to as the City Schools.
We are here to appeal the funding recommendations of the Interagency Committee on Public
School Construction for City Schools Fiscal Year 2010
Capital Improvement Program. In this time of fiscal crisis it should come as no surprise that we are petitioning for the full amount of our CIP request.
In the past three years we have pooled operating funds to fund repairs and capital projects as part of HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
Facilities Solution. This year we will be unable to do that.
Baltimore City is the LEA with the greatest facilities needs in the State of Maryland. I almost chuckle when I hear that a school is twenty years old.
Our facility inventory includes the oldest school buildings of any school district in the State. The average age of City Schools buildings is thirty-eight years based on the State’s calculations, although to our way of thinking they are significantly older.
Many of our building system components have exceeded their useful life span. Yesterday I opened schools but I had to close Baltimore City College because of boiler problems. I ordinarily close three or four schools every single day. In truth, our overall fiscal year 2010 request of $121 million only begins to address our true facility needs. In the interest
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) of equity it is critical that City Schools obtains additional capital funding in fiscal year 2010.
I want to take a moment to stress why it is crucial that the Board of Public Works fund as many of these fiscal year 2010 capital requests for Baltimore
City Public Schools as possible. Our enrollment has increased for the first time in decades. The official
September 30, 2008 City Schools enrollment is 82,309 students. I should add that the enrollment increased between September 30th and December 31st for the first time in memory, even though in the past the average decrease ranged from 1 to 2 percent during that time span. The State projections would have us now as only
75,240 students this year so we are 7,000 above the projections. All indications are that enrollment will continue to increase and we anticipate a minimum of
83,483 students in the next school year. In contrast, the State projects further decline to 73,120 students. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
TREASURER KOPP: Dr. Alonso, could I interrupt just for a second?
DR. ALONSO: Yeah.
TREASURER KOPP: The increase. Where is that, is that retention of students? Or is that new young students? Or --
DR. ALONSO: It’s a combination of several things. First of all, our extraordinary investment in
Pre-K. Even last year as our, as we were facing a shortfall I increased the Pre-K enrollment by over 400 students. Secondly, we created six new transformation schools last year with grade six and nine as new options, citywide options, for parents. That pulled new students into the system and kept students from going outside the system. Third, we had a reduction in the drop out rate last year which meant that fewer students dropped out in the high schools. For the first time in decades the enrollment in the high HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) schools increased. And fourthly, we have been increasing the number of charters every single year.
We will now have twenty-seven charters next year, which has drawn lots of parents that previously did not participate in the public schools, into the public school portfolio schools.
Also, and the Chair just recalled, in
September and October we had an initiative to go out and actually bring back students that had dropped out in the previous six months back into the system. And we were able to capture roughly 230 students to come back into the school system, even though many of them returned after the September 30th deadline had expired. So part of the reason why that number has continued to increase, we’re just doing a better job of offering options, reaching out to them, and just holding the parents who are there within the school system. We had a middle school choice fair on HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
Saturday for the first time ever. There were almost
900 parents and students there and the feedback was, we didn’t even know that this was possible. So it’s a combination of asserting that the school, that the school system has what every single parent needs.
TREASURER KOPP: Is the, has the mobility changed at all in the --
DR. ALONSO: The mobility hasn’t changed.
What we’re seeing is mobility within neighborhoods.
It’s, we have been increasingly moving away from the zone concept in order to deal with mobility. It’s a counterintuitive approach. But if we offer choice, keep the parents happy in the choice, then it’s less important where the students live because there’s already an option embedded where the parent chose to send a child there. The high schools are choice and we are almost at the point in terms of the number of seats that we would be able to offer middle school HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) choice in the future. We had over twenty-five schools represented in this fair where parents could choose where to send their kids for the sixth grade.
The, there is this delta that has developed which we expect, and these are conservative numbers on our part because we know already that we’re going to have an increase next year because the kindergarten class is 6,500 students while the senior class is
4,000. And we’re keeping the kids rather than losing them. So our projection is that by 2010-2011 our enrollment will be roughly 85,000 students. It will be higher. And the projections that we’re working for with in our conversations with the IAC, et cetera, who and we are partners in dealing with this disconnect, are 72,000 in terms of what the State has.
There’s clearly a disconnect and we are turning around our school system. Maybe not in numbers that are the greatest in America -- HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Actually, I think they are.
DR. ALONSO: They might be.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Or in terms of achievement. I don’t think there’s another major city that’s had a more dramatic increase in achievement in children’s test scores than Baltimore. I don’t think, anybody know another city? I haven’t seen one.
DR. GRASMICK: I think we have two jurisdictions that should be praised for that,
Baltimore City is one and we have Prince George’s
County which has thirty-one schools have shown school improvement this past year.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good stuff. One
Maryland.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: It must have had something to do with the Mayor, previous, I mean, both
Mayors. But -- HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: The massive amount of investment our parents and citizens have made in schools. Go ahead, Dr. Alonso.
DR. ALONSO: It’s clearly a progress that goes back over time, right?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: That’s what I was --
(Laughter)
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- those were the words I was searching for.
DR. ALONSO: I readily grant them. We are turning around a school system that had previously been in decline by implementing new initiatives aimed at retaining, reclaiming, and recruiting students at all levels and stages of learning. We owe it to all our students, teachers, and other stakeholders to provide the best facilities we possibly can.
In addition, we have vastly improved our performance in three key areas previously identified HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) by the IAC as points of concern, and I believe Keith
Scroggins is standing behind me and deserves a great deal of the credit. The preventive maintenance program, the delivery of capital projects, and right- sizing the inventory of school facilities.
In the area of preventive maintenance City
Schools has continued with the inspection program developed last year. Staff training is ongoing.
Repairs are completed at an accelerated pace. The schools have added Requirement Contracts to utilize for inspections and repairs, and continues to utilize energy savings companies, ESCOs, to improve our heating, air conditioning, and ventilation system.
Most of the projects that came to the IAC were related to ventilation and to windows, since we wanted to prioritize the projects.
City Schools has efficiently and effectively delivered capital projects. During fiscal year 2008 HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) we awarded approximately $60 million in capital projects compared to $127 million in fiscal year 2007.
2008 systemic projects are being completed, and all but one of the 2009 systemic projects are in design.
This past summer we invested approximately $34 million into schools affected by the Facility Solution planning process, and Transformation School sites.
Our facilities were ready on time for the beginning of the school year and our opening was very successful.
In terms of the previous commitment to right-size the City Schools’ facility inventory, we are at a different moment in time. We were well on our way towards achieving the 15 percent reduction of square footage goal set by the School Board nearly four years ago. This time last year, City Schools had succeeded in completing the requisite COMAR process for closing 11.6 percent of the overall square footage
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) towards the 15 percentage goal, and 6.7 percent had actually been closed.
However, with new increased enrollment and new programs we have rethought. They have necessitated returning some of that space to instructional use, as well as retaining other spaces identified for future closure to instructional use.
We actually find ourselves at the opposite end of the spectrum now, needing more instructional space than we actually have at our disposal. It is worth noting that nine school buildings had already been closed between 2000 and 2005, prior to Facilities Solution, and five of the total thirteen that were COMAR’d during Facilities Solution have actually closed.
We appreciate the $18 million in fiscal year
2010 CIP funding that the IAC has recommended thus far for two of our top priority major renovation projects, one fire safety upgrade project, and two boiler HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) replacement projects. I believe that you have the testimony in front of you. Violetville, a major renovation and addition; Leith Walk, major renovation and addition; the fire safety upgrade for Patapsco
Pre-K to 8; and the boiler replacement projects for
Rognel Heights and for Hilton Elementary School.
We also acknowledge -- okay. So there are two additional projects for which we seek your approval. One is construction funding for the major addition renovation project at Waverly. This is, this is a long term promise of the school system. It’s a school that is growing in terms of enrollment. We are asking that one, the school is now housed in two buildings. That one building be renovated for the
Pre-K to 8, and another building would be renovated as well for a new Transformation School.
We are also asking for construction of a new school on the site of the former Lexington Terrace HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
Elementary in the downtown area. We were here last year to say that the school --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I was here five years ago on that side of the podium for that one.
DR. ALONSO: Well, we’re going to do it, right, Governor?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yeah, absolutely.
DR. ALONSO: So --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All things in time.
DR. ALONSO: All things in time? Okay. So it’s twenty years, all the schools, we haven’t had a new school built in a very long time. So we are asking for funds for the Lexington Terrace project.
And we’re also seeking funding for many other projects which extraordinarily important, such as the fire safety projects at Arundel, at Edmondson
High School, and the West Baltimore Middle School building. The types of projects that we’re bringing HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) to the table include fixing the boilers, the chillers, the windows, heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, roofs, and elevators. These are all requests that are about allowing the schools to function, rather than have me at 5:30 in the morning every day check my email so that I can say,
“Violetville closes,” or a different school closes.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right.
DR. ALONSO: We want to thank you for your help. I want to praise Dr. Lever for his partnership with us. In the nineteen months that I have been in the job it’s been a true partnership in terms of pushing the agenda around the instructional needs of the school system. He has shown great flexibility and he has provided great guidance when needed. Thank you. GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. And thank you for the terrific job that your parents and teachers and staff and students are doing in the City HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) of Baltimore. And Keith Scroggins and the great work that he does. Before you came in, Dr. Alonso, we didn’t even have a system that could track and monitor the requests from principals that had, you know, roofs leaking on kids, or pipes broken. And Keith is one of the best. We’re very lucky that you’re doing that job, Keith, so thank you.
So Dr. Lever, what about this? How about,
Dr. Alonso says the City is growing again. The U.S.
Census says the City is growing again. It started growing, you know, I think the U.S. Census said that a year or two ago. That it’s starting to grow again, and yet we hear the minor violin chords saying that you project perpetual decline in enrollment. Why is that?
DR. LEVER: The projections are based on historical trends. But --
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right. But history can be changed, Dr. Lever.
DR. LEVER: We agree completely and we’re very supportive.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We are not the slaves of circumstance, or need not be. The City’s growing again.
DR. LEVER: We agree completely.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Why are you basing it on the past rather than the trends of the future?
DR. LEVER: If Secretary Powers could respond, please?
MR. POWER: Governor, we, the General
Department of Planning does the enrollment projections for the State. So as a result of our last meeting with Dr. Alonso we are sitting down to look at this dramatic change.
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And you’re going to change it and see that it’s going up, aren’t you?
MR. POWER: We do see that it’s going up. I will tell you --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good.
MR. POWER: -- that our statisticians have their jaws on the floor to see the increase --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right.
MR. POWER: -- in Baltimore City --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right. Come on, break out of the past.
MR. POWER: We have a call set up this week to talk about exactly that in two days and figure out whether we can recognize the significant changes --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great. You know?
That’s good. All right. Well, thank you all very much. I’m sorry, Mr. Comptroller?
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Just following up on that question, if these closed facilities may perhaps be needed in the future, who’s looking after them while they’re closed to protect them from vandalism and --
DR. ALONSO: If they have been given to the
City --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Right.
DR. ALONSO: -- then many of them are already in use. And we don’t have control over the use right now. The, we have some schools that we have closed that we have been using for other purposes, not instructional purposes, planning for what happens next.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Do you have any that are closed that are still within your control, that you’re waiting for demolition dollars in order to take down?
DR. ALONSO: No. HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Just curious.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Dr. Alonso, I just had one other question on that. Apparently you’re requesting $4.8 million for a roof replacement at
Thurgood Marshall.
DR. ALONSO: Mm-hmm.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: That’s a very, either a very big roof or --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It’s a gigantic --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- a very high bid.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It’s a gigantic facility.
DR. ALONSO: I’ll let --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It’s the largest middle school on the East Coast, isn’t it?
MR. SCROGGINS: Well actually, sir, the middle school was phased out at that building. But we
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376) have two high schools there. We have Thurgood
Marshall and Sam Banks.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: But when it was built, wasn’t that the largest middle school on the East
Coast?
MR. SCROGGINS: Absolutely, Governor.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: So I’m sorry. The
Comptroller’s question was, isn’t that a high bid?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Is it, so it’s a large roof, not a high bid?
MR. SCROGGINS: Yes, very large.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Or a high estimate?
Okay, thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. Thank you all very, very much.
TREASURER KOPP: Could I just --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’m sorry, Treasurer?
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
TREASURER KOPP: I just don’t want this moment, this is just a personal thing, Governor. I’ve been, I was involved in the Legislature in the
Appropriations Committee in education funding for almost thirty years, a good part of it in partnership and with the leadership of a man whom you may not have known, former, late Delegate Howard Rawlings, Pete
Rawlings. And I just cannot tell you how pleased I think he would be at this moment. It is almost overwhelming. To see, to see the progress. To see the future is just wonderful and I thank you for your hard work, and your leadership, and everybody who’s been involved in that. It really is a tremendous thing that ought not to pass unnoticed or unmentioned.
DR. ALONSO: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Amen. Can I add one -- go ahead, Bryan?
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
MR. MORRIS: I wanted to make one quick observation. All of the requests that we have been, that we’ve made as priorities for this particular appeal, as Dr. Alonso has said, have been about making sure that we can keep the buildings open. I had the opportunity to hear Frederick County, they mentioned they opened Linganore High School, they opened this high school. I heard the other county, I think it was
Anne Arundel before us, their conversations have been about growth. They’ve been about the opportunity to present 21st century opportunities for their students.
Ours still to this date are still about maintaining and holding on to old buildings that have outlived their useful life.
The system has grown. The City is growing.
The opportunity for a 21st century education is due to the citizens of Baltimore, just like they are to the other twenty-three jurisdictions. It is imperative, HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
even in these desperate fiscal times, that we move the conversation for the students of the City of Baltimore to a conversation about growth, about providing them with 21st century science labs, and all of these other facilities. We don’t have them in the City. We need them desperately. We stood, took the whippings a few years ago about not having, not being right-sized, about not having the preventive maintenance, about not
--
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right. I’ve got those scars on my back, too.
MR. SCROGGINS: I was there with you. And
I’m just saying now that it is imperative even in these terrible fiscal times that we give those kids the same opportunity. You always said as the Mayor that you should have a great opportunity for education wherever where you live in the City.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right.
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
MR. SCROGGINS: The same thing is no matter where you live in the State. And we do not have that as it stands today. So, thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Actually, you’re getting more and more of it. Bryan, I think, Mr. Morris, I think the, I think the conversation did shift here today. And I think it’s a, and I think that’s what
Treasurer Kopp was talking about. That is a shift. I mean, the fact that you all are looking at these numbers, you’re going to project that the City is going up. Even Mr. Lever one day is going to agree with it. The next time we come back with those numbers -- Dr. Lever, excuse me. No, the situation’s, you know, it’s definitely shifting.
Now, do me a favor. When you leave here, go call your members of Congress, will you? Tell them to support the President of the United States in doing
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
what we all elected him to do, which is to invest more in our schools.
MR. SCROGGINS: Yep, will do.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right, thank you all. MR. SCROGGINS: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: See you. Okay,
Baltimore County? Doctor, good to see you.
DR. HAIRSTON: Governor O’Malley,
Comptroller Franchot, Treasurer Kopp, Dr. Grasmick, and Lieutenant Governor Brown, how are you? We’re here today to advocate for the public school construction funds in Baltimore County, and to meet our goals in providing a safe and effective learning environment. But before I go into the text of my speech I want to just qualify what I’m saying and why
I’m making this presentation to you. And the qualification is the same statement that I made last
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
week at the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee with the other LEAs.
If there was a sleeping giant in this room, it is Baltimore County. And what I mean by that, there’s no issue in education in America, whether it’s positive or negative, there’s no achievement, whether superlative or underperforming, on any data set or any research study in this country that you will not find
Baltimore County being a part of it. We don’t make a big deal out of it. We do what we do. And that’s because we’re consistent and we’re very stable and we’re very focused on what we’re doing. And if we were playing in this game called the Super Bowl next
Sunday the scouting report would certainly tell you we would do one thing and we would do it quite well, we would be right off tackle.
So I’m coming straight at you today. And I want to just share with you that you’ve committed
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
$21.5 million, and we thank you for that support. And based on the information that we received, the IAC, we want to ask for increased funding from that perspective. And I have with me the Vice President of the Board of Education, Mr. Ed Parker; our Deputy
Superintendent Robert Haines; our Executive Director for Facilities, Mike Sines; Executive Director for
Strategic Planning, Michele Prumo; and a representative from the County Executive’s office,
Frank Principe.
Our capital request includes $7 million for the construction of a new Towson area elementary school. I think many of you are well aware of the fact that this is a severely overcrowded school, in a highly educated rather, very vocal, very supportive community relative to education. And at this point now, this school specifically is reflective of Rodgers
Forge Elementary School, which is currently 170
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
percent over capacity. The school is scheduled to open in 2010. It is expected to exceed the green building, the LEED criteria for the silver rating.
The centerpiece, of course, for this request goes in our middle school renovation. And we’ve completed eight middle schools and eighteen others are under construction. And basically they’re nearly complete.
Notwithstanding the renovation program, just like Baltimore City, we’re one of the largest school systems in America which means that we have a large inventory of schools that are aging. So our profile is not unlike those other large school systems that have been around for a long time. And we’re at that point now. And thank you, Governor, for the work that you’re doing at the federal level in helping us secure some funding. Because we would certainly qualify for any additional support there.
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
But more importantly, our high schools are going to be our most challenging and most complex approach to our facilities. And we’re asking for
$65.2 million to continue our renovation program at
Catonsville High School, Milford Mill Academy, and
Parkville High School. And this is also in conjunction with six additional high schools.
Now, the requests also include, and Governor you’re well aware of the fact that George Washington
Carver Center for the Arts and Technology. The building itself was built in 1949. Here’s a school that is one of the sleeping giants that we’re talking about, has international, national, and State level prominence with regards to its excellence. Here’s a school that was the, the performing arts program was designed after a school that I once started in Prince
George’s County, it was Suitland High School. But this particular school opened without any of the
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
amenities that you would find in most performing arts schools. Now, just think what would happen when we make true to our promise in terms of giving our students the facility that is consistent with the program that we’re talking about. So this is something that we certainly want to give close consideration for. Again, this school will meet the
LEED criteria as well in terms of the green and thermal, geothermal conditioning in terms of expectations.
Our middle school limited renovation program and our capital projects are certainly something that we focus, and we want to highlight with you. The critical infrastructure is also key to ensuring safety for our students and also comfort. We have many of our schools that are unairconditioned, simply because of age. They were built at a time that the design and scope and scale of funding just did not allow it. But
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
we’re in another date and time and point in time with regards to American history, American education, and certainly our population.
The roof and windows, boilers, are still part of our systemic initiatives. We want to continue that as well.
Regarding matters that we know that are of interest to you, and we heard the conversation this morning. We want to tell you that we are very pleased with the progress that we are making with regards to the minority business enterprise. We’re nearly there, so it’s a work in progress. It’s something that we’re constantly working on improving.
But I also want to say, and as a matter of commendation to our staff, and I’ve been very adamant of making sure that every opportunity is available to provide access to the application process and knowing what is available. But we also are not going to
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
sacrifice quantity for quality. And so we’re very pleased with the percentage participation. But we’re more pleased to say to you that we have quality contractors on board and they’re meeting the needs based on our criteria and our standards. I think that’s really important because then we know the taxpayers are getting the money, getting the work in terms of their investment.
Once again, I’d like to thank you for your support and thank members of the Board of Public
Works. And we certainly hope that you will give close consideration to our request.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you, Dr. Hairston.
Anybody have anything?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes, I had a question for, Dr. Hairston, thank you for your presentation.
Dr. Lever, a year ago we were, you wrote a memo on this situation in Baltimore County that was pretty
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
troubling as to the relationship between the whole CIP submission and the relationship between the LEA and local government. I’m just wondering if those problems that you’ve mentioned there, specifically the
Rodgers Forge, I see progress being made there. But also there was the Loch Raven High School issue.
