Councilmembers, led by Hans Riemer, plan to introduce another zoning scheme that will allow duplexes, triplexes, quadplexes, boarding houses, and even assembly of single-family home lots into stack-and-pack apartment complexes, in currently single-family home neighborhoods. Too incompetent to address the County's moribund economy, failing schools, and rising violent crime, the Council's Maoist-inspired strategy is to bring down successful neighborhoods and school clusters via allowing multifamily development in every neighborhood countywide, and through forced busing of children to schools outside of their neighborhoods.
Residents who have seen the results of similar radical strategies in Seattle and San Francisco are saying, "No, thanks" to the ZTA plan. The ZTA plan will increase school overcrowding in desirable school clusters, and the ultimate multifamily rezoning will more than quadruple existing school overcrowding. Protesters will ask the Council to delay the ZTA vote tomorrow.
Your post is factually incorrect. There is nothing in the zoning amendment that would allow for triplexes and so on, and the "attack on SFH neighborhoods" is just a talking point out of the NIMBY playbook. Plenty of communities across the country have embraced accessory dwelling units without the negative consequences that are being touted by protesters. Accessory dwelling units in fact already exist in Montgomery County, but no one cared until it was pointed out that lower income folks could afford the rents.
ReplyDelete8:48: Reading skills are a must - I clearly stated the further changes for duplexes, triplexes, etc. would come in a later zoning change following the ADU bill.
ReplyDeleteWhat is a "NIMBY playbook?"
Very few jurisdictions have implemented such zoning for ADUs. ADUs do exist, but they are not as large and liberal as those allowed under the new zoning. They haven't been a viable Cultural Revolution tool for the Council Fellow Travelers in their current guise. Believe it or not, there's no human or civil right to live in a Potomac mansion.
True there is a right to a Potomac mansion and there isn’t a right to a movie theater yet you think the council should mandate one in Bethesda. Do you have a financial insensitive for one? Gonna get some kickbacks?
DeleteYou really have to ask what a NIMBY playbook is? That so called elite high school education is a joke.
Ah, distraction. A useful tool for when Dyer doesn't want to come to terms with a reader's factual analysis. I get it. "They're all communists." How clever.
ReplyDeleteso much misinformation in this post by Dyer that there's really no point in leaving a comment, but here I am nevertheless
ReplyDelete"Believe it or not, there's no human or civil right to live in a Potomac mansion."
ReplyDeleteAnd there is no "human or civic right" to have property zoned in perpetuity for "Potomac mansions" either, just to subsidize your property values.
I'm glad that the state of Oregon has seen the light.
https://www.npr.org/2019/07/01/737798440/oregon-legislature-votes-to-essentially-ban-single-family-zoning
9:37: I wouldn't call turning the suburban green space into urban mixed-use "seeing the light." Unless I were a developer.
ReplyDeleteThere's quite a difference between owning property and demanding a nonexistent right to live in a particular neighborhood. The latter is Communism.
"Demanding a nonexistent right to live in a particular neighborhood. The latter is Communism."
ReplyDeleteNot "Communism" and certainly not "nonexistent". Established by the Civil Rights Act and the Fair Housing Act.
Maybe this all a move to destroy property ownership by the middle class. Yes in theory you own the space in condo but you really don't "own" anything. You own a right to use something. At least people in row homes actually own a piece of real property. They can have front and back gardens. They want to kill the middle class for their centralizing schemes.
ReplyDeleteLearning
I'm not exactly sure how giving you more freedom to do more with your own property is "a move to destroy property ownership".
ReplyDelete@ 11:12 AM - Who is forcing you to abandon your home and move into a condo?
ReplyDeleteI think 11:12 AM is confusing condos with co-ops.
ReplyDeleteAre townhomes also not legitimate real estate in their mind? lol
Upzoning would be even better than this proposal. Property values would skyrocket.
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ReplyDelete1:26pm please point me to the folks raking in money covering local news..lol
DeleteSince when are there "middle class" living in single-family homes in Bethesda?
ReplyDelete11:12 is a Gammon who needs to go back to his Shithole Country.
ReplyDelete10:48: Dyer and Brett Kavanaugh are going to drag you kicking and screaming back to the 1950s, as they use their elite education to Make America Great Again, Soy Boyyyyyyyyy!!!!
ReplyDelete`12:05, 12:11, 2:43 and 6:01. Wow I inspired the trolls to comment , Purposely obtuse.
ReplyDeleteI must be on to something. Bethesda still has nice smallish homes and colonials. Not mansions. But a family with kids could have plenty of room and a garden. They could own property actual property. But we have an economy based on making debt slaves of everyone.
Actually I am for pretty much people doing what they want in a neighborly way. ADU, chickens, bee hives Cool. I an not for politicians who get all there money from developers and who work for developers yet pretend that they actually work for their constituents.
Learning
I am curious what percentage of a politician’s donations would count as “all their money”? And what’s the exact amount to be in donor’s pocket? $100? $1000? More?
DeleteThis is one of those rare instances where I agree with Robert, at least to a degree. I'm not necessarily opposed to ADUs, but I'm also not inherently a supporter. Like most policies, they won't be effective or positive, if not implemented correctly. I do think the Council is rushing this process due to developer pressure and that the currently bill is not well thought out and could likely do more harm than good. There are in fact middle-class and also lower class individuals and families still living in Bethesda. I know, I'm one. I also canvassed Bethesda in last year's County Exec race and know that I'm not alone. Continuing to expand population density in many areas w/o providing the necessary infrastructure and amenities is unfair to both current and future residents.
ReplyDeleteKeeping disparate income groups apart is just common sense. Wealthy individuals in favor of such integration tend to be those trying to “rescue the poor” which is just plain insulting. Having said that there’s a lot to be said for members of an extended family sharing the same oversized lot. For example senior citizens having their own separate place out back.
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