Fall / 2016 COG QUARTERLY YULE HAVE TO PLAN AHEAD Holiday travel congestion is not new, but don’t throw out that holiday cheer just yet. There are ways to take hold of those reindeer reins and ease your travel anxiety. 16 WELCOME, BALTIMORE BIKE SHARE! Stations are popping up around the city since the program’s launch on Friday, October 28. Read on to find out how to get peddling. 06 DIVE INTO THE CREATIVE WORLD OF MAKERSPACES AND FAB LABS BMC’s second “What’s on Tap” speaker series featured big picture economic ideas from the innovative minds at Local Motors and Open Works Baltimore. 08 GOODS ON THE MOVE Ever thought about the journey of your holiday goods? From the ingredients in your sugar cookies to the Audi parked in the driveway on Christmas morning, By the Numbers gives a snapshot of how goods move into and around the region. 14 Highlighting BMC’s Regional Coordination www.baltometro.org TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION 01 IN THE NEWS Cooperative Purchasing 02 Housing 04 BMC’s fall 2016 activities foster a growing region Air Quality 05 Bike/Ped 06 Workforce Development 08 through planning, partnership and innovation REGIONAL ROUNDUP 10 BY THE NUMBERS 14 he inescapable aroma of pumpkin-spice, and bustle of holiday travel. The idea is to Tcrisp air, and amber leaves all mean fall provide you with tips and tools so that your is in full swing. plans are executed with the ease of Santa COVER STORY 16 traveling around the world in one night As the door-knocking of enthusiastic trick- and less like the movie “Planes, Trains or-treaters and political canvassers peters and Automobiles.” While we can’t take all LEADING LOCALLY 24 off, we hope you find a quiet moment to the stress out of your holidays, we hope enjoy this edition of COG Quarterly. some of the tips make your season a little B’mORE INVOLVED 26 brighter. Our fall has been a busy one at BMC. We hosted the eighth annual Meet the Primes Our Regional Roundup feature story FROM THE VAULT 28 networking event for small- and minority- showcases the big impact of small business, owned businesses along with Baltimore namely agriculture. From locally produced Rock the Vote: Counting ballots, November 1948 Photo: By Paul S. Henderson, Henderson County. We attended the Columbia beer and wine, to delicious cheese and jam, Photograph Collection, Baltimore City Life Museum Collection, Maryland Historical Society Association’s visit from Rob Breymaier, we provide you with highlights from BMC’s an expert on promoting community racial report, Value-Added Agriculture: A Regional BMC Board of Directors integration, a strategy recommended in Focus, County Executive Barry Glassman’s Barry Glassman the Opportunity Collaborative’s Baltimore 2016 chairman initiative. So when you’re Harford County Executive Regional Housing Plan released in 2014. shopping for the perfect dish for your (BMC board chair) We celebrated the launch of Baltimore Thanksgiving table, consider supporting From all of us here at BMC, we wish Allan H. Kittleman Bike Share program, which includes the the local farmers and producers that are you and your family a happy and safe Howard County Executive (BMC board vice-chair) largest fleet of electric pedal-assist (pedelec) proud to call our region home. holiday season. We also look forward to bikes in the western hemisphere. reading your comments, questions or Steven R. Schuh Anne Arundel County Executive In Leading Locally, we highlight BMC and story suggestions, which you can send Finally, we explored the world of the Maryland Association of Counties’ to [email protected]. Stephanie Rawlings-Blake Baltimore City Mayor makerspaces and micro-manufacturing, (MACo) Next Generation 911 Roundtable Thanks, as always, for reading. and their benefits to the regional economy on September 23. This event brought Kevin Kamenetz Baltimore County Executive for the second installment of BMC’s together 80 county, state and regional “What’s on Tap” speaker series. public safety, emergency management Doug Howard COG Quarterly, as a digital publication, intends to Carroll County Board of Commissioners and GIS staff to discuss the challenges be interactive. So when you see text that is blue But as the trees shed their leaves, we look and embrace the opportunities created by William C. Ferguson or orange, it contains a hyperlink to more Maryland State Senator, D-46 toward what’s next. upgrades to 911 emergency systems. Michael B. Kelly information for you. Click away! Executive Director Stephen W. Lafferty Maryland State Delegate, D-42A The motivation for this issue’s cover Finally, By the Numbers focuses on the long story, “Yule Have to Plan Ahead,” is to journey many of your holiday goods make J. Thomas Sadowski University System of Maryland For more information: encourage you to prepare for the hustle from their origin to your home. CONTACT US Baltimore Metropolitan Council COG Quarterly is a digital publication of the Baltimore Metropolitan Council. For @BaltoMetroCo more information, please email staff at www.baltometro.org [email protected]. COG Quarterly 1 IN THE NEWS COOPERATIVE PURCHASING