Whether those problems have been addressed to your satisfaction?
DR. LEVER: We have not seen anything of a similar type in this year. It seems to be a very well conceived capital improvement request. And we’re aware that there’s a great deal of support and discussion between the County government and the Board of Education. So I believe that there’s significant improvement compared to last year.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Excellent. And you mentioned in that memo a couple of major projects that you were concerned as to whether the County could
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actually complete the funding that was going to be authorized. Are they on track? Or what is the situation with --
DR. LEVER: I believe they’re largely on track, and I have had discussion particularly with Mr.
Sines about these projects. And where there is slippage, it’s the kind of normal slippage that you might find in any construction project. I’m not seeing anything unusual. The, I think the staff has to be commended for really pushing those projects forward and getting them under contract in a timely way.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Okay, excellent. Dr.
Hairston, if I could just ask you a question about
Towson Elementary School project. That’s a project, obviously, I support. But there have been some complaints by, I believe, some of the people in the neighborhood as to traffic and schools too big for the
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
parcel, and too close, or not enough green space. I wonder if you or someone could just address those issues or concerns? And how you’re planning to meet them in the planning process?
DR. HAIRSTON: Well, first of all the school is welcomed by the parents and the existing occupants of the Ridge Ruxton Special Education School there.
There are no problems there. I think it is a well- designed school, well conceived to take advantage of the topography and of the available space. And actually it is certainly energy efficient. It will be quite an amenity for any student to spend the day during the six and a half hours of a normal academic day in a classroom. But Mike Sines is available to give you more detailed information relative to construction and some of the site work.
MR. SINES: Thank you, Dr. Hairston. You do have a supplemental to your, the presentation. And
HUNT REPORTING COMPANY Court Reporting and Litigation Support Serving Maryland, Washington, and Virginia 410-766-HUNT (4868) 1-800-950-DEPO (3376)
clearly we’re looking at an elementary school that’s going to double its capacity --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Mm-hmm.
MR. SINES: -- in enrollment. We went through a very detailed and comprehensive process of identifying potential school sites within the Towson area. And I, even on the ride down today if someone had stepped forward and given us a fifteen and a half acre parcel we’d have another option that we haven’t been able to identify at this juncture. There is a sense of urgency. The school system and Michele Prumo could speak more in a clear sense in terms of the enrollment projections. But this is the first part of a three phase program that we’ve identified to alleviate the overcrowding in Towson area schools.
Clearly we’re in the process of introducing students right now to our middle school. And this is the immediate relief pattern and program that we’re
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recommending to the Board and they’ve approved to accomplish the introduction or the absorption of approximately 900 students in the next three years.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: No, I agree. I support the project and I think most of the community activists do. I think most of the citizens do. But there have been some concerns raised. I just want to make sure to the extent possible you’re communicating, reaching out, trying to accommodate those concerns if they’re valid. And, no, obviously the merits of the proposal everyone supports.
DR. HAIRSTON: Right. We’re, Baltimore
County, as I said before, we’re one of those sleeping giants. So we’re subjected to any issue that might occur. But there’ve been all types of public information in terms of announcements and letting people know when there’s an opportunity to express any
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concerns, or ask questions. And we’re certainly a part of the public process.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you very much,
Doctor. Thank you. We now go on to --
SECRETARY MCDONALD: I want to make sure that Ms. Ward, on behalf of the community association, we have entered her comments on the record for the. I will read your comments in the record on the elementary school, so I just want to --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. Is Ms. Ford here?
SECRETARY MCDONALD: So.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: She’s here?
MS. WARD: Yes, she is.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Ms. Ward, why don’t you tell me in a nutshell. We don’t usually do this at this. But you’re certainly welcome, and we have a total amount of respect for you. We greatly
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appreciate the trouble you’ve taken to provide us with your testimony. Could you tell us in a nutshell what it is that you’d like to bring to our attention, and you’ll be the only person on the Agenda today that we, you know, that we do this for.
MS. WARD: Governor O’Malley, I appreciate the opportunity to take those few moments. I am in the rather unique position of asking you not to spend money. And it is specifically in response to the $7 million request for the Towson Elementary School that was just discussed. And, sir, in a nutshell, as my materials will describe to you, there are three bases for this objection. And with all due respect to Dr.
Hairston, there has not been public process here, as the materials very descriptively show you and demonstrate. There was not a comprehensive analysis.
Mr. Sines, who was here, said at the Board meeting on May 6th when the decision was made to build
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this school on the Ridge Ruxton School site that the study on which it was based had been done in a week and a half. It includes six existing elementary school sites. It does not include a comprehensive review of all potential sites. The existence of the study on which it was based was not made public. The discussion was not on the Board agenda for that night.
The study was not an exhibit to the Board agenda. The community learned that the school was being built there the next morning when they awoke to the news in the newspaper.
There has been no community input. Dr.
Hairston made comments about opportunity for the public to get involved. And I’d like to tell you what has actually happened. And that is seven oral and written requests to the Baltimore County Public
Schools for a meeting, or for answers to questions, have been refused. Two requests made pursuant to the
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Board’s rules and policies be placed on the Board agenda have gone wholly unanswered. Requests to the
County delegation to the General Assembly to facilitate a meeting of the stakeholders have been refused. Request for the meeting with County
Executive Smith has been refused.
The, I understand that there are some members of the community that support this school.
Those are the parents of students at Rodgers Forge
Elementary School and they had absolutely a very serious need to get new seats. But there is an enormous portion of the community that is very seriously in opposition to this school for the reasons of the shortcomings in the school which I’ll address very briefly, sir.
There are three acres here, not sixteen.
There are 16.7 acres --
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right. I’m going to ask you. You know, we have, we’re running really far behind.
MS. WARD: I understand, sir. I’ll --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I have a tremendous amount of respect for what you provided to us but we’re not the Baltimore County Zoning Board.
MS. WARD: I understand --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And I’d ask you to please, I will help you to make sure that your objections are heard by the highest levels of County government. And I do have a great deal of respect for you and I’m just asking that you show the same for the people who have all been waiting here for an hour and a half. This is not the forum within which to do this, though I do respect your frustration at not being able to get a meeting with County people. And
I’ll certainly use, we’ll use our good offices to make
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sure your concerns are heard. I’ll ask Dr. Grasmick to facilitate this meeting. But this is not the place for this, and I appreciate your concluding.
MS. WARD: Thank you, sir. I do believe that it is the place for this in the sense that the
Board of Public Works must use its funds wisely. And this plan is not a wise and responsible use. Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you very much. We go on now to Calvert County. Calvert County, thank you all for your patience. I appreciate it. Dr.
Grasmick, can you facilitate that with them?
DR. GRASMICK: Absolutely.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And can you forward this on to County Executive Jim Smith? Thank you. And also to members of the County delegation? They need to take care of their business so it doesn’t roll in here.
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MR. KAROL: Are you ready? Governor
O’Malley and the members of the Board of Public Works, as the Board President from Calvert County I bring you greetings from our Calvert County Board of Education, our Superintendent, and the student population that we serve. And, again, we would like to thank you for the opportunity to appear before you to discuss Calvert
County Schools’ CIP for 2010.
The kind of level of support that you’ve given Calvert County in the past is to be commended.
And I can speak to that because I spent thirteen years there as Superintendent, and I can’t tell you what you’ve done in Calvert County in school construction.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Oh, great. Well, thank you.
MR. KAROL: Your efforts truly depict the level of commitment the Governor, the Board of Public
Works, and our elected officials have shown public
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education. And I am sure it’s got to be a daunting task to distribute your $266 million, or whatever it is, in construction money to the school districts.
You and the Maryland State Department of Education can really stand tall, I think, having witnessed the results of your efforts, because it’s everybody’s efforts, which resulted in the State of Maryland achieving the number one status in the United States.
And I think Dr. Grasmick can take a lot of credit for that, as can all educators in the State. It really makes you proud to be a Marylander.
Superintendent Smith, our Superintendent, will speak to our CIP request for the fiscal year 2010 in a minute. But let me again thank you profusely in advance for your support of the Calvert County High
School planning project, of the reroofing of Calvert
Country School and the Mutual Elementary rooftop unit replacement project. These projects share the same
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level of importance to Calvert County as do the projects we wish to appeal. I’m making this fast. I know you’re in a hurry.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s okay. No, you, you’ve been patiently waiting and this is the forum for doing this.
MR. KAROL: And Governor, and the other members, and Mrs. Kopp and Mr. Franchot, I’d like to invite you to come to Calvert County to celebrate our opening of Barstow Elementary School. It’s really a super school. And our kids are really proud of it and happy to have it. It’s our newest elementary school which we opened in November. The dedication ceremonies are scheduled for Saturday, March 7, 2009 at 2:00 if you can arrive. We’d sure like to have you there.
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Again, thank you for all you’ve for our
County in the years gone by, and I hope you’ll continue to do it.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. Thank you very, very much. Any questions?
MR. KAROL: Now Dr. Smith --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Oh, I’m sorry.
DR. SMITH: Good afternoon. I too would like to thank you, Governor, as well as the members of the Board of Public Works, Dr. Grasmick, and Dr.
Lever. We certainly appreciate those projects that were recommended by the IAC. And I would like to present briefly information about two projects that we would like to appeal.
First of all, we’d like to appeal for the remaining funds for the completion of Calvert Middle
School. The request in 2010 was $6,335,000 and the current recommendation is $5,130,000. That’s
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certainly a generous recommendation. We’d like to request the balance of $1,205,000. It’s a critically needed school. Construction commenced this past
October, just a few months ago, and you can begin to see the school rising out of the ground. The school will employ a geothermal climate control system, as does Barstow Elementary, newly completed, and Mill
Creek Middle School that was completed about seven years ago.
We’d also like to appeal for Calvert High
School replacement project. The fiscal year 2010 request is $3,683,000. At this point no funds have been committed to this project. Planning approval was granted for this 2009 cycle. We have moved the start date for construction to the beginning of the 2010 calendar year in attempt to lessen the fiscal burden for the 2010 cycle for both the State and local
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governments. This request would equate to just six months of funding in 2010.
Our County Commissioners and County government are completely behind this project and have endorsed the replacement of the Calvert High School.
It’s forty years old. It is experiencing severe, critical problems that impact both the operations, the electricity, the HVAC, everything, as well as the building’s educational facility use and its ability to offer the best possible program to our high school students.
We certainly appreciate your consideration of these. We know it’s a difficult time for everyone in this country and the State, and we appreciate what you’re doing on our behalf. We stand ready to answer any questions. We have Mr. Phalen, our Board Vice
President, and Mr. Leah, our Director of Construction.
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So we’re prepared to respond to any questions you might have.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Questions?
TREASURER KOPP: Does the $3 million include demolition?
DR. SMITH: I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear you.
TREASURER KOPP: Does the $3 million include demolition of the existing school?
DR. SMITH: Do you want to respond, Mr.
Leah? MR. LEAH: This is just a portion of the initial budget request for that project. Its total is $57 million.
TREASURER KOPP: Right.
MR. LEAH: The demolition of the existing building is included in the $57 million total project.
TREASURER KOPP: And the --
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MR. LEAH: The $3 million that you see right now does not include the demolition of this building, of the existing school.
DR. SMITH: If I may add, this design is such that it will be a, the building will be phased --
MR. LEAH: Phased.
DR. SMITH: -- over three years.
TREASURER KOPP: Okay, thank you.
DR. SMITH: And there will be a new classroom building next to the existing school.
TREASURER KOPP: Got you.
DR. SMITH: We’ll move the students into that, and then begin demolishing parts of the old school. So we’ll never need a trailer park, if you will, to house those students.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Governor?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Sure. Mr. Comptroller?
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Just a general question. Do you have data that shows what you have to spend to maintain a forty-year old school? And what kinds of electrical and other investments are, can be avoided once the new school is built?
MR. LEAH: We recently began to compile some of that very information because we’ve now, with our new energy program, we’re trying to compare different facilities, new to old, and so on, and different types of systems. And in comparison in energy usage, obviously, in an older building is going to be substantially higher than what we’re seeing now in our newer facilities, especially with the geotherm. But also the maintenance of the equipment begins to escalate dramatically when we begin to have issues.
A case in point, a chiller replacement we’re doing now. We constantly rebuild it for X number of
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dollars, and we’re just not seeing any return on that investment.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I’d be interested, if you reach any conclusions, I’d be interested in taking a look at that.
MR. LEAH: We can put some data together, absolutely.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Excellent.
DR. SMITH: For example, we have Mill Creek
Middle School that’s a geothermal, and then we have a recently built, ten-year old middle school that’s not.
And when we compare those electricity bills there’s a substantial savings with the geothermal that we’ve been looking at as part of our energy savings building. And we consider that as well as some other data.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Okay. Thank you.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. Thank you all very, very -- yes, sir. Mr. President? What is it?
You want to add something, Mr. President?
MR. KAROL: No, no. I just said thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And thank you for your service. Great school system. Let’s go on now to
Caroline County.
SECRETARY MCDONALD: Carroll should be next.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’m sorry, did I skip, on my list it had -- we’re going off of two different lists. Okay, we go to Carroll County. Carroll
County, my apologies.
DR. ECKER: Governor O’Malley, Comptroller
Franchot, and Treasurer Kopp. First I’d like to apologize for not having a coat and tie on. But with the budget the way it is I had to do some shoveling of snow and ice this morning. I’m sorry.
(Laughter)
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DR. ECKER: First I’d like to thank the
Board of Public Works for what you’ve done for Carroll
County in the past, and I look forward to working with you in the future. I’d also like to thank the IAC for their recommendations. With that, we have Gary Bauer, our member of the Board of Education; we have
Assistant Superintendent for Administration, Steve
Guthrie; we have our Facilities Planner, Bill Caine, with us; and now I’d like to turn it over to our
Director of Facilities, Ray Prokop, to give you the highlights of the four projects we’re appealing.
MR. PROKOP: Thank you, Dr. Ecker. The first project I wanted to speak about today is the
Westminster High School HVAC project. We are seeking
$5 million in additional construction funding. This project is a, is a third of our, is the third project in which we’re using a geothermal system. It’s part of our initiative, High Performing Schools initiatives
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that include many aspects, not just geothermal, but water conservation, stormwater management techniques, even down to building orientation, occupancy sensors, those sorts of things. Many of these high performance items that Carroll County is doing you can read in the
High Performing School Report that Dr. Lever presented to the Board this morning. And we’d be happy to talk at length with any that are interested. We’re very proud of those. We are shooting for LEED silver as required in the future. This project would also fit into the federal stimulus funding criteria, we believe, because we should be ready to go in the spring.
The next project is Winfield Elementary kindergarten addition. This would also, we believe fit into the 180-day category for the federal stimulus package. It’s a continuation of our full day kindergarten implementation, in which the Board of
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Education directed that we house our kindergarten students in brick and mortar spaces as part of our program. These programs, or additions, also include an indoor air quality and HVAC energy efficiency initiatives. The appeal is for $849,000, which is the balance of the construction funding for the project.
We have two additional. The next two projects are both open space enclosure projects to provide distinct classrooms for open space designs.
We are forward funding these projects hoping for State participation. The Carrolltowne Elementary project is currently under construction, scheduled to be opened in the next school year. Our Northwest Middle School project would, though, fit into the 180-day time frame for the federal stimulus package.
With that, we’ll be glad to answer any questions you might have.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Anyone?
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I just wanted to thank Superintendent Ecker. I know years ago you were
County Executive. And I think in, it’s in politics you, you know, you run into all kinds of people. I just wanted to salute you for your both civility and your effectiveness.
DR. ECKER: You’re very kind, sir.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And Carroll’s lucky to have you.
DR. ECKER: Very kind, thank you.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Do you ever run into my old friend, the former Treasurer, Richard Dixon, up there in Carroll?
DR. ECKER: Yeah, he’s not doing very well.
You know, he has diabetes --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, would you give him my regards, please?
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DR. ECKER: -- and is not doing very well at all. But I see him now and then.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, if you do please give him my regards.
DR. ECKER: I sure will.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And thank you for everything you’ve done for our State.
DR. ECKER: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thanks, Mr.
Superintendent. Thank you all very, very much.
Hopefully the news will get better as the year progresses.
DR. ECKER: Hopefully so.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. Okay, we now go to Caroline County.
DR. SHIRLEY: I have to find a way not to have to follow Mr. Ecker.
(Laughter)
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DR. SHIRLEY: It always works this way.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: You’ve got a necktie, though.
DR. SHIRLEY: That’s right.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s right, yeah.
(Laughter)
DR. SHIRLEY: I’m Ed Shirley, Superintendent of Schools in Caroline County, and we appreciate the opportunity to speak to you today. I have several staff and Board members with me. Milton Nagel, my
Chief Financial Officer; Chuck Petrick, who’s in charge of construction; we have Board members Jim
Newcomb and George Abner; and we have a Senator
Richard Colburn has come up to join us this morning as well. So we appreciate the time.
Caroline -- I’m sorry. And the County
Administrator, I should have said it, Rich Barton, is here with us, too. Thank you.
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Caroline County has been a school system of nine schools and a career tech center for nearly forty years. Actually, over forty years. And it’s a system that has served the children and community well.
There’s been only one major boundary change during that forty-year period of time, from the times they were originally set. We realized four years ago, five years ago, that we were starting to see an unprecedented level of growth in the County. And even though that growth has slowed this year, most people believe that it will only return some time in the future. I mention that because it became critical to us that we try to address the needs of first Colonel
Middle, which you supported us on three years ago, and now Colonel High School. So that the debt capacity locally would allow us to move into the new school buildings, which we’ll need to start probably in three years. So it has been important to us to stay on
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schedule and the State has supported us, as has the
County.
So we’ve gone through the Colonel Middle major renovation, and now we are moving into the
Colonel High School major renovation. Once that is completed we would be back three years hence, probably, to start for the first time building new schools. And we have a community group working and staff group working on that particular issue right now. And it’s going to be a complicated, it’s going to be a complicated boundary issue in trying to address.
So that is why we’re here, and that’s why the importance it is to us. We’re asking for an additional $1.1 million to bring us up to the State for the fiscal year ‘10 to $6 million. It is our only capital request for fiscal year ‘10. And we have
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attached with the materials some of your, some of the cash flow projections.
To mention a couple of things, we are very, very pleased with the progress we’ve made working with
Whiting-Turner on MBE participation in this project.
It looks to be at around 12 percent right now and we are very, very pleased with that. And I certainly appreciate the support that Whiting-Turner has given us as the construction manager. They have done detailed analysis to provide that.
We’re also pleased with the initiatives that we’ve done with energy in terms of geothermal heating.
We did it for Colonel Middle, we’ll do it again for
Colonel High School. Good solid work in terms of recycling for materials.
So at that point I’ll pause and if there are any questions we’d be happy to try to answer them.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Why on that sheet do we have only, do we have a zero percent on MBE but Dr.
Shirley tells us it’s 12 percent? Are we behind, or -
-
DR. SHIRLEY: You would be --
MS. JENKINS: This is the fiscal year ‘08 --
DR. SHIRLEY: Right.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Got you. Okay.
DR. SHIRLEY: Right. That was the project for Colonel Middle, which when asked that question last year we floundered and I feel very good about how we have corrected that problem this year.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. Thanks for doing that. Dr. Shirley, you do a great job. We were wondering, who was Colonel Richardson?
DR. SHIRLEY: Colonel Richardson was,
William Richardson, actually, he was the founder of
Caroline County back in the Revolutionary War. Okay?
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So he broke it off from Dorchester. Don’t ask me any more than that because I’m done. That’s all I know.
(Laughter)
DR. SHIRLEY: He’s buried there, too.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good. Well thank you all very, very much for the good job you do for our kids. Oh, Senator Colburn joins us as well. Senator, thanks for being here.
