Live Blog Feed: ESLC Annual Planning Conference

Introductions, MDP Sec. Richard Hall Speech, and Jess Zimbabwe Lecture

Welcome! Please watch this post for updates on the conference throughout the day. We will be starting the conference within the next 10 minutes!

Be sure to reload this blog website periodically to get new posts and additions to this post at the end!

9:11a.m.-We haven't started yet, but everyone is filing into the auditorium. We have approximately 100 people here currently.

9:14a.m.-Rob Etgen is giving introductory comments right now. He notes that this is ESLC's 20th anniversary. "This is going to be a big year for Eastern Shore Land Conservancy," says Rob Etgen. Rob thanks the sponsors of the event that many such as the Maryland Department of Planning, WILMAPCO, Shared Earth, AIA, and many others. Rob is talking about the theme of the conference today "About Town" and how that integrates with the multifaceted approach ESLC has regarding land conservation. ESLC supports downtown development in and around our towns.

9:21a.m.-Jake Day takes the stage now, thanking everyone for coming given the bad weather. Jake is thanking the staff at ESLC and sponsors for their work on this event. Jake explains that Jess Zimbabwe will lead off the conference and how later a panel will talk about "Getting Growth Good." The panel will include a mayor, local planner, and Secretary of the Maryland Department of Planning, Richard Hall, AICP.

9:30a.m.-MDP Secretary Richard Hall, AICP, is speaking now about LEED work and how we need to continue to develop that in Maryland. He mentions an NPR story on LEED scoring systems in California. Hall and MDP are proposing two bills this session in Annapolis: 1) creation of a Sustainable Growth Commission and 2) Sustainable Communities Tax Credit legislation. The tax credit legislation is to expand the program to assist in MD transit-oriented development, BRAC development, etc. Secretary Hall points out at least 8 state planners in attendance who came to the conference today.

9:36a.m.-Hall is commenting on HB 1141 currently and its importance to the state of Maryland and the Eastern Shore. The Secretary is now introducing Jess Zimbabwe. Here is a YouTube video of Jess:



9:45a.m.-Jess is talking about "The Role of Public Officials in Preserving Community Character." Jess mentions an article on planning and politics. The article proposes that politics should be taken out of planning, but Jess says political planning is natural. It's ok. One cannot necessarily separate politics from planning even if one wanted to, but the solution is better politics.

9:48a.m.-Jess mentions Joseph P. Riley, Mayor of Charleston, South Carolina as a kind of public official who gets it. Downtown Charleston was not always the beautiful place we see it as today. Jess explains that Riley found political, community, and financial will to spearhead redevelopment projects in Charleston.

9:50a.m.-Jess is talking about the Mayor's Institute on City Design and her experience working with cities around the country on redevelopment programs as well as transit-oriented development projects.

9:55a.m.-She does workshops for public officials to implement stable development in communities. Jess highlights national trends that apply to the Eastern Shore:

-There is little planning assistance available to most small communities.
-The natural resources and beauty of prime rural areas continue to drive development pressures from retirees, second home buyers, and long-distance commuters.
-Municipal revenue structures make communities overly reliant upon sales taxes and increased residential growth to deliver services.

9:59a.m.-Jess is talking about leadership. She explains adaptive leadership as leadership that is not influencing a community to follow your lead, but influencing a community to face their adaptive challenges.

10:01a.m.-Jess's 5 Expected Behaviors for Public Officials

1) Be choosy about development

Take a long-term approach to development, not a short-term approach. Don't be afraid to say no, but take the lead when you have a great opportunity.

2) Sweat the Small Stuff


Mayor Riley in Charleston, SC, in his travels across the country, took gravel samples from different places when thinking about what his city would use when putting in a water front gravel walk for residents as part of a community redevelopment project.

3) Work across boundaries

Work with towns and regional bodies because what happens next to you--impacts you.

4) Engage the Community

Make it clear that growth is going to occur in the community, but that it can happen in a way where everybody wins. Don't take a no-growth mentality, engage in the community planning effort to do the hard work necessary to make a better future for your town.

5) Insist upon a high quality public realm


10:08a.m.-Jess on the role of organizers in preserving community character. She has two tools here. Organizers are leading without natural authority, so how do they make up the gap? MLK in the civil rights movement specifically chose Selma for demonstration because of its potential for receiving national media attention.

Tool #1 Example: Transit Alliance Citizens' Academy (TACA)

Denver went full-steam ahead on TOD and transit investment and citizens were to some extent blindsided. TACA was formed to address regional-scale concerns about new TOD. Renters, homeowners, and small, local businesses had concerns about how gentrification and construction would impact their life in the area.