Meet the Primes event aims to help small- and minority-owned businesses network smarter he BRCPC and Baltimore County The Baltimore Regional Cooperative Purchasing Committee (BRCPC) T hosted the eighth annual Meet the achieves millions of dollars in cost savings for member jurisdictions by Primes networking event for small- and combining needs into cooperative purchasing contracts, reducing minority-owned businesses on Wednesday, administrative expenses and serving as a forum to exchange resources October 19, at the Maryland State and technical information. Fairgrounds. Attendance at the 2016 event was at and 500 representatives of small- and Meeting face-to-face also provides business an all-time high with more than 110 minority-owned businesses. Baltimore owners time to better communicate exhibitors from both private sector County works together with the BRCPC with prime bidders and gain critical businesses and government agencies, membership to make this event a value- information about upcoming contracts, packed day. Each thus giving them a competitive edge in year, Meet the creating proposals. At the same time, Primes grows in the prime bidders are looking for good its service to the subcontractors to meet their contractual business community subcontracting goals and workforce and in participation. requirements. The intent of “Meet the Primes is a great event for Meet the Primes is helping prime bidders and small and to connect prime minority businesses work smarter. I am contract bidders excited for the business owners who can with businesses make some important contacts with to maximize prime bidders, as well as those who can networking help these businesses develop,” said Bob efforts, develop Ball, coordinator of Minority Business key relationships, Enterprise with Baltimore County and cultivate Public Schools. “It’s very rewarding new business when business owners, large and small, opportunities. are saying that they met someone with whom they are going to work.” “I love Meet the Primes. I met key In addition, Meet the Primes is an players who buy opportunity for government agencies in my products, and the Baltimore region to provide support have developed to small and minority businesses in the long-time business area. Expanding outreach increases More than 500 people representing small- and minority-owned businesses relationships,” participation and competition in their attended the eighth annual Meet the Primes networking event on Wednesday, said Anita Cress, procurements. October 19. (Bottom, left) Debbie Groat, BRCPC coordinator, outlines the of the Sherwood organization’s cooperative purchasing work. Photo: Courtesy of BMC Group, a source for promotional materials. 2 Baltimore Metropolitan Council COG Quarterly 3 IN THE NEWS HOUSING AIR QUALITY Columbia seeks to reinvigorate community integration by BRTB tackles ground-level ozone considering strategies used in prosperous Chicago suburb in Baltimore region BMC first connected with Oak Park shortly after beginning its Sustainable Communities grant-funded planning effort ir quality in the Baltimore region has known as the Opportunity Collaborative. A significantly improved in the past few At a gathering of grantees convened by years. the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) in 2012, National Ambient Air Quality Tammie Grossman, development customer Standards (NAAQS) for ground- services director of the Village of Oak level ozone pollution continue to be Park, mentioned its intentional integration lowered to stricter standards by the U.S. program. That informal conversation led Environmental Protection Agency to a Baltimore delegation trip in 2014 to (EPA). The Baltimore region is close to Chicago, with a stop to visit Oak Park. reaching the newest Ozone NAAQS. From there, the Opportunity Collaborative incorporated some of Oak Parks strategies The region is currently designated as a into its own housing plan. “moderate” ozone nonattainment area for the Ozone NAAQS set in 2008. At The Opportunity Collaborative’s one time, the region was designated as a Baltimore Regional Housing Plan, “serious” nonattainment area for ozone, which was coordinated through BMC, which indicates the area has a more difficult s Columbia approaches its 50th In his visit to Columbia, Breymaier drew focused on diversity. The plan notes that time reaching the NAAQS compared with Aanniversary, it is considering parallels between the model created in Oak the region is becoming more racially other areas. averaged during a three-year period. The coordinate the transportation air quality strategies to reinvigorate its history as a Park and the founding of Columbia. At diverse, but that fault lines of opportunity design value is the fourth highest ozone conformity process carried about by the racially integrated community. the time, Oak Park was an overwhelmingly and economic success too often fall along However, since that time, air pollution concentration in the atmosphere monitored Interagency Consultation Group white suburb of 50,000 on the west side of lines of racially segregated living patterns.