SENATOR COLBURN: Thank you for inviting us to lend our support.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Hey, thank you. Well, hopefully as the year goes forward the year will get better. Call your members of Congress, especially the new one over there. Tell him to support President
Obama in the Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
DR. SHIRLEY: We are in close communication.
Thank you.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good. Thank you. Let’s go to Charles County. Land of General Smallwood, who was no doubt a contemporary of Colonel Richardson.
(Laughter)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good afternoon.
COLONEL WADE: Good afternoon, Governor
O’Malley, Comptroller Franchot, and Treasurer Kopp.
I’m Donald Wade, the Chair of the Board of Education of Charles County. Before I begin I would like to recognize school staff who have joined me today. With me are Deputy Superintendent, Mr. Ronald Cunningham; and Assistant Superintendent for Support Services,
Charles Wineland. Due to hazardous road conditions caused by inclement weather, other members of our staff as well as the Board of Education were unable to join us today.
Our request today is straightforward and short. Specifically, we are asking for your support
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for three projects. Our top priority is planning approval for a new high school, which incorporates green features, global learning opportunities, and relief from overcrowding at our six existing high schools. The high school, which will be located in the developing district of Waldorf, will reduce severe overcrowding in our schools. If we opened the school tomorrow, it would already be filled. Our newest high school, North Point, is already 600 beyond capacity with nearly 2,200 students despite just adding its first senior class this year. In order to increase our chances of receiving planning approval for the high school, we have reduced our request over the past two years and have not asked for planning for two new elementary schools and several other projects.
We have seen tremendous success at our newest High Point High School. The programs are working and the students are achieving both
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academically and personal advancement. Charles County has a reputation for its innovation in its approach to building schools that provide programs for students that enhance the skills they need for living and working in the 21st century and a global society. We propose the next new high school house a digital classroom, as well as the energy efficiency. The new high school would include the new of high efficiency
Energy Star equipment, centralized outside air ventilation units with heat recovery, a geothermal heat pump system, and rainwater harvesting for irrigation use, and a total of twenty-six other energy efficiency design considerations.
Additionally, we would provide educational classes that would complement the green features of the building to teach students of the importance of energy conservation. We are determined to obtain a
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LEEDS certification emphasizing energy and environmental consideration at the new high school.
The digital classroom contains a multi-use dome theater that would be used for all students in the county, and enhances science, technology, and other instructional programs.
Even with the slowdown in housing sales and construction, Charles County remains as one of the fastest growing counties in the State. Charles County has been proactive in dealing with its growth and creative in its solutions to maximize the space in our school buildings. We have utilized portable classrooms to the fullest extent, as is evidenced by the large investment made locally. We have worked with our County Commissioners on the Adequate Public
Facilities Ordinance that was created ten years ago and established core capacities in all schools. The
County has implemented an excise tax to help fund
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school construction. These measures have helped us deal with our growth. But we are running out of options and space and we need more State help.
Most of our schools are being used beyond capacity, and we have been balancing the needs to renovate our old schools and building new ones.
The two other priorities are systemic renovations to the aging schools. We are asking for boiler replacement at Arthur Middleton Elementary
School and John Hanson Middle School, which is also located in Waldorf.
The Hanson request for boiler replacement has been deferred for years, but last year one boiler failed and we had to replace it with general fund money. The project remains urgent to ensure the educational program does not suffer. Our request for boiler replacement is urgent. The cost of these two
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projects is $1.5 million for Middleton and $2 million for Hanson.
Thank you for your assistance with our prior appeals. We recognize the austere times and tough decisions the State has to make during these economic times. We must, however, continue to move forward with vision to continue to provide a quality education for our students.
On behalf of the Board of Education, we pledge our commitment to working with you, and our local and State officials on the successful completion of these projects. Further, we applaud your wisdom in recognizing that education is more than a priority.
It is the key to the civic and economic vitality of this State. We thank you for your favorable consideration of our request. And we will entertain questions.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you, Colonel Wade.
Questions? Okay. You all have a tremendous school system. We’re very proud of what you’re doing on CTE, and I’ve had occasion to walk through some of those halls, albeit at a very sad funeral occasion. But the building itself is really something that all
Marylanders should be proud of. So thank you for your good work. And anything you can do, your continued strides on the MBE, which I had last year at 7.65 percent. And perhaps that’s up this year. What is your more recent year?
MR. WINELAND: Our last three major projects, Gale-Bailey Elementary School full day kindergarten addition was 23 percent.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great.
MR. WINELAND: T.C. Martin full day kindergarten addition was 25 percent. And the new
Mary Burgess Neal Elementary School is 33 percent.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Terrific. That’s great.
Boy, is that a good news story, Ms. Jenkins and Dr.
Grasmick.
MS. JENKINS: Yes.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: But thank you all very, very much. Thanks for your patience in these, and your fortitude in slugging in here in the inclement weather. We now go to Dorchester County.
DR. HILDENBRAND: Good afternoon, Governor
O’Malley, Comptroller Franchot, Treasurer Kopp,
Lieutenant Governor Brown, Dr. Grasmick, Dr. Lever, members. From Dorchester County we have one project and one request, and that is to help us get the
Dorchester Career and Technology Center off the ground, or in the ground, I should say. I thank
Senator Colburn for coming here today with us. To my right is Assistant Superintendent Henry Wagner for
Instruction, and Gary McCabe for Administration.
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Behind me is Jim Bishop, a Board member. And behind me, and Chris you’re going to need to come up front,
I’m sure, Chris Hauge is our Facilities Engineer.
As I said, we have one project and one request. The Dorchester Career and Technology Center.
We’ve been working on this project for the last four years, and we would love to have started the project last year but didn’t have the funding in place. And so we’re here to ask that you, we receive the final promise of $1.5 million to help us get going this year.
The total project cost is $36 million. The
State’s share is $15 million and the local share is
$21 million. The State approved $1 million for the current year, and our request for fiscal year 2010 is
$5 million total. And to date the State has committed
$3.5 million to the project. And as I said, we’re here asking for the last million and a half dollars.
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The County government is committed to $17 million for the upcoming year. Believe me, the whole
County is behind this project. They’re salivating over it if we could get it going. So all we need is a commitment from the State for that full $5 million.
The building that we’re in now was built in the seventies and we’ve kind of outgrown it. It’s not up to modern standards for CTE programs. In addition, we have seven new and exciting programs planned for the new building, which will afford our students many different opportunities. Some of these programs will fit nicely into our STEM program, which we began at the high schools this year.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great.
DR. HILDENBRAND: We have STEM program in both of our high schools.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Terrific.
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DR. HILDENBRAND: And some of the programs that we planned to have in the new Career and
Technology Center will fit in nicely with that. One of my visions is to have all of the students in
Dorchester County to be able to go through the Career and Technology Center, regardless of their career objectives. Whether they’re on the STEM end or anywhere throughout the spectrum. If they’re planning to go into further education or whether they’re planning a career. So that’s one of my hopes that we can do with the new building.
As I said, our County is behind this 100 percent. They are in partnership now with businesses in the County to build a technical and business park which includes, as you have seen in your documents I’m sure, the expansion of the Dorchester County airport.
The park will be built right adjacent to that. And we see our Technology Center as being a pipeline for
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funneling students and future workers into those businesses. And the business picture is kind of changing in Dorchester County. We’re, as you know, it’s a seafood county, also a food processing county.
And we’re moving more toward technology and services.
And our Career and Technology Center has some of those services as their programs.
Our minority business enterprise participation, on the current school that we hope, that we are opening this spring and hope to occupy early this summer, North Dorchester Middle School, our minority business participation in that school has been 22 percent. And this is due to aggressive work on the part of our engineers, our engineer and his crowd. And we expect to aggressively pursue this in building the Career and Technology Center as well.
While this school is not planned to be what you would call a typically or perfectly green school,
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we have elements built into the program. First of all, this will be the fifth geothermal school that we will have built. The current middle school that we’re going to open is geothermal. We have an elementary and another middle school that we opened ten years ago, and we’ve retrofitted another school to be our duty center. These schools are all geothermal. We feel that we’re kind of pioneers in this sense. And we have realized the savings as a result of that.
Other ideas that we have for this new model will be to recycle rainwater to be used in the horticulture program --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great.
DR. HILDENBRAND: -- in the greenhouse. The window placement and design is such that we will take full advantage of solar energy and cut down on, we hope on HVAC, and make that more efficient. The landscape design will be, has been designed to limit
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and redirect stormwater runoff, and also the plantings, the indigenous plantings that we do adjacent to the building we hope will not only protect our environment but provide for reduced operating costs as well.
In summary, Dorchester County is very proud that we designed a new Career and Technology Center and now it’s time for this project to become a reality. Our request to the Board of Public Works is that the State solidifies our partnership with
Dorchester County and provides the first major installment of funding which, as I said, totals $5 million for fiscal year 2010. And our appeal today is for the final $1.5 million.
It’s my hope that you’ll be attending a groundbreaking this summer. And in two years that we have students that will be occupying the Technology
Center. And I defer any questions that you might
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have, technical questions, to my engineer and my
Assistant for Administration.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay, thank you. Any questions?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Senator Colburn, does this have an impact on the midshore region as well as
Dorchester County? The new Technology, School of
Technology? Does that provide a feeder for employers in the region as well as just the County?
SENATOR COLBURN: Well, this will be just
Dorchester students but it, it can have an impact on the entire midshore region.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Mm-hmm.
SENATOR COLBURN: We’re hopeful. But
Dorchester County particularly is heavily dependent, as the Superintendent pointed out, on the seafood and agriculture industries. And both industries are in trouble now, as you know. And I’ve lobbied you
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heavily, I’ve lobbied you as well as the Governor and the Treasurer on this project. And it is shovel ready. I know the Governor’s emphasizing, corresponding about bringing forth projects that are shovel ready.
DR. HILDENBRAND: We’re ready to bid the project.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Excellent.
DR. HILDENBRAND: And my hope, too, is, that is with the rest of the County and the region is that we can keep our young people in the area so that they don’t have to go elsewhere to find the jobs.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Superintendent
Hildenbrand, you’re too modest on the geothermal.
Because when the Governor and I and the Treasurer two years ago began to talk about geothermal, it was only because Dorchester and several other districts on the
Eastern Shore had shown that it worked. I mean, you
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were ahead of the times. And I love Montgomery
County, it’s my home county, but, and I love this
Great Seneca gold plated, not gold plated, gold standard school. But you led the way --
DR. HILDENBRAND: Yes.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- as far as geothermal. And you are to be complimented for it. I was just showing the Governor a picture of the geothermal maintenance in, I guess it’s this school.
Maybe it was another one. But that’s exactly what
President Obama has been talking about, as far as creating jobs, saving oil, and energy, saving money, or spending money more effectively and efficiently.
So the Shore really led the way.
DR. HILDENBRAND: We’re very aware of our environment, as you can imagine, and we want to protect what we have. And we do have experience with the geothermal.
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, now it’s all the rage. But you guys really deserve an award for frugality and leadership.
DR. HILDENBRAND: Thank you, sir.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: It’s really going to, really going to benefit the environment. Thank you.
DR. HILDENBRAND: Any new school should have geothermal, any new school being built in Maryland, I think, whenever possible.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: It’s, I, a couple areas aren’t, can’t do it because of bedrock. But other, I think you’re onto something there. Because particularly if the premium, as you say Dr. Lever, is being eliminated through experience and comfort from the contractors. It’s a big deal. Thank you.
TREASURER KOPP: Mace’s Landing, is that --
DR. HILDENBRAND: Mace’s Lane. Mace’s Lane
Middle School.
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MR. MCCABE: That was our second geothermal school.
TREASURER KOPP: That’s also where you have the community health --
DR. HILDENBRAND: Yes, we have a wellness center there. Yes.
TREASURER KOPP: Yes. That actually, I mean, I think the geothermal is wonderful. I think that that centralization of service and access to healthcare is also a great, a great model for the rest of the State.
DR. HILDENBRAND: Which is also a problem for the Eastern Shore.
TREASURER KOPP: Absolutely.
DR. HILDENBRAND: I mean, adequate healthcare in the rural areas.
TREASURER KOPP: I hope others will look at that as the model that --
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DR. HILDENBRAND: Please come down and visit us.
TREASURER KOPP: And not just for students.
I mean, it’s for the community.
DR. GRASMICK: We have about fifty that we’ve started.
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah. It’s wonderful.
DR. HILDENBRAND: Yeah, we have them in our other high schools and middle school as well.
TREASURER KOPP: Great leader. Great leaders. Thank you.
DR. HILDENBRAND: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you all very, very much.
DR. HILDENBRAND: Thank you, sir.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We go on now to, what, lunch?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Lunch.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. We go on to lunch. We’re going to take a half hour and come back, is that what we’re doing? Half hour and come back, okay? Motion to adjourn? 2:15.
(Short recess taken)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you for your forbearance as we took a pause for the cause, as we used to say in --
DR. GRASMICK: Governor?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yes?
DR. GRASMICK: Can I just say something?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Absolutely.
DR. GRASMICK: I have a hearing in the
Senate at 3:00, and I would not want any superintendent or school system to think I’m really walking out. So I will --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: This is on the report on
Thornton? And the --
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DR. GRASMICK: Yes.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- and how much the 82 percent increase in State funding --
DR. GRASMICK: Exactly.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- of public education made a difference in the lives and the achievements and the outcomes for our children?
DR. GRASMICK: That is exactly it.
(Laughter)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Go ahead. Well, you’ve got to be at that one. We all understand. Next up,
Harford County.
MS. SKEBECK: Good afternoon.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good afternoon. I’m very sorry for your loss.
MS. SKEBECK: Thank you, we very much appreciate it. I’m Pat Skebeck. I’m the interim superintendent of Harford County Public Schools. And
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I come before you today representing our 38,000 students and over 5,000 employees that make up Harford
County. And the success, their success, is the reason that we strive to infuse state of the art energy efficient facilities with world class instruction.
I want to thank the Board of Public Works,
Governor O’Malley, Comptroller Franchot, Treasurer
Kopp, for the opportunity to discuss the continuation of a very successful partnership in our bridge to excellence master plan in order to marry construction with instruction.
TREASURER KOPP: Well, that’s good. That’s very good. I like that.
MS. SKEBECK: Standing beside me today -- that’s the elementary in me.
(Laughter)
MS. SKEBECK: Standing beside me today is our Board President, Mr. Hess. Thank you for being
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here with us. I would also like to extend sincere gratitude to Dr. Grasmick and the members of the IAC,
Dr. Lever, for their continued support for Harford
County.
I would like to take an opportunity for a moment to highlight two successfully completed capital initiatives that acknowledge the strong partnership between the State and Harford County Public Schools, and the impact of construction and instruction.
First, the funding that you provided to facilitate the
Science and Math Academy at Aberdeen High School. It combines a rigorous STEM program with a deep rooted partnership with Aberdeen Proving Ground. Federal,
State, and local funds made it possible for us to bring this unique educational opportunity to Harford
County. The magnet provides 200 students with the opportunity to experience challenging course work in science, mathematics, technology, with an emphasis on
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research and real world application. The innovatively designed structured signature school is housed on the third floor of the replacement Aberdeen High School, allowing our students to receive instruction in technologically advanced classrooms and still allow them to get down and participate in mainstream high school activities.
We also want to thank you for providing funding for the modernization of North Harford High
School. Now, North Harford is in an area rich in tradition and history and is geographically located in the heart of our agricultural center. By allowing us to modernize the existing building we were able to preserve that school that serves the hub of the community and add precious instructional space for an agriscience career pathway program that partners the farm community and the school system.
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While Harford County has seen a slight decline in enrollment, mainly at the elementary level, we still remain in the top 1 percent of school districts in Maryland when ranked by enrollment. As one of the recipients of the military base realignment enclosure initiative we know that we must now focus and concentrate our efforts on planning for future growth and workforce development.
So now to why we’re here today. Each year our Board of Education, school staff, and community review our CIP plan in order to establish priorities that are directly aligned with our master plan and incorporate green, high performance construction strategies. We’re confident that the requests we bring you today are fiscally sound and continue to expand the construction/instruction partnership.
Today we’re requesting the balance of funding for the replacement of Bel Air High School,
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which will open as scheduled in August of 2009. Along with the --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’m sorry, we’re joined by Delegate McComus and also County Executive Craig.
If you could, if you want to come and stand with your folks you’re welcome to. Or --
TREASURER KOPP: But you don’t have to.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Or you don’t have to.
DELEGATE MCCOMUS: Moral support. We don’t
–
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. All right. Well, it’s nice of you to be here and, go ahead.
MS. SKEBECK: Thank you. I’m glad you saw them come in and recognized them. Along with the expanded capacity to accommodate BRAC, Bel Air High
School will be the home of a cutting edge biomed medical career pathway program slated to evolve into a magnet program in the future. A partnership has been
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established already with the Upper Chesapeake Health, which is our leading healthcare system and the second largest private industry in Harford County. And it’s located about two miles from Bel Air High School.
Much like the science/math academy, the biomedical career program will be housed in its own wing of the replacement building. And we have been very fortunate to have the support of our local government in forward funding that project.
Much local and national attention recently has been given to the Edgewood Community, with the
President-elect –
TREASURER KOPP: Can I ask you a question about --
MS. SKEBECK: Surely.
TREASURER KOPP: -- the biotech and the existing one? Is higher education involved with that?
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MS. SKEBECK: In all, yes. In all aspects.
At the STEM program not only are we using --
TREASURER KOPP: Right.
MS. SKEBECK: -- Aberdeen Proving Ground, but we’ve got the heat setter there which really draws from a lot of the colleges in the area. And Harford
Community College is a very strong partner with us.
TREASURER KOPP: Thank you.
MS. SKEBECK: Okay, back to Edgewood High
School. And you’ll begin to see a theme here when we’re talking about the high schools. Through BRAC and the emphasis on the science and technology Route
40 corridor, the area is gaining a lot of attention.
We have two capital projects we’re bringing before you on the Edgewood Campus that will solidify our commitment to the Edgewood community. Edgewood High
School replacement and Deerfield Elementary
Replacement, both on the same campus.
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We are requesting planning approval and funding for Edgewood High School, which is already under construction. We’re very proud to announce today that Edgewood High School recently achieved full accreditation from the International Baccalaureate organization, and will open its doors to its first fifty students who are enrolled in the International
Baccalaureate Magnet Program this coming fall. This milestone puts us one step closer to achieving our goal of infusing state of the art educational programs with school facility modernizations in each of our high schools. In addition, Edgewood High School is also located adjacent to the military base.
Therefore, it must accommodate an anticipated increase in future student population.
On the same campus, with Deerfield
Elementary School, a replacement school that is under
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construction. And we are requesting the balance of funding for this project.
In an effort to retain and attract a highly qualified workforce we’ve designated space in this facility to accommodate an on site daycare for teachers. Not only for those working at the elementary school, but on that campus for the middle school and high school as well.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Which campus is that?
MS. SKEBECK: This would be Edgewood, or
Deerfield Elementary School.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Uh-huh.
MS. SKEBECK: They are on the same campus,
Governor, with the middle school, Edgewood Middle
School and Edgewood High School.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s a great idea.
MS. SKEBECK: Thank you. We thought so, too.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: So in a school where you have to work hard to attract and retain your most qualified teachers, you provide the added amenity of childcare for those teachers so they can be in a setting with their child and go have lunch and see them. That’s a good idea. I like that one.
TREASURER KOPP: Is this unique?
MS. SKEBECK: I’m not sure. It is something that we --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: There’s --
DR. GRASMICK: It’s unique to Harford County and we’re thrilled about it. We’d like to see more of this develop. And it also, as I understand it, will accommodate some of the workforce at Aberdeen?
MS. SKEBECK: Yes. It won’t be, that’s right. It won’t be a closed, but it will be a full daycare facility that will include infants. Because we have a young --
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TREASURER KOPP: Wonderful.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: But you’ll give priority to faculty?
MS. SKEBECK: That’s correct.
DR. GRASMICK: Yes.