Tool #2 Example: Greenbelt Alliance (GA)

This group started much like the ESLC did. In 1987, GA changed focus to affordable housing as a way to prevent sprawl. People were moving out of the San Francisco Bay area for cheaper housing in the suburbs. They worked on infill, compact development programs. They do development endorsements and send people to attend hearings to speak on development proposals. They have Compact Development Endorsemnt Guidelines that include compactness, affordability, pedestrian facilities, transportation choice, green building, environmental considerations, community input, land preservation, sustainable parking, etc.

The GA has endorsed various developments in their area over the years creating a database of community development information useful to citizens.

10:10a.m.-Jess Zimbabwe finishes and asks for questions. Contact Jess at jess.zimbabwe@uli.org or via phone at 202-624-7038.

Audience asks about how to work with local government officials and multiple jurisdictions. What success strategies ought we use? Jess says in Minneapolis-St. Paul region has a revenue sharing model for new development where municipalities share revenues from new development and work together on project management. She says regional governmental cooperation is very important.

MAPP ACTION CENTER PHOTO CLARIFICATION

It has been brought to our attention that the main masthead image on our MAPP Action center site is not an accurate depiction of what the proposed towers would like there if they are built in Dorchester County. While ESLC recognizes that the transmission tower that is currently on our website is not representative of the structures that PHI and Delmarva will be using in Dorchester County, we do not feel that the renderings that PHI and Delmarva have represented (please click here for a PDF of the photos that PHI have released publicly) are true to the nature of the height and scale of the structures. While the renderings show the type of transmission tower that will be built, the environment in the renderings do not represent the impacts of these towers on the landscape of the Eastern Shore.

We want to know what you think - and please use this blog as an area to talk about the project, the towers, our photos or PHI's photos.

Celebrating a Major Victory this Week

Later this week, ESLC staff and other partners will celebrate a major land protection victory - the protection of a very special place in Dorchester County. On April 24, 2009 at 3 p.m., ESLC will host a ribbon cutting at a property it recently protected on Marshyhope Creek. ESLC's partners in the preservation of this property will be present, including representatives from ESLC, The Nature Conservancy, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Dorchester County, and the DelMarVa Council of Boy Scouts of America. According to The Nature Conservancy, the property which is located the confluence of the Marshyhope and Nanticoke Rivers in Dorchester County, is one of the State’s “Last Great Places.”

The 392-acre property includes approximately 332 acres of wet and upland forest, The remaining acreage is meadow and wetlands. It is the site of the globally rare Wades Savanna wetland, the only wetland of its kind in Maryland, Wetlands of Special State Concern, as well as ancient sand dunes. The property is also known to contain habitat for a lengthy list of rare, threatened and endangered species.

Despite long-time efforts by conservation groups to protect the land, the property was purchased in 2005 for the purpose of mining sand and gravel. In August 2008, using Federal money through the Coastal and Estuarine Land Conservation Program (CELCP) and private funds from The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and ESLC The property was purchased in order to protect it forever.

ESLC transferred the property to Dorchester County last September. The County conveyed a conservation easement to ESLC and MET in December, which allows only natural, environmental, educational, scenic, cultural, open space, historic, and rural uses of the property. The property is now leased by Boy Scouts of America, which operates the Richard A. Henson Scout Reservation on an adjacent property.

The ribbon cutting ceremony, which is open to the public, will include a blessing of the land by Chief Winterhawk, remarks by locak officials, as well as tours of the property and refreshments. The property is located at 5603 Sharptown Road in Rhodesdale, MD. For directions and further information, visit www.eslc.org or call 410-827-9756.

Check out ESLC's Spring Newsletter

It is here and hot off the presses for your viewing pleasure...ESLC's Spring newsletter! Want to have it delivered direcly to your door (or save some carbon and have it delivered to your in-box?) Sign up for an ESLC membership - for the first time, we are offering an online membership for only $15! You get all the benefits of an ESLC membership, plus the knowledge that you are helping protect the rich rural heritage of the Eastern Shore - for less than it costs to fill up a tank of gas! Please wander over to the ESLC website at www.eslc.org to sign up or contact our Membership Coordinator, Robin Telepchak at rtelepchak@eslc.org to sign up now!

