Good afternoon, everyone.

We are uh beginning the uh development review streamlining work group meeting.

And I'd like to turn it over to the chair.

We just started the recording.

And we can move from there, Chair and following your direction.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

I appreciate it.

Um thank you to uh the members of the work group that are joining us today and the staff.

Uh thank you for your continued work on this work group.

Uh as always, these uh meetings are public, they're open to the public.

They will be recorded and posted on the website for anyone um to be able to have access to in any presentation or information that's shared in this work group will also be shared with the public to orient people.

The goal of this work group is for us to have a conversation around the development process, how we can streamline it in a way that makes it more efficient, but also make sure that we center still the community input and do it in a way that doesn't allow anything around projects to suffer.

And there's representation from industry and community uh that are part of this worker.

Um one of the things we wanted to do is look at uh a condensed fast track process, um, knowing that we wanted to at least present legislation proposals and recommendations to the body that could be passed this session, and there's an opportunity for this uh work group to still meet beyond this point and be extended.

Uh, but the goal was for us to get at least a first round of recommendations out the door.

So for today on the agenda, uh, we're gonna talk about proposed legislation.

Um, some legislation has come from this group and the meetings that have been already sent to me is probably the ones easiest to move forward that I want to make sure we have a space to discuss as a group, and then continue discussion on the um chart of recommendations that have been collected through all of the meetings we've had thus far, and then we'll have a uh opportunity to uh vote on the package of recommendations that will be sent as an official letter to the body of the council.

So I wanna start with okay.

Is there I see a hand, guess Greg.

Um correct, can you come off of mute or does someone have to give you the ability to do that?

I'm sorry, I'm having trouble hearing.

Are you calling on me?

Yes.

So, Madam Chair.

Um, it's it sounds like you want this group to make recommendations for legislation that would pass before summer recess.

Is that what I heard?

No, before the end of session.

Okay, so before the end of this calendar year session.

Yeah.

Gotcha.

Okay.

Okay.

So I just want to um, you know, people are tired of hearing hearing me say this, but like to serve from the start.

And you know, I I agree to participate um after being appointed, um, just to have a voice at the table.

Um, and my concern all along has been that there's a presumption in the mission of this of this committee that uh, and I think it's a biased presumption that things are too slow in Prince George's County.

I I really think um what we really need is a full conversation about not just getting faster decisions and and faster approvals, but getting better decisions.

Um, and we can talk about what that means through a fairer process, and we could talk about what that means as well.

Um, and I've said more than once I have a lot of sympathy for um agency staff who are working their butts off, working well past 5 p.m., uh, but also um working in agencies that are understaffed that may not have the resources and sometimes are in a political pressure to do certain things.

But I I think there's a unfortunately that I think there's a bias in the mission, and I think clearly there's a bias in the composition of the committee.

Um it's it's one environmental activist, one person who's been through the planning academy, I guess, as a community representative, and then 10 folks from what I consider to be the development community.

You know, no uh criticism there, but four or five, I think have identified themselves as being in leadership positions within my own built building industry association.

And I I think at a number of, you know, so I've met I've made that point, and I think it would make a whole lot more sense to serve the public and the council well to reconstitute the committee with um a broader, more balanced membership, and to rethink the mission so that we're getting the the goal is better decisions rather than the broadly defined and a fairer process.

Um there hasn't been an opportunity.

I've raised some concerns on different points of problems with the process, but there hasn't been an opportunity present to this committee from a community perspective, the problems that we see in the process of problems with um weak notice requirements, the problems with the agencies or the applicants failing to follow the notice requirements, the lack of transparency around projects in general, the really poor databases at planning and DPI, um, the non-existing database that's a public database at soil conservation.

I mean, the whole process is rife with these problems.

And honestly, I I first engaged on a land use issue, an application in Prince Orchest County in 2018, and I pointed some of these problems out from the beginning.

And I could tell you at every turn, I was told pretty much that there was really no problem there, when in fact there were serious problems, when in fact the applicant hadn't followed the public notice requirements and planning had failed to require them to do that, to the point that I went back and spent hours documenting the extent of the violation and finally put it and putting that in detailed in writing with the with the um exhibits, and the applicant was compelled days before the hearing to withdraw their application.

The planning board was compelled to cancel the hearing.

That shouldn't have been necessary.

So I I think if we want to have a get a better decision through fairer process, where there really is informed public engagement facilitated through really good databases, real transparency, better procedural laws, and better adherence to procedural laws, then that's a conversation worth having.

But this, where two weeks ago we were asked to move to consensus on certain recommendations when we have been told the 24th might be the voting date.

Yeah, it just it it just doesn't this doesn't, I don't think serve the public interest or the council particularly well in this approach.

And I can understand it may be a well-meaning approach, but right now I count we maybe have four or five committee members.

I'm seeing on screen.

We don't have what anybody would consider to be a forum.

Um we've asked for information.

I've asked for information along the way where we saw comparisons on how different jurisdictions uh processes work.

I said, okay, what are the relevant staffing levels?

What tools are they working with?