MS. SKEBECK: That’s correct.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Huh. That’s a good idea. And is it a, is it a, so it’s a paid, is it a privately run daycare? Is it run by the school, or a contractor, or how does that work?
MS. SKEBECK: We will entertain, no we’re not going to run it. We will entertain folks who do daycare to come in and bid, and we have a process. We have a policy in place anyway.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Uh-huh.
MS. SKEBECK: Because we have daycare in our schools now, but not full day.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right. And then do you let, do they avail themselves then of your sovereign immunity? So, I mean the second biggest cost of daycare is the insurance. So do they get a much lower rate, or no, do they save that cost?
MS. SKEBECK: They must come in with their own insurance.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Ah.
MS. SKEBECK: That’s part of the agreement that we have with them.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We should do a bill that covers them under our sovereign immunity.
DR. GRASMICK: That would be huge.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I wrote that bill as my writing requirement in law school. Avery Eisenstark was my legislative drafting professor. So all --
DR. GRASMICK: So will you dust it off and -
-
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’ll dust it off and
I’ll give it to you.
MS. SKEBECK: Well, we’d appreciate --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Because it’s their second biggest, that’s how I know it’s the second biggest cost. It’s the insurance after only the labor. And if you don’t have the insurance costs, and if you’re right there and you’re already supervising a public and open building, why do you need that sort of insurance cost? And then you can pay the people more to keep retaining your quality sort of daycare people.
LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BROWN: And Governor, I should add that I believe Delegate McComus has supported a lot of those immunity bills down there in the Judiciary Committee over the years, haven’t you?
DELEGATE MCCOMUS: Well, you’ve put me on the spot.
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LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BROWN: Okay. So, I’m just, a rhetorical question.
MS. SKEBECK: Okay?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Proceed.
MS. SKEBECK: The other, just the final piece with Deerfield is that it is also, because it’s on the same campus, located within ten miles of the perimeter of the military base. And so the additional capacity that we’ve put there will support the significant demographic impact of BRAC.
We have several systemic projects that we have included in our request that will increase our ability to provide energy efficient, high performing facilities. Upgrading mechanical systems will provide cost effectiveness by prolonging the life of the equipment. These projects will meet the needs of replacing an aging infrastructure and prevent unexpected equipment failures. The systemic projects
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we’re requesting include an HVAC replacement at Havre de Grace High School, and an HVAC and roof replacement at Southampton Middle School.
And finally, Schuck’s Road Elementary School is currently under full design and is listed to open in the fall of 2011. We are currently undergoing an elementary redistricting process to balance enrollment countywide and allow for room in each of our elementary schools to accommodate incoming BRAC residents. While we’ve seen a slight decrease in our elementary population over the last three years, there remain regions in our county that are extremely overcrowded. The Schuck’s Road property is located near Churchville on Route 22, which is the main thoroughfare to Aberdeen and Aberdeen Proving Ground.
It is the closest to our most severe capacity issues with Prospect Mill at 137 percent capacity and
Fountain Green at 114 percent capacity. The school is
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a prototypical design. The school’s already been designed. And its designed in sections which can be stacked one on top of another or designed any way around --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great. We like prototypes.
MS. SKEBECK: We do, too.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: The whole State should have some prototypes. Do we have prototypes, yes, Dr.
Grasmick, at that State? Everybody likes to do their own thing, right?
DR. GRASMICK: Well, we do have some.
Actually, it has increased. But, you know, it’s very dependent on the architect to bring, et cetera.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right.
DR. LEVER: It’s local. It’s, the jurisdictions do it. We don’t have a statewide policy on that. But we have a number of jurisdictions, I
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think it’s nine now, that are using prototypes. And that’s going to increase to eleven, from what we understand.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s good. They all should. I don’t understand why they, I mean, I guess it’s good for architects’ stimulus. But you’d think we’d have a couple of standard designs.
DR. GRASMICK: And we do have some good sharing. We have one from Queen Anne’s County being shared with Baltimore County, which is a nice thing.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mm-hmm.
DR. GRASMICK: Because usually it’s internal.
MS. SKEBECK: And just my final statement.
If you’ll notice --
TREASURER KOPP: Can I ask you about
Schuck’s –
MS. SKEBECK: Sure.
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TREASURER KOPP: I don’t know whether this actually is you or the County Executive. But a question’s been raised about the fact that the site is not in the priority funding area, and has marginal reported perks along with being dependent on local well water supply. This strikes me as a concern, as the Governor mentioned in an earlier, this is a, really a local zoning concern. I think that maybe somebody could pass it on and –
MR. CRAIG: We’ve had a Zoning Department rule on it. It is outside the priority funding area, but the students are in it. The problem is there’s no land in the priority zoning area to build a school, where we could buy at a reasonable price to build a school. And that we’re consolidating several pieces of property to be able to do this. We’re also in the process, it’s right near a community college and it’s also right near any major recreation complex, fields.
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So all those things together will work pretty well together. But it’s right at the edge of the development area.
TREASURER KOPP: Could you ask somebody to respond in writing?
MR. CRAIG: To?
TREASURER KOPP: To that point.
MR. CRAIG: Okay, sure. Do you have something in writing that I can work --
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah, I do. I can try to throw it to you or, thank you.
MR. HESS: And we will also be able to answer in regards to the perc test, too.
TREASURER KOPP: That would be swell, thank you.
MS. SKEBECK: We should have that information.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mr. Comptroller?
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: What impact will Bel
Air have on the, your capacity situation up there?
MS. SKEBECK: Bel Air Elementary are you referring to?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: No. I’m talking Bel
Air High School.
MS. SKEBECK: Oh, Bel Air High School?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Right.
MS. SKEBECK: Well, our County Executive has agreed with us that as we modernize or replace high school buildings we’ll put them at 1,600 capacity. So we are building capacity into each of our high schools. Right at the present time we’re between 92 percent, about 92 percent capacity in all of our middle and high schools. So we’ll feeling pretty comfortable that we’re going to have space to accommodate folks as they come into our program. And that’s where we’re moving with an additional
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elementary school, and then adding capacity as we’ve been modernizing elementary schools, and a complete redistricting.
That really concludes my remarks. Again, I really would like to thank you all for the time you’ve given me today. I’m a newbie. And the opportunity to share with you our vision for the students of Harford
County, and to continue this really solid partnership that we have with you. Thank you so much. And if there are any other questions, we’d be glad to answer them.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I think, we appreciate your presentation. Anything you can do to support your congressional leaders, and urge them to vote for
President Obama’s Recovery and Reinvestment Act, it would be a lot of dollars invested in school construction. So anything, the vote’s being taken now in the House. It will come up in the Senate. And
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anything you can do as a Board, or members, or PTAs to weigh in on it and urge its passage would really help us put some more dollars to this urgent need for school construction.
MR. HESS: Thank you very much for your time.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you, sir.
MS. SKEBECK: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay, Howard County.
Dr. Cousin, how are you, sir?
DR. COUSIN: I’m doing fine.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good. How is Howard
County? Are you the best, highest achieving school system in the entire State?
DR. COUSIN: We like to say yes.
MR. AQUINO: We like to hear that message, yes. That’s a nice compliment.
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DR. GRASMICK: Highest achieving in the highest achieving State.
MR. AQUINO: In the highest achieving State.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Highest achieving in the highest achieving State. It doesn’t get much better than that in this country. Good to see you. Go ahead.
MR. AQUINO: Good afternoon, Governor,
O’Malley, Comptroller Franchot, and Treasurer Kopp.
My name is Frank Aquino and I have the pleasure of being the Chairman of the Howard County Board of
Education. I’m here with our Board Vice Chair Ellen
Flynn Giles, our Superintendent Dr. Sydney Cousin, and staff. And I just noticed that Delegate Liz Bobo has joined us for support. Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Hello, Delegate Bobo.
MR. AQUINO: I want to thank all of you for your continued support of public education in
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Maryland. I realize that in these rough economic times setting priorities among a wide variety of projects, all of which are important, is difficult at best. Howard County is prepared to do its part. And while the Board has only begun its operating budget process, the operating budget presented to the Board by Superintendent Cousin is essentially flat. It calls for no new programs.
In addition, and I suspect Dr. Cousin will get to this, on the capital side of the budget I am pleased to note that Howard County’s first LEED eligible renovation project is underway at Northfield
Elementary School. Among the project highlights is the installation of a geothermal HVAC system, a first for the Howard County Public School System.
I thank you again for the opportunity to be here today, and we’ll turn over the rest of our
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presentation to the best Superintendent in the State,
Dr. Sydney Cousin.
DR. COUSIN: Good afternoon. Governor
O’Malley, Comptroller Franchot, and Treasurer Kopp,
I’m Sydney Cousin, the Superintendent of Schools in
Howard County. And we’re here today to appeal the decision of the Interagency Committee on School
Construction’s recommendations for capital projects.
But before I begin, I wanted to address one of the questions that came up when you were, had Harford
County here and that was about child development centers and daycare for employees. We have four centers in Howard County. They’ve been in operation since the mid-eighties. And it’s not only for staff but it’s also to help train our students in daycare and child development issues and opportunities.
TREASURER KOPP: Has it in fact had an impact on staff retention?
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DR. COUSIN: Yes, we believe that it has.
Because finding affordable daycare is particularly difficult. And to have it in a setting where you know your child is safe and protected is also an incentive for not only recruiting but also retaining teachers as well.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mm-hmm.
TREASURER KOPP: And is it also contracted out, as Harford County was --
DR. COUSIN: We have a partnership with the providers. At first we subsidized the operation until they had legs. And by making loans and by providing the facilities at no cost. But now they are self- supporting and well established. We have a close relationship, as I said, because our curriculum is tied to the operations of the child development centers as well.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mr. Comptroller asked, do teachers pay the same fee as the public would?
DR. COUSIN: Teachers, it’s only open to employees of the --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Only open to schools.
DR. COUSIN: -- schools system.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay.
DR. COUSIN: So it’s not only for teachers.
It’s for any staff member.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: But they pay the, they pay a fee?
DR. COUSIN: They pay a fee, yes. And that fee is really below market.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Because you’re giving the rent for free?
DR. COUSIN: Right.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Got you. What about the insurance issue?
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DR. COUSIN: The insurance is paid through the operators.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Operator?
DR. COUSIN: Mm-hmm.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We need my bill, great.
Every good idea comes around eventually. Only took
1987 to 2009.
LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BROWN: Did you get a good grade?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I got a great grade.
Avery Eisenstark told me at the time, “This isn’t politically popular.” I said, “This is a legislative drafting course, I thought. Not a politically possible course.” He said, “Fair enough.” He gave me an A on it. I’ve got it somewhere. I’ll dig it out.
We’re --
DR. COUSIN: Okay. Back to the capital --
(Laughter)
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: The capital budget.
We’re a little punchy in hour four, here.
DR. COUSIN: First of all, we received the recommendation of $14 million and we are thankful for that. But that represents only about a third of our overall request of $41,880,000. And our purpose today is to appeal the projects that have been deferred or only partially funded through the action of the
State’s school construction program and the
Interagency Committee. And we just want you to be cognizant of some of these facts as you continue to review our requests.
And first of all, since 1989 enrollment in the County has been increasing. And it’s projected to increase for the next several years even though the rate of increase has slowed down. And while the impact has yet to be quantified for BRAC, we know that
BRAC is going to have a significant impact on how we
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operate as a school system and the capacity that we need to support folks moving into Fort Meade and the environment.
For example, there are currently ten full day kindergarten projects receiving State funding which have been determined to be BRAC related. And there are ten other BRAC related projects for which construction has already begun, or will begin within the next year. In addition, there’s redevelopment along the Route 1 corridor in the County and there’s a plan for the revitalization of Columbia’s downtown which Delegate Bobo is intimately aware of and involved in. The taxpayers of Howard County have overwhelmingly indicated their support for school construction over many years and their willingness to do more than their share is indicated by the fact that for the past five years the County has funded about 80 percent of our capital funding needs, with the State
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picking up about 20 percent. This has been true for many years and it indicates that the County’s elected officials and community are willing to support schools in many different respects.
Over the next ten years our master plan calls for one new elementary school addition/renovation project, two elementary additions, three renovation projects that we call systemic renovation projects, one high school renovation, and one high school addition and renovation projects, and a variety of badly needed maintenance and modernization projects ranging from additions of dance studios to the replacement of roofs. We have recently completed a very comprehensive facilities master plan for schools at all levels. This was an evaluation of existing conditions of schools, looking at all the systems in the schools and then making recommendations how we could preserve the schools for
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the next fifteen to twenty-five years. And that has been incorporated into our overall master plan and capital improvement program for the next ten years.
I just want to let you know that some of the critical projects that we are requesting funding for are the Clarksville Middle School renovation. That’s a BRAC related project. It’s already been forward funded by local government. We’re just asking for
State contribution in this project. The Glenelg High
School drama addition; the Mount Hebron renovation and addition; the Northfield Elementary School addition, which as Mr. Aquino mentioned is a LEED project; the
Hammond Elementary/Middle School renovation project, which is also a BRAC related school. It should be also noted that the Clarksville Middle School renovation had been forward funded as I mentioned.
But it’s just an example of the County taking the initiative to put projects in place when they are
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needed with the expectation that the State will come back and eventually fund their share of these projects.
We want to say that the Northfield
Elementary School is being renovated as a LEED silver project. We are very proud of this beginning. But it’s only a beginning of our approach to making schools as green as they possibly can be, given the limitations that we have in funding. But that’s an ideal that we are striving to make as comprehensive as we can.
Our total master plan totals $1,035,883,000.
And while the County has generously funded school projects, other capital needs in the County have been deferred. It is essential, therefore, that Howard
County Public School System receives a continuing commitment of capital funding from the State. And we’re not asking the State to assume a
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disproportionate share of school construction. We’re just asking for a true partnership.
I want to thank Dr. Lever for his leadership in working with us to make the best of the funds that are made available to Howard County and other local schools systems, and to Nancy Grasmick for her support as well. And I’ll be glad to address any questions that you may have.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Do you want to ask Dr.
Cousin a question?
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah. Dr. Lever, I just have a question. This is just an example of a school where the, that’s been forward funded. I mean, it’s been planned and it’s been built. And yet it’s, in terms of construction it’s categorized as C because of lack of planning approval. I mean --
DR. LEVER: Which project was that again?
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TREASURER KOPP: I’m just looking at
Clarksville Middle. But it, I mean, I don’t understand how you can have something built --
DR. LEVER: There can still be questions having to do with enrollment. There can be contract issues. And under the new MBE procedure when a project is locally funded and it’s been approved through the State Superintendent, including the contract approval, when it becomes a State funded project we have to make sure that the MBE procedures were followed when they bid it even as a locally funded project, before we can recommend it as a State funded project. Now, I would have to ask staff about the specific issues on that school. They confirm it is the MBE issue, which is under review.
DR. COUSIN: I have Ken Roy. Ken Roy is the
Executive Director of Facilities for Howard County.
He may be able to address the MBE requirement.
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MR. ROY: Just to confirm what Dr. Lever said, we are working closely with his staff on understanding the, how the MBE requirements are being applied to this project. Since this was bid several years ago, and prior to the new regulations coming into effect. So we’ve had an active dialogue over the last few weeks. And hopefully we’ll be able to resolve that shortly.
DR. LEVER: The fact that it’s under review doesn’t mean that it won’t become eligible. We have to go through that process. But this has introduced a delay in, that’s now affecting, I believe, nine projects across the State.
TREASURER KOPP: Well maybe it’s just how the description is written in this book. But, I mean, it does look very odd. I mean, you’ve got a building being built, to say it’s being held up because of planning approval. I mean --
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It’s not held up too much, is it?
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah, I mean, yeah. A horse and cart sort of situation. But I understand.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mr. Comptroller?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes. Superintendent
Cousin, on the subject of MBE I read your description where you’re doubling your efforts and making progress. But I would urge you to redouble those efforts because Howard County I see as such a strong county and such a leader. And I think it’s important to make the best effort here. Because women and minority owned businesses are new talent. And when you bring new talent in it increases competition, it helps the State and the local, I believe, budgets because of that new talent and competition. And we experience some of the push back at the State level that you may experience at the local level. But I’d
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really urge you, because of your prominence in the
State, to --
DR. COUSIN: I think we are doing just that.
I’ll give you a recent example.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Oh, good.
DR. COUSIN: We just bid the construction for Mt. Hebron High School renovation. And we do this through a construction management process so we have many, many different packages, separate contracts.
And the school system serves as the general contractor. And each one of those packages exceeded the requirement of the --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: 25 percent?
DR. COUSIN: So I’ll let Mr. Roy address that as well.
MR. ROY: We have done a lot to be a little bit more proactive in our approach. In October we hosted a regional MBE outreach event with Howard
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County. And we’ve also actively participated in some recent ASBO workshops and other workshops. Things that we would have done over the course of time. But we have specifically targeted local and regional contractors and making them aware of the opportunities and, of course, the new procedures that apply. So, you know, we were cognizant of that in the past. But
I would say definitely in the last six months we’ve made several significant outreach steps to try to increase the participation.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I mention that in part because I see Delegate Bobo who’s such a progressive voice in the Legislature, and someone that
I admire and sought to emulate. And I offer this just as, because of my admiration for your county, how strong it is. So to the extent you can reenergize that. It’s not easy, because there’s a mind set that it’s going to need more money, or it’s not deserved,
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or it’s whatever, whatever. But in my view it means jobs. Because we’re bringing new talent in. And to the extent you can turbo charge some of that I’d be,
I’d be appreciative. I think the other members of the
Board have expressed themselves, also. But thank you.
And thank you, Delegate Bobo for your leadership.
DR. LEVER: Mr. Comptroller, could I just add something to that?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Sure.
DR. LEVER: Since we have the new procedures, our MBE officer is taking fifteen to twenty calls a day from the school systems on MBE issues. Clarifications of the procedures. And we had discussion when this first began with Howard County on a particular project. And because of a discussion that we had, it was very intensive, they withdrew two bids and reissued them because there were violations
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in the procedure. So they are taking it very, very seriously.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Excellent.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Well, all of this MBE progress is very, you know, reflects a lot of work and we appreciate that. And we all start where we start.
But you’re moving up. And also, thank you very, very much for your participation in environmental literacy and the children in nature. I think that’s a, you know, a really important thing for our State’s soul.
So thank you for your leadership on that as well.
DR. COUSIN: Well, thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Montgomery County? Dr.
Weast? Hi, I’m sorry.
MS. BRANDMAN: Hi. Good afternoon.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good afternoon.
MS. BRANDMAN: Good afternoon, Governor
O’Malley, Treasurer Kopp, Comptroller Franchot. I’m
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Shirley Brandman. I’m the President of the Montgomery
County Board of Education. And on behalf of the members of the Board and of our Montgomery County
Public Schools I want to thank you for the opportunity to present our appeal to the IAC recommendations for
State funding for our fiscal year 2010 State aid request. I also want to take this opportunity to acknowledge the Governor for his corrective action regarding the unintended shortfall in direct aid to
Montgomery County Public Schools. We very much and fully appreciate the Governor’s prompt attention to the matter once informed about the problem and we thank you for the deficiency appropriation request to fully restore our fiscal 2009 funding. Your commitment to education and to school construction is longstanding and we’re heartened by the prospects of the federal stimulus package and a possible infusion of funds that will be very, very needed.
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As you know, we are here because, like all the other jurisdictions you’ve heard from, there are some very pressing needs. One of the stories in
Montgomery County, as in other jurisdictions, is that our enrollment is exploding. We had 1,500 more students this year than expected. We’re expecting another 1,300 students next year. And of those roughly 2,800 students 2,000 of them come to us eligible for free and reduced meals. So we have a population that is growing. The challenge for us, obviously, is about creating permanent seats for all of our students.
In the request that was submitted by
Montgomery County Public Schools, the request was for roughly $113 million. The current appropriation is
$21 million. And we’re asking you to please meet our absolute bare bottom assumption in our current CIP, which is $40 million. And those projects are ready.