An Opportunity to make your voice heard about a LOST opportunity

Please join us this Tuesday, April 14 to show your support for protecting the viewshed of the Leaverton House in Caroline County. The Board of Zoning Appeals will make a ruling on the proposal to construct a new cell tower on the Harriet Tubman Underground Byway Corridor in Caroline County. This proposal should be denied by the Caroline County Board of Zoning Appeals because its construction would adversely affect an important cultural and historical resource in the county. This tower, which is proposed for 4321 Langrell Road, would have a tremendous adverse impact on the viewshed of and to the Leaverton house, one of the main stopping houses along the Underground Railroad in Maryland. It is the last standing such “station,” and it is a critical component of future interpretation of the Underground Railroad and pending National Historical Park.
In 2005 ESLC identified the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Byway corridor as one of our highest priority conservation areas due to its tremendous importance to the culture and heritage of this region. In an effort to save this important resource, ESLC is working with several of the landowners along the corridor on voluntary preservation options, are active with several other government and private protection efforts, and we nominated the Corridor as one of Maryland’s “Last Chance Landscapes” in 2007 - a designation which was awarded by Scenic Maryland.
Based on the obvious impact of a cell tower at the proposed location on the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Byway corridor, and because of the critical importance of this historic area to telling one of America’s greatest freedom stories and celebrating its hero Harriet Tubman, ESLC is strongly opposed to this proposed cell tower.

We encourage the Caroline residents to show their opposition to the Board of Appeals to help protect one of the County’s most important cultural resources.
Please show your support for the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Byway by attending Tuesday's meeting. It will be held at 7:30 pm at the Health & Public Service Building, 403 S. 7th Street, Room 110, Denton, Maryland 21629.

New Report Highlights Sprawl Issues: ESLC's take

The recent Environment Maryland report brings up several important issues about the direction of growth on the Eastern Shore and the tools and resource our local governments need to effectively manage that growth. While the report highlights good examples of comprehensive plan inconsistencies in the state, it is important to recognize the efforts our local governments are taking to follow smart growth principles. . Our Eastern Shore counties and towns are working hard against development proposals that go against their comprehensive planning and to their credit, are doing the best in the state to reverse sprawl trends and direct growth where it should be – in and around designated growth areas.

The Eastern Shore is unique in its number of small towns and small-sized priority funding areas, making the challenges our local towns, counties and municipalities a unique and especially challenging one. Eastern Shore 2010, Eastern Shore Land Conservancy’s (ESLC) regional agreement aimed at strengthening land protection efforts on the Eastern Shore, is one of the ways our local counties have stepped up to take control of growth and avoid making land use planning decisions that are not in line with their long-term needs and goals. One of the key goals of Eastern Shore 2010 –directing 80 percent of all new development to villages and towns – will help our towns and villages grow in way that is consistent with their comprehensive planning process and we are proud of the counties who have signed on to strive toward the goals of Eastern Shore 2010.. More work is needed - in terms of education, resources and legislation to support municipalities in their efforts – as local leaders must make the important decisions needed to manage growth effectively.

In just the next 25 years, the Eastern Shore is expected to grow by 160,000 people – growth that could forever alter the landscape we love so much. Our local leaders must take strong steps to manage growth more effectively before it is too late; before the Eastern Shore we know and love is forever altered.

Help Save Program Open Space!

FUNDING FOR PROGRAM OPEN SPACE IS ONCE AGAIN AT RISK!

The Senate is considering taking ALL land conservation funding for FY10.

Please contact Senate President Mike Miller immediately and urge him to fully fund Program Open Space!

Call: 301-970-3700

Email: mailto:thomas.v.mike.miller@senate.state.md.us thomas.v.mike.miller@senate.state.md.us

Fax: 301-970-3910

Program Open Space is a vital part of land conservation efforts in the state of Maryland. It is funded through the state real estate transfer tax, which is recognized as one of the first and most successful dedicated funding sources for land conservation in the country. This 0.5% tax on real estate sales is the source of funding for many of Maryland's land conservation programs. This tax revenue provides funding for these critical conservation programs including county parks programs, state land acquisition and development (state parks, forests, and wildlife management areas), the Rural Legacy Program, which protects important agricultural, historical and ecological landscapes, and Maryland Agricultural Land Preservation Foundation (MALPF), which buys easements to protect productive farmland.

The loss of funding will severe impacted land conservation programs and the future of these programs is at a critical point. In addition to valuable farmland and forests, we stand to lose safe and healthy places for our children to play, clean waters and streams and vital wildlife habitat.

Won't you take a minute to call or write Senator Miller TODAY and urge him to fully fund Program Open Space? Thanks for your help!