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Monday, January 11, 2016

Racheff Ready to Undertake Frederick County Comprehensive Plan Update

George Wenschhof

First time elected Frederick County executive Jan Gardner (D) after spending her first year in office undoing many of the legislative actions undertaken by the previous board of county commissioners led by Blaine Young (R), has now turned her attention to an update of the county’s Comprehensive Plan.

How to manage growth in Frederick County, Maryland has been the main issue dominating local politics for more than two decades.

Gardner has called this Comprehensive Plan update process “Livable Frederick” and has appointed 13 members to a committee chaired by Jim Racheff.  Over the next two years, the committee is charged with developing a comprehensive plan for the county.

I sat down with Mr. Racheff recently for what turned out to be a lengthy interview to go over how he viewed the upcoming process.  Racheff is a local businessman who, as a result of being a strong Gardner supporter, was named by her to lead her transition effort after she won election. Now she has asked him to lead this effort.

Concerned over this long term pendulum swing on how best to manage growth in Frederick County, I wrote a column 2 years ago, prior to the 2014 election entitled “When will the pendulum swing stop in Frederick County?”   In that column I wrote about how the down zoning of properties by the Gardner board of commissioners had led to the election of Blaine Young who in turn rezoned many county properties.  His actions led to the election of Jan Gardner as the first Frederick County executive.

I asked Jim if this process would be a repeat of what has taken place previously. He said “I understand the process will be politically charged, of course.  I believe the way to address this is to be open and genuine”. 

He added “I want the committee to set a new tone and direction at how we look at developing a sustainable community.  I don’t care what Jan and Blaine did. I just want to do something right. This is not about fighting old battles.”

Racheff told me the comprehensive plan update is require by state law every ten years and this process does not change zoning.  It is an overlay of the county and it is the planning commission and ultimately the county council who will determine zoning.

At the end of two years the committee will present their update to county executive Gardner who can make any changes she wishes prior to presenting to the planning commission for their input. Finally, the comprehensive plan update will be presented to the county council for approval.

New to the update process is new guidance from the American Planning Association on how to deal with the unintended negative side effects of past planning.

As a result of this, Racheff said their goal will be to develop a community vision process by talking to residents to find out what they would like to see.  They will also be using new analytic tools to help understand demographics, transportation and other variables.  In other words there will be data to support the recommendations of the committee.

They also intend to use social media to receive input and feedback as they proceed over the next two years.  They already have a Facebook page and website www.livablefrederick.org.

Racheff also would like to see the committee bring in some outside professionals to help with presentations and with outreach to the community.

He said the name “livable” should reflect community interests on how issues such as public health, changes in work environment, transportation and employment impact the quality of life.

Jim also told me “the focus should be on the desire to have a prosperous community, not a big or small one”.  Furthermore, he would like to “provide more predictability so both sides (on growth) can be satisfied”.

The first meeting of the committee will be open to the public and held on January 22 at the Browning Building in Pinecliff Park from 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM.

Racheff concluded with “Let’s move forward, not back and forth.  It’s time to end the pendulum swing.  My goal is whatever comes out of this comprehensive plan update process is something we all believe is a good outcome”.

Stay tuned.


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