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Every dime that you give us is ready to be spent and ready to be spent in accordance with many of the priorities that you have articulated.
As you know, Montgomery County is proud to have the first public school building that is gold
LEED certified. We --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We’ve been there, right?
Which one was that?
MS. BRANDMAN: Great Seneca.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great Seneca. I have been there.
MS. BRANDMAN: Absolutely.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. You’re the poster. You’re the poster child.
MS. BRANDMAN: There it is. Exactly.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: There you are.
MS. BRANDMAN: And our commitment is real.
And we are looking at ways to constantly enhance how
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we green our schools, looking at ways to save energy through photovoltaic roof panels; looking at ways to create incentives for conservation. We also are struggling to make sure that we try and hit our target of 25 percent on our MBE. We get very close. And it is something that we commit resources to and something that the Board of Education asks about and considers with all our projects.
We are using prototypes --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: When you say that you’ve hit, Madam President, when you say you’ve hit close to it --
MS. BRANDMAN: 22 percent.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- ours are a little dated. We had 8.5 percent, but that was the prior fiscal year?
MS. JENKINS: Fiscal year ‘08.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: What are your more recent numbers?
MS. BRANDMAN: The more recent numbers I will turn to Mr. Lavorgna to share. But I know that we had in adopting the goal --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Well, we can come back to it. Keep going on with your presentation, at the end if you can –
MS. BRANDMAN: We had attained 22 percent, was my understanding --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great.
MS. BRANDMAN: -- in reaching our goal. And so we’re not quite at 25 but we are working.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s terrific.
MS. BRANDMAN: And it is on our radar screen. And I just want to reassure you of that.
We’re also looking at prototypes. We’ve had three elementary school prototypes and two middle school
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prototypes that have allowed us to repeat patterns of our construction of the schools. And as you heard before talk about daycare, we’ve had thirty full time daycare centers scattered throughout the clusters in
Montgomery County.
So our priorities like yours are about having buildings that support and facilitate instruction. But as you know, the struggle is real.
We’re on a cycle now where our elementary schools are only being modernized on a forty-year schedule. Our middle and high schools it is taking even longer. And so these monies are desperately needed. And we are shovel ready, as the word of the day is. We are ready to use every single penny that is given to us to try and meet the needs. And we urge you to really look at the expanding enrollment, the desperate needs for these buildings. The fact that these are aging buildings. Many of the requests, as you’ll notice,
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that are put forward are the kinds of things we as a
Board of Education hear about from our community day in and day out. It’s the HVAC systems. It’s the systemic things that we need to keep our buildings healthy and appropriate for learning.
So we urge you to look upon our request favorably. We’re happy to answer any questions you have. And thank you, because we know that it is in your partnership and it is in your support that we have the quality buildings that we do.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All right, thank you very much. We’re very proud of the strides Montgomery
County is making.
MS. BRANDMAN: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Did we come up with the actual number?
MR. LAVORGNA: Yes, sir.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: What is it?
MR. LAVORGNA: In the last two projects that we bid -- good afternoon, my name is Joe Lavorgna.
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I’m the Acting Director for Facilities Management for
Montgomery County. The last two projects that we bid,
Takoma Park Elementary School, Cresthaven, Takoma Park was 22 percent, and the Cresthaven project was 23.98 percent MDOT certified.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. Terrific.
Anyone else? Questions, Comptroller Franchot?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: For Dr. Weast, if I could. How, or, well, the Board President also. But how, what percentage of our elementary, middle and high school students are in trailers?
DR. WEAST: We have 423 trailers. We’d like to reduce that down to 340.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: In what time frame?
DR. WEAST: It’s about 12,000 students.
10,000 to 12,000 students in the trailers.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Mm-hmm.
DR. WEAST: With regard to the federal stimulus package, we were invited down and appeared
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with Congressman Van Hollen and Congressman Edwards yesterday on the Hill --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Uh-huh.
DR. WEAST: -- when they put the stimulus package forward. And there’s three things that that stimulus package is really going to help us with. Is construction, and we really appreciate your support on that. And we told them about the number of kids that we had in mobile classrooms. But Title I, and I think probably what really drew them back because John
Sweeney was also testifying for AFL-CIO. We increased the number of free and reduced lunch meals served last year to our students by 5 million. The number of children who are eligible for free and reduced lunch come to us in the last three years, 7,545. And since we’ve turned it in in October, about 500.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mm-hmm.
DR. WEAST: So to keep a strong system strong, we need to keep on moving forward. And as you know, our teachers and our SEIU Local 500 and our
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administrators already voted to roll back $89 million worth of wages. And that’s the kind of faith our employees have to support this program of reform that we have. And our increases in MSA, AP, all of those things are very helpful to the State’s ranking as number one, as you know. Because we are your largest system.
So we really do appreciate your support. I personally appreciate the Governor stepping in as quickly as he did when he knew with regard to our funding. That is going to really make next year work for us. So thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Sure, thank you.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: If I could just follow up?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Sure. No, go ahead.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: What is the balance between space that you, used to be schools and aren’t being used as schools and this trailer situation? It seems --
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DR. WEAST: We just don’t have anything left in the inventory out there that is available. We reconverted five back into our area that is most heavily impacted. We reopened the, you know, the
Parkland, and all of the area down in there.
Loiederman Middle School, and we don’t have any that we can bring back out of the inventory.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Well, could you go back and just take another look? Because it seems, I agree, the ultimate solution is to have up to date, new facilities. But it strikes me that --
DR. WEAST: I’ll be happy to --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- you have to --
DR. WEAST: We’ll send you a list of how those are being utilized by the County, or how they’ve been utilized by other institutions.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Great. And then I had a last question --
DR. WEAST: We also do something, and I think, I’d like to put a plug in with the daycare.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Sure.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Mm-hmm.
DR. WEAST: One of the things that we have been part of, and that we lead, I think, the country on according to the Pew Foundation is this early childhood education. And we’re taking up a lot of space in our buildings and working with early childhood providers for not only three and four-year- olds but universal, all day. And what we’re finding is, is that with our reform effort being ten years old, those children that started in those early childhood classrooms got that all day K before it was a State mandate, are now in the eighth grade. And there are record numbers being able to complete algebra at the highest levels. And they’ve done that prior to graduating out of the eighth grade, sixth, seventh, and eighth. So this investment in preschool education and thinking about how space is affected with preschool education is something that I think is very important. That in conjunction with our linkages
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to learning, where we put health clinics in with those elementary schools --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yep.
DR. WEAST: -- is a combination that you just can’t beat. Having early childhood, having the health clinics, having the proper time running your after school programs and running your daycares. And we run over 100 daycares in our schools. All of those make a difference because our population is majority minority, and is one of the highest scoring districts with the highest graduation rate in the country. And
I think that really speaks to it.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And we’ve seen the same sorts of, you know, the City of Baltimore started fully day kindergarten --
DR. WEAST: Absolutely.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- long before the mandate, and long before we could afford to sustain that outlay of cash. But for the children who were only that age once, their scores similarly, we’ve
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never seen higher levels of achievement among our now sixth, seventh, eighth graders who’ve had the benefit of that. On there, the insurance that’s provided?
DR. WEAST: Right.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: How does that work? Do they bring their own insurance, the operators? Do they get a lower rate because they’re in a school building?
DR. WEAST: Yeah. They bring their own insurance. But we do work a lot with our own government. As you know, Montgomery County is self- insured.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right.
DR. WEAST: And so we try to do it through our insurance pool when it regards our facilities and those kind of things. But if it is a provider they have to bring their own insurance. Because they are not covered by that sovereign immunity that you --
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: You could, and that’s a matter of us not allowing that by statute.
DR. WEAST: That’s right. That’s right.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We should just allow that. That’s a good one.
DR. WEAST: I think that would be a great idea.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Who do we know in the
Legislature that could do that?
(Laughter)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Well, I hope you all might come with us. I’m going to be talking with the
Prince George’s and Baltimore City delegations immediately following this meeting. And --
DR. WEAST: We’d be happy to --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- I’d like to invite you to come, as we talk about the distribution levels on formulas and how they, how they play out.
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DR. WEAST: I think we are adequately poised. And I hope all of the counties across the
State take a look at the stimulus package.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yeah, it’s great. And part of --
DR. WEAST: Because if you take a look at the budget you proposed and dovetail it with the stimulus package, I think you can see that the State education programs that we have can continue to move forward.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yeah. Well it’s not done without --
DR. WEAST: If the stimulus package doesn’t pass we’ve got some real issues.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right. It was not done without some aforethought and knowledge of the funding streams that would be used.
DR. WEAST: That became obvious to me when I reviewed it.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good. Well, thank you for noticing that.
DR. WEAST: Yeah.
TREASURER KOPP: Can I ask Dr. Lever a question? You all have raised about four projects totaling $5.4 million in State aid that were privately
--
DR. WEAST: We lose the thing.
TREASURER KOPP: My question, I understand.
Are there other projects throughout the State in the same situation?
DR. LEVER: Projects that, I’m sorry?
MS. BRANDMAN: These are forward funded projects, which if we don’t get the State money --
DR. WEAST: Last year of bond. Last year of bond on them.
TREASURER KOPP: Right.
DR. WEAST: I don’t have an answer to that.
But I do know this is the last year of bond eligibility for that $5.4 million. So I know that you
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will, certainly as you did last year, look very favorably.
DR. LEVER: We have projects in Prince
George’s that are not bond eligible that were forward funded. You already saw the --
TREASURER KOPP: I’m talking about ones that are presently bond eligible but will not be if deferred.
DR. LEVER: In Howard County, the ones that we had talked about. I don’t think we have a list of all the projects but we can get that for you.
TREASURER KOPP: I would think that would be of significance.
DR. WEAST: We do, too.
TREASURER KOPP: Thank you.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I have a question.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Sure. Mr. Comptroller?
I’m sorry.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes. Dr. Lever, I have a question about the previously mentioned surplus
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school property that apparently there’s a difference of opinion between your staff and Montgomery County on when those surplus properties are leased for private use. I think your staff is asking, I may not have this exactly right, or asking the County to pay anticipated lease payments in advance. Is that something you can comment on? Or --
DR. LEVER: Well, we follow a standard methodology. When a school building is transferred to the county government --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Right.
DR. LEVER: -- and there’s State investment, the investment to bond revenues has to be recaptured.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Right.
DR. LEVER: And there’s a method of calculating that. The Board of Public Works also has the option of taking a share of the sale proceeds or the lease proceeds. And we do calculate that. But the issue that you’re addressing, I believe, affects
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the recapture of the bond proceeds in which there really is very little discretion.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: But isn’t there an issue of your collecting the anticipated future lease payments in advance of the County, I believe, maybe asks to make payments before they actually collect?
DR. LEVER: The reason for doing that was to avoid having to come back again and again and again.
In other words, if there’s a known life to the building it’s to say that we anticipate when the lease will be in effect. And the revenue stream is known.
And so it’s like doing a one time action. It simplifies the whole process. Now if --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Could you maybe just take another look at that? Because obviously it’s a, it makes all the difference if you’re getting paid out of an ongoing revenue stream as opposed to in advance in a lump sum.
DR. LEVER: Yes.
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And I would be appreciative if we could just hear back as to whether there is a way to modify that given the tight times that, I know you have your interest. But these folks also have a –
DR. WEAST: We do appreciate you bringing that up, Comptroller Franchot. Look forward to that answer.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: You’ll be glad to know that the snow emergency plans for Montgomery County were lifted at 2:00 p.m. today.
DR. WEAST: All right.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I just thought I’d --
(Laughter)
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We’re always on top of things with the state satellite here. I wanted to let you know that. Thank you all very much. All right.
Let’s move on now to gorgeous Prince George’s County.
We are joined by Senator Muse. We are also joined by
Delegate Melony Griffith.
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LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BROWN: And the County
Executive is here.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And the County Executive is here as well?
LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BROWN: Yes, he is.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great. County Executive
Jack Johnson from gorgeous Prince George’s County doing some great things on public safety in Prince
George’s County with their new invigorated police chief, and his full support of the County Executive.
We’re going to do great things, save a lot of lives this year in Prince George’s County.
DR. HITE: Governor O’Malley, good afternoon, Lieutenant Governor Brown, Comptroller
Franchot, good afternoon. My name is William Hite and
I am Interim Superintendent of Schools in Prince
George’s County. Joining me today are the individuals, the esteemed individuals you just introduced. Our County Exec and the heads of both delegations. Also joining me is our Board Chair, Ms.
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Verjeana M. Jacobs, and other members of the school staff representing and supporting our CIP program and services.
Today we will provide testimony in support of our fiscal year 2010 2015 capital improvement program request. These requests are outlined in our revised CIP dated November 24th. The request of $88.4 million in State funding is the result of the joint decision made by the Prince George’s County Executive and County Council in adjusting the project priorities and funding to support current initiatives. The amount submitted to the County was $137 million.
As described in our January 6th Board of
Public Works letter, which is enclosed, we are requesting reconsideration of projects not currently recommended for approval. We feel that in Prince
George’s County we have made tremendous academic strides. Over the past two years we’ve had thirty- five of our schools exit school improvement. And for the first time since the inception of No Child Left
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Behind we have a school system that has made adequate yearly progress, which if we make one more time we exit corrective action at the State level. So we’re very proud of those results. So this submission obviously provides for facility improvements to support future academic gains made by our students.
I now would like to introduce Ms. Verjeana
Jacobs, Chair of the Board of Education in Prince
George’s County who will provide additional information.
MS. JACOBS: Thank you, Dr. Hite. I want to acknowledge our County Executive, Jack Johnson,
Senator Muse, and Delegate Melony Griffith. Thank you for being here. And thank you all for allowing us the opportunity to come before you on this appeal.
A record fourteen elementary schools exited school improvement this year by meeting all State and federal mandates for adequate yearly progress.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s terrific.
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MS. JACOBS: For two years in a row. We think it’s a big deal --
TREASURER KOPP: Could I just interrupt?
Before you came here I want you to know that Secretary
Grasmick also made a comment about how extraordinarily well you all had done, and how thirty-five schools?
Although I thought she said thirty-seven.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Right. She had to go to a hearing.
TREASURER KOPP: And, before she had to leave. And I think you should know --
MS. JACOBS: Thank you.
TREASURER KOPP: -- the whole State congratulates you.
MS. JACOBS: Thank you very much. So for the second year in a row the number of schools that exited school improvement reached double digits.
There were three more high schools that exited school improvement this year and no schools entered school improvement. We have ten high schools in Prince
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George’s County that have exited school improvement in the last two years, as you’ve just stated.
The Board of Education recognizes, particularly with regard to our conditions with the
CIP, that we have schools that are significantly underenrolled and we also have schools that are overenrolled. We have learning shacks of 426 in our
County.
Last May we -- last June, excuse me, the
Board commissioned the administration, therefore, to look at a comprehensive review of our school boundaries overall in the County. And the reason why that is very significant for what we are talking about today is because as we look at the conditions of schools in Prince George’s County and seek your approval we know that you’re also looking for us to make the best use and the most effective and efficient use of our facilities. That would require a comprehensive review of all schools in the district.
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We have current projects that do not reflect the initiatives that positively impact our high schoolers. For example, small learning communities and career tech programs that we would like to implement. School enrollment for this school year surprised us. We had 1,000 more students than we anticipated.
The CIP maintains alignment with strategy
4.3.1 of the Bridge to Excellence Master Plan. And this strategy identifies the implementation of the capital improvement program and all maintenance projects as critical initiatives to improve education in our school facilities.
In May of 2008 this Board also commissioned the 3DI International, Inc. updated facility condition assessment study for 184 of our schools. This independent assessment drives the priorities with regard to major renovations, major repairs, and all systemic improvements and modernizations in CIP.
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Again, we also recognize that that was necessary as we look at the enrollment numbers in our County.
We appreciate the $21 million in construction funding that has been recommended by the
IAC for projects to start new construction, finish projects that are already in construction, and for reimbursement of projects that have been forward funded by our County. And we are very appreciative of our County for doing that. However, the sum does represent a 24 percent of State funds request for school construction in Prince George’s County Schools.
And we require -- the $21.31 million that you did give us, we are appreciative of that. But we respectfully request your consideration of our appeal for full funding of Prince George’s County CIP.
I hope the testimony that we’ve provided today gives you a great picture of what’s going on in
Prince George’s County. Student achievement is obviously up. I think everyone across the State does recognize that. We also wanted to acknowledge the
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fact that we are in the process and have received the recommendations from the IAC regarding our boundaries.
And I think it’s an opportunity for us to take a really good look at Prince George’s County and our enrollment status. Thank you very much.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. The, can I ask about, we’ve been asking of everyone here. What sort of strides are you making with regard to improving MBE attainment? Because in the past, traditionally, we gave some of the largest waivers for the largest amount of money to school construction dollars, as if somehow school construction could not, you know. So many of the counties are doing a lot better. I have, my numbers are kind of dated. So I’m wondering if you have more recent numbers?
MS. JACOBS: Yes. So, that’s a good point.
The Board of Education when we first came on two years ago also looked at that, and recognized that when you’re using subcontractors to be awarded contracts, we wanted to make sure that that was tracked. We
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revised the, we adopted the revision of the administrative procedure. And currently our numbers are at 32.5 percent. And we also followed what the
County had implemented as the minority business enterprise requirements. And the school system has done a lot of things over the last couple of years to improve on that.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: So any idea what it is right now?
MS. JACOBS: 32.5 percent.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Wow.
DR. HITE: We exceeded the target.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: On recent projects? One recent project?
MS. JACOBS: We had a target of 30.
DR. HITE: With a target of 30 percent, and it was 32.5.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Because the number I had from Ms. Jenkins two years ago --
MS. JACOBS: Two years ago.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- was only about, just a little shy of 7 percent.
MS. JACOBS: That sounds right. And that’s why we did an adjustment. You can add on, Dr. Hite.
But we, the Board in our, when we used to have a committee structure we actually looked at that issue solely and revised what we looked at as target, and also patterned behind what the County had recommended.
And the school system has done a lot to improve those numbers.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great.
MS. JENKINS: And I also have to acknowledge
I hired away their public school construction MBE liaison --
MS. JACOBS: Yes, you did.
MS. JENKINS: She joined my office and so --
MS. JACOBS: That is correct.
MS. JENKINS: -- she’s actually the lead person working with Dr. Lever on public school construction.
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DR. LEVER: Could I add something here?
That the number of percentage you are referring, 6.66 percent? We’re seeing that there actually may be a great deal more MBE participation in fiscal year ‘08 that wasn’t captured, simply because of certain information that wasn’t submitted. And part of the change in procedure that we have will enforce the submission of all the material at the time of contract award. We expect that by itself to result in an increase of the numbers.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Got you. And the, okay.
Anyone else? Mr. Comptroller?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I just wanted to recognize the leadership of Senator Muse and Delegate
Griffith, and thank them for what they do. But wherever I go in the Washington area I always salute the County Executive. Because he doesn’t get credit for the AAA bond rating that he brought to Prince
George’s County through his fiscal management, which I take a lot of pride in as a State official, seeing
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that kind of progress. But based on today, I think the other legacy is going to be this school improvement. That the fact that thirty whatever it is, thirty-five or thirty-seven schools, are coming, making progress and moving out of this category they were in I think is going to be one of your legacies,
Mr. County Executive. I would like to ask, though, having given you all that praise, what are you planning to do with the schools that I read are targeted for being closed? Are they going to be leased? Or renovated? Or am I not asking the right people? I’m sorry. Ms. Jacobs or Mr. Hite?
MS. JACOBS: Go ahead.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: What is --
DR. HITE: So the proposal I’ve submitted is to look at plans to consolidate schools and to provide choice options in places in the County that have historically not had those types of options. Options like specialty centers, choice schools around immersion, performing arts, Montessori, so we have
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those opportunities to do that. And then for the other buildings, we are actually not planning to get rid of that space because we feel like our enrollment will turn. But we want to maintain those buildings and use those buildings, if in fact they already house after school programs they will continue to house after school programs. They remain voting precincts.
