A standing-room-only crowd of more than 275 residents packed the hearing room in the county office building last night to tell the Planning Board their concerns about capital budget requests for the fiscal year beginning July 1.
Nancy Perkins of Vista Road wanted to make sure a $132,000
storm drainage project for her street was included among the recommendations. The project is not scheduled to begin until July 1997, but that may be too late to do any good, Ms. Perkins told the board.
Properties continue to be developed without adequate storm drainage, she said, because the county has been granting the developer waivers and accepting fees in lieu of construction. "Collecting the money doesn't help," Ms. Perkins said. "What we need is to have storm drains constructed."
Pat Flynn of Baltimore Avenue in North Laurel asked the board to endorse a $173,000 sidewalk construction project planed for her area. "We've been extremely lucky so far that no child has been seriously hurt or worse" because of the lack of a sidewalk, she said. "But it's a dangerous situation that cannot go on indefinitely."
Penny Zimring of Dee Jay Drive in Ellicott City expressed just the opposite view about a $209,000 sidewalk planned for her neighborhood, calling the project "irresponsible." The problem for pedestrians is not a lack of sidewalks, but speeders, she said. People already are complaining about speeding cars knocking down mailboxes, she said, and "to put a walkway in [their path] is almost more dangerous."
People in her neighborhood want to preserve the privacy afforded them by the mature trees and shrubs that would be removed for sidewalks, Ms. Zimring said. "Are you going to replant them?" she asked. "Who is going to clean the walkways and remove the snow?"
A group of property owners planning to build homes in a development called Spring Valley Chase in western Howard County complained about a recommended site for an $8 million water tower the county plans to build near Alpha Ridge landfill.
The group complained that it was not aware of the county's plans to build a water tower so close to the development and feared it would lower property values.
Lynn Zimmerman, who identified herself as a "soon-to-be-resident" of the county, said her residence would be the most severely impacted of the homes in the development. "Our living room view changes from peaceful trees to a water tower globe," she said. "I am concerned we will never be able to find a good buyer. [The water tower] is the size of a 13-story building."
Ms. Zimmerman suggested that the tower be located at the county landfill, where its unsightliness would bother fewer property owners. In addition, those properties already are depreciated because they are so close to the landfill, she said.
The most expensive new projects proposed for the next capital budget -- those put forward by Howard Community College and the Board of Education -- received scant attention last night.
The Planning Board will continue to receive written testimony about capital budget requests until Wednesday. It will hold a work session on them Thursday.
After hearing from the public, the board will review department heads' requests and make recommendations to County Executive Charles I. Ecker.