'Green' bills may be delayed

The Baltimore Sun

Although he wants the County Council to approve his "green" building legislation next week, Howard County Executive Ken Ulman might have to wait until fall.

The County Council is to meet again today for an unusual second work-session discussion on the five-piece package of bills and resolutions. But despite an Ulman administration fact sheet debunking nine "myths" about the green legislation, council members seemed divided and uncertain after a long discussion Monday evening on the complex legislation. The green-buildings term is a shorthand way of describing buildings that are environmentally friendly.

All five council members say they favor the green-building concept, but with a deadline of 2 p.m. tomorrow for filing amendments, it is unclear if the issue will be voted on Monday or delayed. The council does not meet in August, so if the bills are tabled, members could vote on the measures in September or delay them again until October, said council administrator Sheila Tolliver.

The package would offer commercial builders property tax breaks up to 75 percent for five years for buildings that meet Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design silver, gold or platinum standards. It requires a minimum LEED certification -- one level below silver -- for commercial buildings of 20,000 square feet or more. Builders objected, saying they don't like mandates, and that costs are proportionately higher for small buildings. Ulman quickly said he would change the minimum size to 50,000 square feet or more.

"Most business people have ingrained in their DNA [opposition to] government mandates. It's just the way we are," Cole Schnorf, a partner in Manekin, one of the county's most active office builders and management firms, told the council. Other issues involve a required bond to guarantee compliance and how to properly incorporate LEED standards into county law. The Ulman administration is working on amendments on both issues.

A second bill would require any building constructed with at least 30 percent county money to at least meet silver LEED standards.

The other measures would set residential environmental standards and alter the allocation system the county uses to restrict how many homes can be built annually in each area.

Ulman would take 100 of the 250 allocations from the rural western county and allow builders countywide to compete for them as green residential developments. Landowners, builders and council members have objected that the idea would change the development rules. They advocate allowing 50 or 100 more homes next year for Ulman's purpose.

Ulman's fact sheet said that despite complaints from Mildred Nixon and her son, Randall, that the proposed law would threaten their plans to develop their West Friendship farm into large new homes, "the Nixons are second in the allocation line for next year, and they will receive their full complement of allocations, 43."

Council Chairman Calvin Ball, an east Columbia Democrat, and Councilwoman Jen Terrasa, a North Laurel-Savage Democrat, appear interested in voting Monday on the environmental bills. But western county Republican Councilman Greg Fox is campaigning to table them. The other two members, west Columbia's Mary Kay Sigaty and Ellicott City Democrat Courtney Watson, haven't publicly committed themselves.

"We have to work through these issues as much as we can and see what we can accomplish," Ball said after the session.

At Watson's urging, council members compiled 13 questions on the two commercial building bills. Ulman administration officials vowed to try to satisfy any objections with amendments and explanations.

"I'm not prepared to vote on it tonight," Sigaty said. "I don't know what we'll be doing."

Fox said he is not trying to harm the legislation but feels the council needs more time. He handed out information sheets about similar laws, including a reprint of a May 8 Fox News story about major operation problems in green municipal buildings built in Seattle.

"Everyone one of us is committed to get something done," Fox said after the meeting.

Joshua Feldmark, executive director of the county Commission on Environment and Sustainability, said Ulman is prepared to offer multiple amendments to satisfy specific objections from council members or business leaders. "I don't think there is anything on here [the council's list] we'd be opposed to," he said.

Although work sessions have traditionally involved brief exchanges among the five council members, the meeting resembled a public hearing, with a battery of lobbyists and experts answering members' questions and sometimes offering their views uninvited.

Sigaty and Watson haven't said how they might vote on the bills.

The council is to discuss the residential portion of the package at 4 p.m. today.

The council also discussed a binding-arbitration bill for county firefighters and police and a living-wage bill that would set a minimum hourly pay of $12.41 for workers at firms with at least five employees that are doing at least $100,000 a year in county business -- primarily contract janitorial workers.

larry.carson@baltsun.com

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