And they also remain places inside of the community for our senior citizens if that is the use of the building at the moment. But the consolidation plan is to actually use the space more efficiently and it’s also to provide choice options in places in our County that have historically not been represented with choice options.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Okay. If you could just help me understand that a little bit more and send me something in writing, maybe.
DR. HITE: I’d be glad to.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And it’s the clash between closing, whatever it is, twelve schools and
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building seven new ones, or I’m not sure if I have the number right. If you could just make sure I’ve got a good, because I’m a little bit uninformed on that.
DR. HITE: Sure.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: So I’d like to understand that. And also, if you could let us know how you plan to keep the schools that are in transition, or being warehoused for future use, how you’re going to keep those maintained, and protected from vandalism, and --
DR. HITE: I’ll be glad to submit that.
That’s all inside the proposal.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- you know, just deterioration? Because that, I take it, is part of that is a State investment.
MS. JACOBS: Can I just add that, you know, when you look at, when Superintendent made a proposal to the Board, which hasn’t been approved yet.
However, you might have four schools that are in close proximity and all are underenrolled. And one of the
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things that we were really adamant about was, you’re not going to drive around Prince George’s County and see boarded up schools. We want to make sure that they are utilized for the community and that we can give back in whatever way that we can. We just don’t want to make the mistake of giving up the buildings knowing that we could in the future use them. So we’ll make sure that you --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Okay. And so I didn’t ask a single tough question of County Executive
Johnson. I’m just all praise over that end, and thank you for, thank you for being here. I see Delegate
Proctor is here also. But do you want to say anything, County Executive?
MR. JOHNSON: No, I don’t. I just want to say it’s good to see all of you. And we’re making a lot of progress. You know we just announced the other day that we are at a twenty-year low in crime.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great stuff. And we have more progress ahead, too.
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MR. JOHNSON: That’s right.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thanks for your leadership on that. And we’re going to be speaking shortly. And Dr. Hite, I appreciate the job you’re doing. All of a sudden pressed into service, and I know these aren’t easy times. But we’ll talk about the operating challenges, but also the real promise on the horizon. It, and you know, as difficult as the budget was that we had to submit we were under a time constraint that predated even the introduction of the
Senate version of the Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
But as, even as we were, you know, making those decisions three weeks ago to make the printing deadline to get here, it was with the understanding that all of our hard work in supporting President
Obama would be rewarded in terms of the Title I and the special ed and those other things. So we’re all going to get through this together. And I look forward, your delegation really fights hard for you.
So, Senator Muse and the Delegate really, you know,
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they watch like hawks, these formulas, how they shift and affect things. And so they really fight for you hard here and do a very, very good job. And nobody fights harder than Prince George’s own, Anthony Brown, our Lieutenant Governor. And I can assure you that when Secretary Foster is throwing her fast pitch budget cut balls over the plate, trying to get us not to hit them back, that Lieutenant Governor Brown always has one eye on the State’s interests and one eye on Prince George’s interests. So you’re not alone. We’re all going to get through this. And having gone as Mayor, the Chief Executive in Baltimore
City, there’s some painful closure process. I know it’s not easy and I know nobody ever wants to see any school closed. At the end of the day, though, I think with these investments that we have hope to believe are coming, and the ones we’ve already made, a billion dollars, the way we found ourselves communicating that was that, “Look, while there’s painful steps in this process the goal overall is to get more of our
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children into better classrooms with better bathrooms.” And everybody sort of got that. And with that acknowledged as the goal, then it was easier for people to let go of some of the hurt and the pain of, you know, that the school reconfigurations as populations shift. But we’re proud of the job that the children of Prince George’s County are doing, Mr.
County Executive, and Baltimore City, and really throughout our State. And number one, number one in
America thanks to your good work.
DR. HITE: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you.
MR. JOHNSON: The leadership that we have, and Dr. Hite is doing an excellent job working with all of us. And we want to thank you for your work.
DR. HITE: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you.
TREASURER KOPP: Could I just ask you to, because questions have been raised by others. And you mentioned the 2008 Parson study. Could you just
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briefly in writing -- not now. But just follow up on how your requests both original and this one trace the
Parsons?
MS. JACOBS: Absolutely.
TREASURER KOPP: Thanks.
DR. HITE: Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. Next on our hit parade is Queen Anne’s County.
DR. WILLIAMSON: Good afternoon, Governor
O’Malley, Comptroller Franchot, Treasurer Kopp, and
Dr. Lever, and members of the IAC. I want to thank you for the opportunity to come before you and appeal the recommendation to defer funding of construction for Sudlersville Middle School. Please know we’re very appreciative of the past support that we have received from the State. We are just now completing
Kent Island Elementary School renovations. Our community and staff are very excited about getting into that building within the next month. A little more than a year ago we completed a new facility,
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Matapeake Middle School. Both Comptroller Franchot and Treasurer Kopp have had the opportunity to tour that building and they were able to see the excellent learning environment we were able to create for our students.
Both Kent Island Elementary and Matapeake
Middle School have incorporated many green school components. Both of these facilities have geothermal systems. As a matter of fact, Kent Island Elementary is our first renovated school to have such a system.
Both schools have the latest technology in their classrooms and teachers have been trained to fully utilize that technology, else there would not be much use to have those dollars put there. And Kent Island
Elementary has incorporated pervious concrete as a part of their playground so that they’ll be able to use that as a viable play area even after inclement weather.
The educational specifications for these two facilities incorporated recommendations and guidelines
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from the Facilities Assessment Study that was conducted by the Kopp Commission. I’m proud to say
Queen Anne’s County is one of your high performing counties and is, as you know, in the State that ranks number one in the nation. Our school system has worked very hard to provide students and teachers with the resources they need to meet a rigorous instructional program. We attribute our high level of success in part to the generosity and the commitment of the County and the State for ensuring that we have adequate and technologically up to date facilities.
I would like to recognize the people that are with me today that are here to support the appeal that we’re here to talk about. With me is Mr. Vito
Tinelli, who’s President of our Board of Education.
And around me somewhere, Lisa Darden, who is a Board member; Cindy Todd, who is Vice President of our
Board; and I have also two of our commissioners here,
Mr. Courtney Billups and Mrs. Carol Fordonski. I had several others that were here who had to leave for
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other appointments, but they wanted to show their support for the project that we have on the Board.
As I said earlier, we’re here to appeal the recommendation to defer the construction funds for the
Sudlersville Middle School project. We do recognize the bleak economic condition of both the County and the State. However, we feel that the approval for the funding of this project will send a positive statement and an economic stimulus to our community.
Sudlersville is the most economically depressed community within our County. The construction of a new middle school facility is an opportunity for this rural community to experience its first new school in over fifty years. Sudlersville
Middle School is a 1951 building with an addition made in 1963. There was a renovation in 1979. That was the last time the building saw any modernization. As you know, many things have changed in the last thirty years regarding what programs we must provide to our students, and what teaching strategies and learning
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tools enhance their instruction. It’s clear when you walk into Sudlersville Middle School that many of our new programs and the techniques cannot be adequately utilized at that building.
Comptroller Franchot had an opportunity last
March to visit Sudlersville Middle School. He remarked that the staff seemed to be using closets for teaching spaces, and for providing other services to students. In addition to having many undersized classrooms, the facility does not allow for the clustering of grade level classrooms. That model is used in all of our other middle schools and aids in the effective movement within the building and better articulation among teachers on that team. It also reduces the number of disciplinary problems in a school.
In addition to the small classrooms and the inability to cluster them by grade level, there seems to be no space for teacher planning for interdisciplinary grade level teams, as we have in our
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other middle schools. We believe strongly in collaboration among teachers on grade level teams and we found it increases the level of success of students who are shared across that grade level. Grade level teams enhance opportunities to make interdisciplinary connections for students. These connections help to extend student learning.
And finally, the current facility does not have the infrastructure to support the type of technology utilized in our other middle schools. This puts these students at an academic disadvantage when they feed into Queen Anne’s County High School along with peers from other middle schools.
The planning committee for the new facility numbers almost thirty, and it’s comprised of parents, teachers, principal, content supervisors, support services staff, MSDE staff. The school is slated to be our first LEED certified building. We’re aiming for silver certification. And with so much excitement and so many differing opinions on the committee, it’s
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understandable that the design process has been a little bit slow. We wanted to ensure that we got it right from the onset of the project. We believe this is a very critical phase of doing a building. And just as we were able to get the planning phase of the project up and progressing in a timely manner, so will we be able to do that with the construction phase.
All of us sitting here today, our Board members, our county commissioners, our staff, want to see this project underway in 2010. Our county commissioners have already spent approximately $1.2 million in infrastructure upgrade for the anticipated school.
The location of the school was part of the smart growth policy of Queen Anne’s County. There’s tremendous activity in the town of Sudlersville in anticipation of the construction. Groundbreaking is tentatively scheduled for the end of this calendar year. The building design is modeled after the last middle school that we built, Matapeake Middle. The
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facility will be complementary to its surrounding community. It will be accessible for the community activities and it will be situated so that it appears to be an extension of the adjacent park.
This will be our first opportunity to implement the new approved MBE procedures. Our schedule is ambitious and aggressive. Although our planning process was slowed by the quest for an auditorium, as well as by the potential cost of the program, I believe that we have resolved those issues.
There will be great disappointment to the students, staff, parents, and the community members of
Sudlersville if anticipated groundbreaking of a new school is postponed due to lack of funding from the
State. We look forward to a favorable decision by the
Board of Public Works for construction funding for this project.
Over the last four years we believe that we have wisely used the funds that have been appropriated to us. As I said at the beginning of our comments,
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just think about the two schools that we just completed. We’re now looking forward to being able to provide that kind of support to Sudlersville Middle
School. I’d be happy to answer any questions you might have.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Do you know how much the
State’s proposed in three years for school construction?
DR. WILLIAMSON: For our County?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: No, for the State.
DR. WILLIAMSON: Oh, no, I don’t.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Do you care?
DR. WILLIAMSON: Yes, I do.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay.
DR. WILLIAMSON: Very much.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Anybody have any other questions?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Governor?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Yes.
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Dr. Williamson, thank you for your testimony and I, the Treasurer I think would agree that Sudlersville is in a very rural part of your County. And it’s well removed from a lot of population centers. And I enjoyed my visit there. I was very pleased to see that you’re now in the planning stage, and you’re in the albeit somewhat early process. I was a little disappointed to read about the auditorium, though, because I thought when I visited that that seemed to be an important part of the school because it provided in a rural area, I guess, an opportunity for the public to be able to get together. And I appreciate the fact that we need to save money, obviously, and value engineering and all that. But I’m wondering, are there, is there any possibility that could be put back in? How much money do you save if you can’t? And are there any alternative plans by the County to construct something that would be usable in that area?
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DR. WILLIAMSON: We have looked at that.
One of the things that we considered was the school that we’ll be vacating. We had several other things that we wanted to use in that other school. But we thought it’s possible that could be used for a community facility. We also have a future plan of putting a high school on that property where the middle school is. And that school would have an auditorium. This building, this auditorium is estimated to be approximately $3 million. And that would be a total cost back to our County, which was a significant cost for us. And so as we looked at options that was one that we put aside. However, we have asked for a second set of drawings to look at what that would cost and if there’s any way that we’d be able to fund it.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Could you just stay in touch with me on that?
DR. WILLIAMSON: Mm-hmm.
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Because, and just let people know. For what it’s worth that’s very important to me because I think that public gathering place is needed.
DR. WILLIAMSON: Absolutely.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: It’s, obviously in the more populated areas of the State there are alternatives.
DR. WILLIAMSON: Right. And --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: But I didn’t get the sense out there that there was.
DR. WILLIAMSON: Well, there are not.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And if we can somehow put them back together again I’d be appreciative.
DR. WILLIAMSON: Well, our middle schools often use our high schools as a place where they can do some of their programs for parents, because we have so many parents attending. And our community likes to use those high school auditoriums as well. But
Sudlersville Middle School is about thirty miles away
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from that high school. And has difficulty, it would be a problem bringing them in to use the high school as the auditorium. And they thought as a community center, it would be an excellent opportunity to try and do something together with the community.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Maybe you could just communicate back --
DR. WILLIAMSON: I’d be happy to.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: -- and let me know what the response is. Thank you.
DR. WILLIAMSON: Okay. Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. Okay, we go on now to Somerset County.
SECRETARY MCDONALD: Is St. Mary’s here?
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’m sorry. Did I skip
Saint? Well, I’m going, I have two different, my list, one of my lists goes alphabetical, the other doesn’t.
DR. MARTIRANO: Do you want us to come back,
Governor?
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SECRETARY MCDONALD: Well, I guess it’s whether you spell out the Saint or not.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I apologize.
TREASURER KOPP: Governor, since St. Mary’s
--
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: St. Mary’s?
TREASURER KOPP: Since Queen Anne’s is still leaving? Dr. Williamson, I just wanted to thank you for your hospitality.
DR. WILLIAMSON: Oh, thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thanks. I’m sorry, I apologize. Let me read off the list. Somerset, if you could stand down. If we could call St. Mary’s
County?
DR. MARTIRANO: Good afternoon.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good afternoon.
DR. MARTIRANO: I know you’ve had a long day, and we’re delighted to be able to speak in front of you today, bringing you sunshine from the wonderful sunshine county of St. Mary’s County. And we had our
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first official snow day today so that gives you an idea of where we are.
I’m joined today with members of my Board of
Education. My Board Chair, Mr. William Mattingly;
Vice Chair Cathy Allen; Commissioner President Jack
Russell; Commissioner member Tom Mattingly; staff members from the St. Mary’s County Public School
System, Mr. Brad Clements, Chief Operating Officer; and Kim Howe, our Coordinating Supervisor of Capital
Planning and Construction. Once again, good afternoon.
Governor, it is a, we’re very, very proud of the work that’s occurring in St. Mary’s County Public
Schools. We are very proud of the accomplishments in public education across the State, as I know that all of you are. To be ranked number one in the nation is quite a phenomenal feat. But we’re very proud of the work that is occurring in St. Mary’s County academically, recognizing that of all of our twenty-
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six schools, all of our schools made AYP in all categories.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s great.
DR. MARTIRANO: Six school districts in the
State of Maryland accomplished this feat and it is a phenomenal feat to be able to accomplish.
Additionally, twenty-three of our twenty-six schools achieved an attendance rate of 95 percent. So if you follow that in terms of a direct report in terms of the drop out rate, the drop out rate issue is nothing that’s going to be solved at the high school level.
It’s got to be solved at the elementary and middle school level as well. And the number one characteristic of the drop out rate, preventing drop out rate, is keeping children in school. And to have those phenomenal attendance rates are absolutely something that we’re very proud of, combined with our academic standards.
Over the last several years we have been able to implement several wonderful initiatives. We
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have a very robust STEM initiative, a STEM program in place where we have developed three different academies but we have the concept of STEM for all.
We’ve also implemented the Chesapeake Public Charter
School, the first charter school to be implemented in all of Southern Maryland. We also have established an academy of finance at one of our high schools. We have a very robust technology center. And we also have under construction a brand new elementary school which will open in August of 2009 entitled Evergreen
Elementary School. I’m going to talk a little bit more about that, and I see Comptroller Franchot is nodding with approval. He was there with us on the groundbreaking. And I know that several other members of the Committee as well have been in terms of seeing that school.
But we selected the name Evergeen because forever this school will be green. And we’ve embedded the instructional program so that it becomes a learning environment as well. So all of these
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selected pieces, when we talk about placing high performance, sustainable design features in a school, ultimately our students are going to be stewards of the environment. So in order to make certain that we’re doing this effectively, we have to change the behaviors of our students. And we’re keeping that, hence forever, forever green.
Also recognizing, Governor, that our overall, highly qualified teaching staff is 93 percent. We do recognize that the majority of our operating budget goes to our personnel and we realize that putting a highly qualified teacher in front of our children everyday matters.
We have so many wonderful things occurring.
And something that we’ve implemented this year, further educating students about being stewards of their environment, is we’ve implemented a mascot entitled Watson. And Watson is a mascot that goes around to all of our schools and educates our children about ways to save energy. And if I could get one
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basic concept taught to all of our children that would be, “Please turn off the lights.” And it would make a tremendous difference as we continue to educate.
Recognizing that quality facilities are a key component to what we do, the Division of
Supporting Services has approached our buildings with an integrated vision for action. And we continue our construction projects to allow for opportunities to showcase our commitment to the environment and fiscal responsibility during these challenging economic times. The goals of the St. Mary’s County Public
Schools is sustainability initiative design, is to design buildings and operate schools that provide high productive learning environments which are energy efficient. So not just our brand new school, but we’re going back through and retrofitting our other schools with energy efficient features as well.
Each of the projects within our improvement program, from the limited renovation of Leonardtown
Middle School, systemic renovation at Greenview Knolls
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Elementary, and a new school will incorporate sustainable design features that will further foster our commitment to improving and protecting the environment for St. Mary’s County and Maryland. And you recognize that all of our counties are very important in the State of Maryland. But particularly when we think about St. Mary’s County, we are bordered by the Patuxent and the Potomac, which ultimately feeds into the Chesapeake Bay. So we are truly in that watershed as it feeds into that.
Also, I, we want to make certain that we focus on the aspects of the minority business enterprise. Our minority business enterprise in terms of our actual data is 19 percent. And we’re not real proud of that number, but realizing that we are having some challenges in terms of getting the businesses to register. Tomorrow night I’m pleased to announce that we are conducting a seminar within our community to invite our business members in to assist them in the registration process. And that will be occurring. We
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are working very aggressively on our goals in that arena and taking a very proactive stance to reach out.
What we find is several of our members in this category are not fully registered. We are engaging in business with our minority individuals but they’re not necessarily fully registered.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Any help we can be to you on that, please reach out to Secretary Jenkins’ office. We can help by sending staff down there to walk them through, encourage them.
MS. JENKINS: Actually, our certification has folks going down for certification.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good.
MS. JENKINS: We have a person going down tomorrow.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And you’re doing better this year than you were last year.
DR. MARTIRANO: Absolutely. It was always the continuous improvement focus, but we’re always
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receptive to hearing best practices of ways to assist in terms of the recruitment process.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thanks for your commitment. The best and most important best practice is being committed to doing it.
DR. MARTIRANO: Absolutely.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Everything else follows if you’re committed. Thanks a lot for the commitment.
DR. MARTIRANO: Very good. Now, to get into some of the issues in terms of our actual appeals request, recognizing in these tough economic times, we recognize the need to align our priorities with fiscal realities. And we have crafted a capital program that we feel accomplishes this task.
First we bring forward to you --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’m sorry, could we turn off the lights? I mean, those big ones up there?
There are no cameras. And following the advice of
Watson the green detective --
DR. MARTIRANO: Thank you.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- we’re going to turn off the --
DR. MARTIRANO: I’m a teacher at heart, and that’s good.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Ahh, isn’t that nicer?
Look how our founding mothers and fathers designed the windows to let the light in even as the sun’s setting.
DR. MARTIRANO: Now you’ve highlighted the fact that I’m getting older and I didn’t bring my glasses, and now I’ve got to back up from the podium.
Thank you very much, Governor. I appreciate those.
Yes, I may need those. I appreciate that.
I will continue to read through those things that we’re appealing. Construction funding approval in the amount of $2,764,000 for the Leonardtown Middle
School limited renovations program. That is one of the areas that we are appealing. Which would be the renovation replacement of five major building systems:
HVAC, fire sprinkler, lighting, security, public address, and wireless technology.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Is it ready to go?
DR. MARTIRANO: We will be ready to go in terms of shovel ready, in terms of eighteen months.
So we are ready to go --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Eighteen months?
DR. MARTIRANO: Eighteen months that will be shovel ready. We want to bring that forward that it is ready to go. Our plans are in that area.
Next is Greenview Knolls Elementary School, an HVAC systemic renovation in the total amount of
$765,000.
And then also, I’ve already alluded to the fact that we have a brand new elementary school under construction to open in August 2009. Again, the first new elementary school to be built in twenty years in
St. Mary’s County. But now we are putting forward an appeal for planning approval for a second new elementary school that will have all of those sustaining features as a green school, and again will house 646 students, to repeat the design features
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going for that gold LEED certification. And again, we’ll be ready again as a shovel ready project hopefully in two years, again, eighteen months.
So Governor, I’m very proud of the work that is occurring in our County. We feel as if we are truly taking the lead in terms of academic achievement, in terms of educating our students about the environment, and putting in features to be forward thinkers regarding the overall aspect of our environment. And again, specifically speaking for St.
Mary’s County we enjoy a very beautiful, natural environment. It is our responsibility to continue to educate our children in wonderful facilities that allow for them to be stewards of our environment.
I thank you for your time. And I appreciate it. If you would have any questions I’ll be prepared to answer any of those as well. Thank you very much.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you. Mr.
Comptroller?
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Dr. Martirano, thank you for your hospitality when I was down there. And also for your spirited presentation. It was terrific.
DR. MARTIRANO: I try to be calm, but --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I have a little bone to pick with you. I, you know, you hand out all this great literature. But your name is nowhere to be found. Put it in there so that, because you’re, I think, doing a great job. And today I think is a signature day for St. Mary’s because of the land purchase earlier today, and now hearing about the strength of your school system which I saw first hand but is a real gem, I think, in Maryland.
DR. MARTIRANO: It is.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: So thank you for what you do.
DR. MARTIRANO: Thank you for your acknowledgment, sir.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you.
DR. MARTIRANO: Thank you, Governor.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Stay tuned. And anything you can do to call your congressional representatives. I mean, you’re preaching to the choir on Majority Leader Hoyer. But I’ve been talking with him every day on this Recovery and Reinvestment
Act.
DR. MARTIRANO: Absolutely.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And there is the strong promise -- have they voted on it yet, by the way?
Does anybody know?
TREASURER KOPP: No, I don’t think so.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Have they voted? They were supposed to vote on the House floor today. The tougher vote will come in the Senate. So any calls that you can make as a PTA, parent associations, to
Senators Mikulski and Cardin, who are also supportive of it, but give them support. Because we’ve put $260 million into the budget, very lean, very tough, painful budget, which takes us up to $1 billion over a three-year period, which is the first time in our
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history we’ve even done $3 billion in just three years. The Obama Recovery and Reinvestment Act has the promise of another $191 million this year on top of the $260 million. So in the face of these hard times, to be able to spend $451 million -- is that right? $451 million on school construction would be a real blessing that could not only do something to get our economy moving. It would also give our children something great, and children yet to be born who are going to be using these classrooms, you know, down the road. So thanks so much for your leadership. Support your congressional delegation. Tell them to get this thing done.
DR. MARTIRANO: Will do.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you.
DR. MARTIRANO: Thank you very much.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: I saw Delegate
Eckardt jump out in the audience. It’s $1 billion in three years, which is magnificent. Not $3 billion in three years.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: What did I say? $3 billion? I’m not, sorry. Correct that. $1 billion over three years.
DR. MARTIRANO: Thank you very much.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Sure, Somerset County.
Page Elmore, Delegate Elmore, good to see you again, my friend.
DELEGATE ELMORE: Good to see you, Governor.
Governor O’Malley, Comptroller Franchot, and Treasurer
Kopp. We’re here today on behalf of Somerset School
Board to appeal the decision on the renovation of
Washington High School, which is one of the two high schools in the County. The total project is $19 million. We asked for $6 million in fiscal year 2010.
We did not ask for any money, any funding in fiscal year 2009. And we received $4.2 million and we’re appealing for $1.8 million more for the total project, what we’re asking for for this fiscal year 2010.
We appreciate all you’ve done for us in the past. You’ve been a big help in improving the
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educational system in Somerset County. Without your help we would still be way, way down. But we’ve been able to contribute towards making Maryland the number one public education system in the United States. And we’re proud of the effort that we’ve put forward in that.
We have a problem that we have been trying to correct for the last few years. We have one of the highest rates in the State of Maryland of seniors, or adults, who do not have a high school education. It’s well over 50 percent. We’ve made great strides in bringing that down. And under the great leadership of our distinguished Superintendent Dr. Brofee we have done a very good job of bringing that down. And we would like to get it down at least in the middle of the State if not lower. And we’ll need your help to do that. And we look forward to working with you and to help educate more students in Somerset County. And at this time, with your permission Governor, I’d like
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to introduce to you our Superintendent Dr. Karen-Lee
Brofee who will give you the details.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you.
DELEGATE ELMORE: Thank you, Governor.
DR. BROFEE: Thank you, Delegate Elmore.
That’s pretty nice when somebody comes to introduce you, so I really appreciate that. Good afternoon,
Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Comptroller, and
Treasurer. I appreciate your time, particularly at this late hour. And I will try to be succinct. Page pretty much summed it up, but I’ll try to move through pretty quickly.
The very first thing that I want to do, though, is to thank you. Because the support that you have put into Somerset County’s children and families and adults has made a tremendous difference. We’re a part of that number one. If you look at the numbers you’ll see the great gains that Somerset has made. We have children in our middle school that you just, our intermediate school that you just did for us, who say
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they have to pinch themselves because they’re in such a wonderful school. We have a 92 percent teacher retention rate. We’ve never had that before. It has to do with the fine leadership we have and the fine facilities. And you’ve done a magnificent job for us.
If this were a perfect world I wouldn’t be here asking for Washington High renovation because we would have already done it. We would have done it four, five, maybe even longer years ago. But we have had to live within the economic means of our County.
And with respect to all twenty-four counties in
Maryland we’ve had to, had to work with what we can.
And so we’ve been very pleased to be able to renovate
Woodson and to build Somerset Intermediate. Two schools have been completely closed and turned over to the County, used for the community now. One we use partially for the community and partially for an alternative school. So we’ve been able to get a little bit closer to economy of scale. But we’re a small County. We only have 2,900 students, a little
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bit over that. Our preschool is growing by leaps and bounds of needy children. So we’re going to need that school eventually in the future.
The handout that you’ve been provided, which has no pictures, it’s just straight black and white for you, talked a little bit about where we’ve been and shows you from 1995 up until 2009, really over fourteen years, we’ve had those two major projects. I want to talk a little bit about why we can’t wait at
Washington High any longer and why we have to go forward. We’ve not only had the help of you financially for our other two schools, but the public school construction group has been particularly supportive of us in helping to know how to go forward with this project.
In order to accomplish the reorganization we had to put Washington High to the back burner even though it was in clear need of renovation. We knew in
2002 that we really had to do something, but we had to do something with the whole County. So in an effort,
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our priorities were directed towards Woodson and
Somerset Intermediate. Now we have to look at maintaining safety, putting forth a positive image and being able to continue the wonderful education we have at our elementary level and intermediate level, and reduce the additional pressure on County and State funds, and cannot continue patching Washington High
School. Right now with our HVAC system we’re creating parts because they don’t make them for those systems anymore. So we’re kind of running out of rubber bands. We are, this will be our third geothermal project in the county. Actually fourth, Roger, right?
Fourth, because Deal Island, we’re working on that one right now. And that would be our first initiative in this.
Recognizing that all of this was a temporary strategy, making us more vulnerable than ever, our
County Commissioners said, “Yes, you need to go forward.” And they funded a feasibility study for us in 2007. The study was conducted by the architectural
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firm of Buck Simpers Architects and Associates.
Officials at the Public School Construction Program have complete copies of that full study and its recommendations. To summarize, the Study recommended replacement of all systems at Washington Academy and
High School, as well as ADA upgrades throughout the building. The Study also recommended a number of architectural upgrades to better utilize our space, such as new science labs, updated art facilities, improved technology throughout the building, particularly the infrastructure there.
A much awaited piece of the renovation is the plan to introduce a school based health center.
As a County in poverty, having a school based health center would be enormously supportive. And we’ve been working closely with that for the last three years.
It would be managed and operated by the healthcare community so that’s a good partnership for us.
Critical findings I’ve quoted for you in the handout that I’ve given you. You’ll notice ADA
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compliance; the HVAC, the entire system needs to be replaced, poorly designed, inefficient, circulation pumps leak, no backflow prevention. The teachers could tell you this in their terms in the classroom because it’s hard to teach in classrooms that don’t have good, efficient environmental settings. Domestic water, our water piping is in very poor condition.
We’ve got to get that fixed. Our lighting is bad.
Our electrical system is at maximum capacity. And our students are coming in from the middle school so technologically able. Our teachers are trained, they’re ready to go. We’re doing what we can.
What we’re seeking is the full $6 million of
State support for year one of this $19 million cost.
Our County has actually committed to going forward to bonding in order to front funds. They have never done that. That is a real step of faith, and tremendously supportive to the public school system. We cannot delay any longer. We have to address the economic needs. We have to keep going, what is already started
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with good hands on challenges, and excellent learning environments.
We are a County of significant poverty, with poverty comes poor health. Getting that community based health center in there will impact on school attendance which, by the way, is at 94 percent in both of our high schools so we’re very proud of that. And higher in our elementary schools.
TREASURER KOPP: Geez.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: What was that?
TREASURER KOPP: 94 percent.
DR. BROFEE: Mm-hmm.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: 94 percent of what? The
--
DR. BROFEE: 94 percent is our attendance rate.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Great.
DR. BROFEE: Yeah, and we monitor that on a monthly basis and we’d actually like to get it up to
100.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We’d like you to as well.
DR. BROFEE: Than you. We plan this limited renovation as a means of modernizing the systems and providing educational enhancements to improve our instructional delivery. Work unable to be accomplished in this limited renovation will fall under a renovation umbrella and will be able to move forward at a later date. We believe by starting this project as soon as possible the inflationary effect that we, most projects experience can be limited.
Current conditions tell us this is the time to be building.
At our Deal Island project we’re working on
HVAC. We have a 23 percent minority business enterprise participation. That’s not a high number but it’s much higher than anything we’ve had before.
Our preconstruction management that we’re using right now and construction management from Somerset
Intermediate understand the importance of minority
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business enterprise and how they need to be working towards that and increasing that percentage for us.
Our block is that it’s hard to find vendors in our area and contractors, but we’re getting better. And with the economy as it is now, I think there are more people looking for work so we should be better if we start off now.
I don’t think I need to go through all these. You have them before you and you certainly are well aware. I don’t want to repeat myself. But I do want to be very clear that we can do no less than continue our efforts on behalf of the students of
Somerset County to assure equity. A student in
Somerset deserves every bit of quality education as a student anywhere in the great State of Maryland. And supporting us on this, I have one Board member with me today. Our Vice Chairman, Reverend William Miles.
And also Mr. Darby is our facilities. And I bring the regrets from Sam Boston who is our County
Commissioner. And also from Dr. DeWayne Whittington,
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who is a newly named Board member. So I would be glad to answer any questions you might have.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Do you know Ms. Jenkins?
She’s our Director of Minority Business Development.
DR. BROFEE: I don’t think we’ve had direct conversations. It’s a pleasure to meet and talk with you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: And she can be of help to you, in any difficulty you might have in finding --
DR. BROFEE: Great.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: -- contractors.
Wicomico, just next door, has had a lot of success.
MS. JENKINS: They have. There are a couple of outreaches scheduled for the next few months on the
Lower Shore, mainly we’d like to see a lot of expansion activity. But we’re trying to pull in anyone from the Eastern Shore who needs access to minority contractors, including public schools.
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DR. BROFEE: We’re working with Whiting
Turner right now for preconstruction, so we’ll make sure we’re present.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Tell Sam, tell Sam
Boston to get on the phone to Frank Kratovil now and work him on this Recovery Act.
DR. BROFEE: Okay, I’ll do that.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: He needs to vote for it so we have more school construction dollars. My goodness, people didn’t vote for him just to have him sit down there. He needs to vote for the Recovery Act so we get more school construction.
DELEGATE ELMORE: Probably both sides,
Governor, need to talk to him.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: That’s right, right?
DR. BROFEE: Comptroller Franchot, thank you for visiting our intermediate school. You did that this summer. I was not able to be present with the
Economic Development Council. So I appreciate that.
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COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes. Very good.
Great jobs.
DR. BROFEE: We like it when people come that far south.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Good. Terrific.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you very much for your presentation. We’ll do all we can to help you.
Stay tuned. And, seriously, the Recovery Act has a lot of help in it if we can get it passed.
DR. BROFEE: I heard that.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Progress is bipartisan.
Washington County?
DELEGATE ELMORE: Thank you, Governor.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you, Page. Thank you, Delegate.
DR. MORGAN: Good afternoon. I have laryngitis, obviously, so I’m going to be handing this off to, you thought Frank Sinatra was the voice but the voice is Boyd Michael. This is our deputy. But I just want to say we think we should get some bonus
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point funds for coming down out of the mountains today.
(Laughter)
DR. MORGAN: Governor, Lieutenant Governor,
Comptroller Franchot, Treasurer Kopp, Dr. Lever, thank you for giving us this opportunity. And before I hand it off to Boyd Michael I just wanted to introduce Ruth
Anne Callaham’s with me, that’s our Board Vice
President. Bob Spong, Dr. Spong is our Facilities
Planner. And I just wanted to say up front thank you very much for enabling us to open three new elementary, wholly new elementary schools this year.
You don’t know what a plus it’s been for our County, for the students. Schools that would have just been modernized like Pangborn, we thank you for that very much. And I know, Comptroller, you’re very involved in it. So here’s Boyd Michael. I’ll make some concluding remarks.
MR. MICHAEL: Thank you, Dr. Morgan. As Dr.
Morgan mentioned, we did open up three new
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elementaries this year. It was very exciting to be part of those programs, to see the children and to enjoy the new facility. We did involve seventeen schools in a redistricting effort as a result of opening those three schools. So that impact wasn’t just for those three school districts but it helped seventeen other schools, either by being in the new facility or by helping with overcrowded conditions in their school.
Today we’re specifically requesting your reconsideration on Eastern Primary and five systemic projects. And before I begin to speak specifically about those we would like to remind the Board of
Public Works of a few pieces of information.
The 2007-2008 Fact Book just recently came out, the Maryland State Fact Book. In that Fact Book it indicates over the last five years that the public school enrollment in the State of Maryland has declined 2.4 percent. During that same five-year period Washington County has grown 8 percent. So that
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would make us, when you look down to the list in the
Fact Book, it makes Washington County the fastest growing county in the State of Maryland with regard to public school enrollment percentage wise. And we believe that’s very important to realize as we’re requesting additional seat capacity.
It’s an unprecedented growth for Washington
County. And, again, we’re going to have to do a great deal of work to keep up with this type of growth.
Even in this economic slowdown we experienced growth this past fall.
We believe the BRAC, the realignment particularly at Fort Detrick, which is a billion dollars worth of buildings going in, a substantial number of jobs in the thousands, we believe that employees from that realignment are going to look for affordable housing in Washington County.
Our County Commissioners like never before have stepped up to help support our three new elementary and other systemic projects, along with the
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State. And we want to continue to encourage them to invest in Washington County and realize the State is there as a partner in that investment as we look to create additional seat capacity to support our children in overcrowded, inadequate facilities.
So specifically our request today is for $1 million for Eastern Primary. In our original submittal with our CIP back in November, Dr. Lever might note we requested almost $7.5 million for
Eastern Primary. We recognize the condition of the
State. We recognize there’s a limited amount of money. So we’ve changed our request since that initial submittal in November to a request of $1 million for Eastern Primary. And we certainly hope that we get the remaining funds in fiscal year ‘11 and
‘12. But we’re just requesting seed money for Eastern
Primary. We do appreciate the support of the IAC’s recommendation for planning approval, and we recognize only a few counties have received planning approval at this time.
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But that will help us significantly with our seat capacity issue. Eastern Primary will be a paired school with the current Eastern Elementary. It’s in the middle of a growth area. It will have sidewalks, and children walking to school. It has specifically designed areas to meet the unique needs of children.
It’s going to be our first geothermal heating and cooling system building and we’re very excited about that. And it will meet, along with Antietam Academy, will meet all the requirements for C LEED certification, even though we’re not under that requirement yet until July 1st.
We’ll be submitting our design developments for this project after our Board approval on Tuesday and I believe that’s the last thing that stands in the way of State approval of funding. And our, we anticipate starting Eastern Primary in August of this summer, with your support.
Very quickly I’d like to review the five systemic projects. Washington County has over $40
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million of backlog and deferred maintenance. That’s about $1 million a building. Our County, along with the State and our Board of Education, have supported trying to reduce that number substantially. But at this point it’s starting to grow and we need your support in this area.
We are requesting an additional $563,000 for
Hancock roof project, $911,000 for HVAC work at
Boonsboro Middle School. This equipment is original to the 1976 building. We’re requesting funding of
$730,000 for a boiler and air handling units at Emma
K. Doub. Some of this equipment is original to the
1967 building. Sharpsburg Elementary, $506,000 for a roof, and $190,000 for a window project to increase energy efficiency at Williamsport High School.
We are fully committed to the recently revised and implemented minority business enterprise procedures. Next Tuesday we are having our, not only did we host a State meeting in Washington County, we’re having our own MBE workshop for local
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contractors. We’ve sent out hundreds of invitations.
We hope to help them understand the new requirements and also to help recruit additional minority businesses.
Our most recent State project, the Cascade window project that the State supported, is 100 percent MBE. A local contractor was awarded that bid and the owner is an American Indian.
We’ve put a lot of emphasis on our energy savings. Through Dr. Morgan’s leadership we’ve hired an energy management specialist. He’s saved us hundreds of thousands of dollars at this point. As I pointed out, Antietam and Eastern Primary will both be eligible, the anticipation of the design is that they would be eligible for LEED silver certification. And they will be the first public buildings in Washington
County with geothermal and cooling systems.
As far as prototypes, Eastern Primary will be our prototype for future primary buildings. We anticipate at some point possibly building a primary
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building in Boonsboro. And we might use this design for that. And also we’re going to use lessons learned from our three new elementaries, and try to use one of those in the future as a prototype.
So, again, I thank you and Dr. Morgan has some additional comments.
DR. MORGAN: In summary, we just wanted you to consider our request. In considering our request, please note that Washington County Public Schools has been a responsible steward of State funding. All three of our elementary projects this year came in under budget. I don’t think that was an accident. We hired construction managers who actually rode hard on each project and made sure that we were getting the most for our money. And so we think we’ve been very diligent in that way.
We are a growing county, as Boyd said, as opposed to a lot of the State now where the growth has slowed down or stopped, at least temporarily. We have a 40 percent farms rate. 40 percent of our students
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across the County qualify for free and reduced price meals. At the elementary level it’s more like 50 percent. And as a lot of us know, a lot of the poverty is centered in and around the urban areas where the schools, the infrastructure is decaying.
Old schools, high poverty, and we’re trying to combat that.
Additionally, we continue to rank twenty- fourth, twenty-fourth for the lowest per pupil cost among all of the jurisdictions in the State of
Maryland. We’re proud of that fact because we are pretty consistently in a number of areas in the top five school systems in the State of Maryland. We had an all time record this year, in the lowest drop out rate and the highest graduation rate we’ve ever enjoyed, and in the top five in the State in both those areas. Again, ranking twenty-fourth out of twenty-four jurisdictions in spending per pupil.
So the impact of overcrowded schools, high poverty in a number of the aging schools, growing
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enrollment, coupled with I think our very good stewardship with the funding that you have provided to us, we’re hoping that you will consider all of that.
And our Vice President of the Board Mrs. Callaham just had a couple of comments.
MRS. CALLAHAM: Thank you, Dr. Morgan. In the short time that I sat here today. Two things rang out with great clarity and importance. And the people that said them obviously are intelligent, well educated, and focused on the achievement of children.
One is that we must hold laser focus on better buildings with better bathrooms for our students.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It’s a visionary concept.
MRS. CALLAHAM: Absolutely. You cannot get any better than that.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Better classrooms with better bathrooms.
MRS. CALLAHAM: Thank you for that,
Governor. Number two, and I will carry this back to
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my colleagues in Washington County. I think they already know it because we’re excited about the new primary elementary at Eastern, is that you stop high school drop out at the elementary school level. Don’t ever forget that. And one reason you get kids to come to school is because they’ve got a better building.
Elementary primary at Eastern is such a wonderful place. We draw children from the most challenged neighborhood. The ones that live in our row houses with no backyard, and they play stickball in the street when the cars aren’t there. And we’re going to bring them out and put them in a bucolic, pastoral setting in a wonderful neighborhood with lots of sidewalks. And they can have after school programs.
It’s located very close to a senior living community, to our brand new hospital. These children are going to thrive. And they’re going to wind up sitting in front of you one day with a Ph.D. behind their name.
So thank you so much in advance for your funding.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you.
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DR. MORGAN: If you have any questions we’d be thrilled to answer them.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We’d like you to call your congressman. I’d like to know if you would do that for us and urge him to support the American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Because it will give us the flexibility to be able to invest an additional
$191 million in school construction this year, on top of the billion that we’ve done in three years. So we appreciate your leadership, Doctor. Mr. Franchot,
Comptroller?
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes, and please let me know what the Congressman says.
DR. MORGAN: Okay.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: But also thank you for coming down even with your laryngitis.
DR. MORGAN: It sounds worse than --
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And thank you for your leadership. Do you have any lessons learned for other jurisdictions? The one that testified just
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before you had one of the highest drop out rates in the State. And I’m wondering what you did that, or is there something there that could be exported?
DR. MORGAN: Thank you for asking that, actually. When I arrived in Washington County in 2001
I thought I was still in Baltimore City. We were second only to Baltimore City in teen pregnancy, drop out rate, lowest graduation rate. It was 78 percent.
So it is not something that is a miracle or has happened overnight, or happened by accident. We’ve been very aggressive in putting in drop out prevention programs, elementary, middle, and high. We have drop out prevention specialists. We go to students’ homes when they’re absent, sometimes even one day. We send cabs for them to get in and come to school. We monitor very closely. We have our own kind of dashboard, and we know patterns. We see patterns at schools. We see patterns in classrooms. And also lots of talking to individual students. Where we talk to them about, “What’s your future? If you only have
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a high school diploma, or if you drop out, you’re a king of the crib. You will master that crib but you won’t be able to get out of it.” We use that image with a lot of them. “And if you want to be able to climb down out of that crib, and walk around the room and have a life, you can’t drop out of school.”
So it’s a lot of things. But it’s very, very specific, concerted efforts and programmatic change, and programmatic delivery for the students.
And a lot of monitoring of data. We don’t let any patterns go too long. We’re on it right away.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: And your Vice Chair gets the Franchot Award for the most passionate presentation.
MRS. CALLAHAM: Thank you, sir.
DR. MORGAN: She does it better than I do.
You all know I’m passionate anyway. I don’t know, but she can do that voice.
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TREASURER KOPP: Dr. Morgan, could I just say that you have a very significant track record throughout the State of Maryland.
DR. MORGAN: Thank you.
TREASURER KOPP: And I think everywhere you have gone the schools have, have thrived and improved.
And I appreciate it.
DR. MORGAN: Well, I’ve been in a State with very high standards, very supportive people when we were doing Barbara Ingram, we got the most incredible support. And by the way, that new high school for the visual and performing arts is opening up --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: It is?
DR. MORGAN: -- this spring. It is opening up this May.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Oh, we should go to that one, Lieutenant Governor.
DR. MORGAN: Well, you will be invited and -
-
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good.
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DR. MORGAN: -- you will be our honored guests.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Well, thank you.
DR. MORGAN: And many of you participated and we appreciate it. And, you know, I just, I’ve been blessed to have so many great opportunities in this State. I’ve had great support, thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Thank you, Doctor. Take care of that cold. Get back over the mountains, now.
Thank you all --
DR. MORGAN: I should be entered bonus points, too, for --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Well, we give you bonus points. There’s some coffee and tea in the next room.
How’s that?
(Laughter)
TREASURER KOPP: Could I ask Dr. Lever --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Dr. Lever?
TREASURER KOPP: -- really briefly, then it brings up a really good point. When you have growth,
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BRAC growth in Frederick, but because of housing prices among other things, young families might well be moving to Washington County instead.
DR. LEVER: Yes.
TREASURER KOPP: It’s very close, but a different school system. How do you take care of, how do you, first of all are you tracking that? Is there some way to track that? And secondly, how does that work with the BRAC? They’re not going to get a BRAC bonus but they’re going to take on the BRAC costs.
DR. LEVER: Well, they’re seeing new schools as you’ve seen. And there’s been, in my observation since I came into this position in 2003, there’s been a sea change in Washington County in the perception of their role in the State. And --
TREASURER KOPP: Well, absolutely. I’m just talking, you said there was a bonus --
DR. LEVER: Schools that are BRAC related --
TREASURER KOPP: Right.
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DR. LEVER: -- are eligible for a reimbursement of BRAC induced enrollment.
TREASURER KOPP: But theirs would not count as BRAC related, and --
DR. LEVER: They’re outside of the area.
TREASURER KOPP: Yes.
DR. LEVER: And the distance and time parameters were set fairly strictly.
TREASURER KOPP: Yes, that’s what you said.
But, but my question is, is there a way to track to see what the actual BRAC impact is? And if the actual
BRAC impact is related not just to miles. Even though we don’t want people driving a lot because of carbon footprint and everything, not just related to miles but also the housing market and a number of other things.
MR. HALL: It is very difficult to separate the BRAC growth and how soon it will be developed in certain areas, from regular growth Maryland is experiencing --
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TREASURER KOPP: Right.
MR. HALL: -- at any rate. But we’ve been working to try to come up with a system so that we’re tracking it and seeing what happens, and then paying attention with regards to agencies like DLLR and others to see where the jobs are in relation to the facility and where those families are locating. But it is very hard to break it out. And it’s very hard to project it, which we try to do very closely working with the Lieutenant Governor. And our hope is that as we see the families coming in, we’ll be able to sort it out --
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah, that’s, I mean, projecting is one thing, and very difficult. The other is the question of how you, how you track it. I know, you know, people move into jobs in Montgomery
County but they used to move, the jobs were in the
County but they moved to Frederick. Because at that time the cost was less. Well now, Frederick’s very expensive.
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DR. MORGAN: But if I may, the issue, too, is Washington County is only fifteen minutes from Fort
Detrick. So if you go up to Northern Frederick, to
Southern Frederick, you’re traveling a longer period of time. And they’re going against traffic. And there would be some advantage to living --
TREASURER KOPP: Right. But if, but if my, if the bonus for BRAC related growth is delineated by the number of miles, the school is from --
DR. LEVER: It’s ten miles from the fence or twenty minutes from the gate, and within a PFA.
TREASURER KOPP: Right. So you’re a half hour. So you don’t get it.
DR. LEVER: Right. I think that the purpose of that, and David Whittacre and I worked on this last year about this time. The purpose of that was to try to encourage growth and capacity projects near the base. That was the purpose.
TREASURER KOPP: Right. Which makes a whole lot of sense if it’s affordable.
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DR. LEVER: Correct. We understand that.
TREASURER KOPP: But all I’m asking is if whether there’s a way to track that because it is difficult to project.
MR. HALL: -- says that, you know, the jobs coming are very high paying jobs. So part of it is that we may be talking about being affordable is that the affordability issue might be less of an issue with several of the families. Having said that, I think we’re certainly open to monitoring it as it moves forward and being flexible. And if we start seeing huge impacts in other places there are ways that we can --
TREASURER KOPP: As the world used to be, even for high paying government related jobs, and then you look at the cost of buying a home, it’s still a very big jump
DR. MORGAN: And sometimes the same developer in Frederick County --
TREASURER KOPP: Absolutely.
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DR. MORGAN: -- and you can get the same home for $110,000 less in Washington County and travel twenty minutes.
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah.
DR. MORGAN: So that’s the challenge.
TREASURER KOPP: One more complicating factor.
MR. HALL: I understand that. We are trying to direct the growth as best we can so that when we have people moving in we aren’t trying to shut out most of the State.
TREASURER KOPP: And then maybe have to look at the cost of housing and do something about that.
MR. HALL: There are ways we can look at that that probably --
DR. LEVER: If I could just add something.
Part of the effort is also, it’s about concentrated development but it’s also about revitalization of those areas that are near the bases, in particularly, say, Aberdeen Proving Ground. And the information you
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learned today about the programs at the high schools in combination with state of the art school, we’re hoping that that will be a powerful attractor to people at the base, high paying incomes, but they’ll want to live there rather than travel forty-five minutes away to Greenfields, or --
TREASURER KOPP: Yeah. And we were just talking about Frederick County and Washington County.
Not a --
DR. LEVER: Yes, I understand. But that’s part of the purpose of setting these parameters the way that we did.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay, last one.
DR. FREDERICKSEN: I’m still here.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Wicomico.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes, bonus points.
Weren’t we going to start on the Ws one year, and run backwards?
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I thought I would do that today, but then they had already given out the schedule. Next year we start at the Ws.
DR. FREDERICKSEN: I look forward to an
Australian start. Governor O’Malley, Lieutenant
Governor Brown, Comptroller Franchot, Treasurer Kopp,
Dr. Lever, and other committee members. Thank you for your support of education. I’d like to introduce my team to you, as we believe in collaborating to make things happen and I think I’ve been hearing a lot of collaboration going on here today. I’m John
Fredericksen, Superintendent of Schools, Wicomico
County. And to my left, to your right, Delegate Page
Elmore, Delegate Addie Eckardt, did I get that right?
Behind me to my left is Rick Pollitt, County Executive for Wicomico County. He’ll be speaking in a little bit. And to my right, to your left, and I think you probably know everybody here but I’m the one that’s having a hard time with it. Senator Richard Colburn,
President of our Board of Education Robin Holloway,
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and Delegate Jim Mathias? Or James? Okay, I’m getting that closer. And behind me, oh I think we got everybody except my staff people who are hiding over to the side here. We’ll get them up later. And the one that’s really going to carry the load today for us is Representative, Delegate Norm Conway.
I want to make sure that you understand what we’re here for today, to promote the idea of getting our schools improved. 23 percent of our schools in our system are not air conditioned. We’re looking for your assistance to help with three schools. We’re looking for assistance on our James M. Bennett High
School. This is a project that’s in the middle portion of its construction. The steel is coming out of the ground.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’ve seen it. It’s a beautiful thing.
DR. FREDERICKSEN: And it’s a great, great project, isn’t it? Secondly is Bennett Middle School on the same site, crowding James M. Bennet High School
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and taking away instructional space for it. And we’re looking for planning authority on that. And then the third item is Northwest Elementary School. This is an
HVAC systems renovation. We’re looking at energy efficiency, we’re looking at decent air, air conditioning for our students. We’re looking at lower operating costs. Energy is really a critical piece to that operating cost. And then finally, we’re looking at trying to do some of the newer things like geothermal in it. And I’m going to yield to Delegate
Conway to talk about the meat and potatoes on it.
Thank you.
DELEGATE CONWAY: Thank you, Dr.
Fredericksen. Governor and Lieutenant Governor,
Treasurer and Comptroller. I’m privileged to be with you today. And at some point in the future go from Ws to whatever at the --
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Next year. The motion by Norm Conway, seconded by the Treasurer. All in favor signal by saying, “Aye.”
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DELEGATE CONWAY: I tell you, you’re good.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Make a note of that, now, Ms. McDonald. We wanted to this year. I started to, and then I saw they had already published the alphabetical schedule.
DELEGATE CONWAY: I know. Let me just thank you for the opportunity to come up and I think we all recognize the significance and the importance of school construction in Maryland. It’s been given a very high priority since the Kopp Committee made some very, very strong recommendations after long analysis of what our needs were. And to be quite honest, when the initial recommendations came out it seems like it was almost going to be an impossible task to do. But
I think we have worked on it. And by giving it a priority status I think we’ve been able to make some gigantic strides. And I know the people of the State, the boys and girls of the State, have certainly appreciated it. We still have much to do.
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One of those projects, the James M. Bennett
High School, one of the appeals we have is to maintain construction funding for the current construction of the James M. Bennett High School. Our number one priority request is appealing for the full, full
$13.17 million, which is above the recommendation of
$6.2 million as the project is already eight months into construction. And this is a project that I, last year I was really concerned about when I received some of the material that we get on the amounts of funding that was put out there. And primarily because
Wicomico really worked with IAC to go from a three- year funding to a four-year funding, primarily because of the cost of the project. The largest cost project the Board of Ed has had in our County. It’s going to be almost $89 million, maybe a little more than that before it’s really all done. But the Board has maintained the IAC’s ‘08 request to extend funding over four years, while Wicomico County has maintained the three-year funding support.
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Now, important to that, by going to the four years and the County staying at the three years of course is the cash flow for the project itself. Last year I wrote the IAC and they did respond, and they did give additional money to the James M. Bennett project in about a, just about $1 million more. But the fact was, when you took the four year and you allocated out what that four year State cost would be, we’d really never reached either one of those. And that’s the problem. And we really, we really wanted to accomplish this and we’re going to accomplish it.
But it’s important that these last two funding years, that we get to where we need to be.
This project includes several sustainable, high performance components such as geothermal, HVAC system. Wells are already complete. Natural light harvesting combined with integrated lighting control system. A reclaimed stormwater management for irrigation, and ultra low flow plumbing fixtures. And
Energy Star roofing, just to name a few. The Board’s
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pleased that the MBE participation for this project, which was approximately 17 percent, had a significant increase over what prior MBE participation has been.
The facility is overcrowded with aging infrastructure.
And an existing complex shared with the Bennet Middle
School, and a detached auditorium are critically linked to the replacement of the Bennett Middle School project which is the next one that we would like to ask your consideration of. This will have direct effect on the completion of phase three of the James
M. Bennett project, that is the middle school, simply because they’re on the same overall site.
Our second one, Bennett Middle School, planning approval for the replacement of the Bennett
Middle School in order to facilitate the completion of the James M. Bennett project noted above, and to begin design for this project. Very important, and the
Board is appealing for planning approval for the middle school project. The County has already committed to the initial A and E and C and M fees, and
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is recommending for approval of additional A and E fees and initial construction funding for the year
2010. Educational specifications were completed, approved by MSDE, and established as a comprehensive program including a high performance goal of LEED silver. The Board of Ed’s currently in the final stage of selection for full architectural and engineering design services.
This project is also critical for the planning stage simply because it’s going to have to be moved. Land is in the process of being acquired. And if it’s not put in the process, it’s going to impact the phase of the James M. Bennett High project.
The third is Northwestern Elementary School construction funding, primarily to facilitate the completion of HVAC at Northwestern Elementary.
They’re appealing for the $4.437 million to assist with the completion of the planned new geothermal mechanical plant, and upgrades to associated systems,
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which is the final phase of a multiyear system renovation and upgrades.
Folks, I deeply appreciate your consideration. I know school construction is important to every subdivision in this State. That’s why you’ve had folks here all day long, to come in and to promote their importance. I say to you all of them are important. And as a member of the House, we’re going to be doing all we can to make sure that school construction funding is going to be there. And support the Governor’s program, and even do a little more if we can. Thank you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Mr. Chairman, thank you.
And thank you for all your leadership over these rough two years. Your fiscal stewardship, your fiscal responsibility, the cuts that you’ve had the courage to make in this budget without compromising the ability for us to give to our children the best public school system in America. You’ve really been a
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critically important part of that and I just wanted to say that in this forum.
DELEGATE CONWAY: Thank you. I’ve got a great Committee.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: You sure do.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Governor, I, Mr.
Chairman, I’d also like to say that every other county has been before us, as you noted, asking for more money. But none of them had the Chairman of the House
Appropriations Committee with them. So it’s good to see you.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: We like your odds.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: Yes.
DELEGATE CONWAY: I’m still a One Maryland person. But Wicomico’s very important.
COMPTROLLER FRANCHOT: It’s a very impressive turnout, also, of your elected colleagues and we appreciate it.
DELEGATE CONWAY: Thank you.
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Any other questions?
Treasurer?
TREASURER KOPP: As I understand what you’re saying is that all of the, at least the high school and the middle school, are ready to, will be ready to go and ready to spend the money --
DELEGATE CONWAY: That’s right.
TREASURER KOPP: -- and ready to employ, continue employing people building and making --
DELEGATE CONWAY: And I think, you know, as for every subdivision, it’s, these kinds of projects right now are critically important simply because of jobs. And the spinoff that occurs in every community as a result. So thank you.
MS. HOLLOWAY: And if I may, the critical piece between James M. Bennett and Bennett Middle property is it is adjacent to Salisbury University’s recent acquisition of Dresser Industries. That whole area is critical in terms of traffic pattern, in terms
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of well planned area development. We appreciate the many visits from many of you.
TREASURER KOPP: I’d like to go down and, we’re going to go down and visit just to –
MS. HOLLOWAY: The Eastern Shore Music Man back here is making sure that I remind Governor
O’Malley that Rock and Roll Revival, you’re always invited again to come back to James M. Bennett and play guitar, February 13th, 14th, and 15th, and the following weekend.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I’ve got to do that.
MS. HOLLOWAY: And bring the Treasurer with you when you come, and certainly the Comptroller as well.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Can you send, Jim can you remind me of that when it comes up?
DELEGATE MATHIAS: Yes, sir.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: I rely on Delegate
Mathias for all of my rock and roll bookings.
(Laughter)
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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Such as they are. Rick, did you want to say something? County Executive?
MR. POLLITT: Just a quick word of thanks.
I was asked to just wrap things up. And I can tell you all that when I was running for this job the two most popular words I came across were “in conclusion.”
(Laughter)
MR. POLLITT: And so I would like to say that we do thank you for your endurance and your attention and your consideration. Because if there’s anything that shows that we really are all One
Maryland it’s days like this. And it doesn’t matter whether you represent the State, the Counties, the municipalities, we’re all in business for the same thing and that’s to work to make our communities better. And we succeed when our partnerships are strong. And Wicomico County’s always enjoyed a strong partnership with you, Governor O’Malley, and with the people at the table here. And we’re committed to doing our part. And we look forward to working with
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you, and really do appreciate you taking time to hear us out today.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: County Executive, thank you. Thanks for your leadership. I thank you all, one and all. All right. Well, thanks. Stay tuned, support your Congressman. Tell him to support the
Recovery and Reinvestment Act, Page. Sure.
DELEGATE ELMORE: We’ve had Congressman
Kratovil tour the Eastern Shore delegation. He said he wanted to hear from us. We told him we wanted to hear from him, and we would be back again, and we’ll be in touch with him.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Good. Tell him to vote right. All right. Okay. We are now on, that concludes our last agenda item which was Agenda Item
5, which is the preliminary IAC Committee reports on school construction. Right, Dr. Lever?
DR. LEVER: Do you have any questions at all? SECRETARY MCDONALD: Item 5, the $191
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million worth of allotments that were recommended.
And these appeals will be coming back at a later date.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: Okay. These appeals will come back in May. Hopefully, when they come back the President will have signed a substantial federal investment in schools. And we can consider those at that time as well. Right, so Comptroller moves approval, seconded by the Treasurer. All in favor signal by saying, “Aye.”
THE BOARD: Aye.
GOVERNOR O’MALLEY: All opposed, “Nay.” The ayes have it. Thank you all very, very much for your patience.
DR. LEVER: Thank you.
(Whereupon, at 4:01 p.m., the meeting was concluded.)
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