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Politics & Government

Council Talks Public Safety, Transportation Budgets

Fire and Rescue recruiting class added; high school cadet program eliminated.

The Montgomery County Council is continuing to hammer out the county's 2012 budget, and Tuesday took on funding for public safety, a major concern in the county.

The public safety committee made some changes to County Executive Isiah Leggett's proposed budget, only slightly increasing funding for the police force. Changes include:

  • Restoring three victim services positions.
  • Restoring funding for the Olney satellite station and the East County satellite station.
  • Restoring funding for overnight front desk service in the 2nd and 6th police district stations.
  • Restoring $60,000 in community policing funds, which cover community outreach and education.
  • Saving nearly $550,000 by putting off scheduled replacement of 25 police vehicles.

The council is leaving other issues untouched, including:

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  • More than $2 million budgeted for 16 new officers in the Ida Sector, a police district in Silver Spring from North White Oak to Briggs Chaney Road, which has seen high rates of violent crime recently. This accounts for the entire increase of $1.2 million to the police budget after cuts in other places.
  • More than $1 million will be cut from the budget proposal to abolish the School Resource Officers program, removing the nine officers from schools. The police will instead work with Montgomery County Public Schools through liaison officers.

The budget must be approved by May 26. Fiscal year 2012 begins July 1.

The council deferred a vote on the plan to replace Bethesda's police station, a public-private partnership with the development firm JBG, which will relocate the station to Cordell Avenue between Wisconsin Avenue and Woodmont Avenue. The council will likely take up the issue later in the week, after members have more time to look at the proposal.

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The committee made few changes to Leggett's budget for the Fire and Rescue Service, adding a second recruiting class with 30 recruits for nearly $350,000. The service's high school cadet program will be eliminated.

The council tackled the transportation budget, making some changes to Leggett's plan.

  • Adding $650,000 for road surfacing from highway user revenue.
  • Adding $350,000 for tree removal, largely in response to Pepco's claims that the county's trees contribute to extensive power outages.
  • Tripling the snow removal budget to $9 million from the current year's budget. This is less than the $13 million Leggett had proposed in his budget, but the committee said it will be enough to maintain the county's bond rating, which had been threatened as the reserve fund was depleted for snow removal over the last few years.

Parking fees, which Councilmember Roger Berliner, D-District 1, called "the hot potato of the transportation world" are still up in the air, but the transportation committee is recommending a 10-cent increase in long-term parking rates beginning in July for the Bethesda parking lot district, but not in Silver Spring, as Leggett's budget requested.The council also discussed funding for Montgomery College, which the committee recommends receive $4.6 million more than the $90.6 million county contribution Leggett's budget allocated. 

College President DeRionne Pollard, defending the school's funding requests, said, "We've done the heavy lifting," on budget cuts, including administrative staff cuts, program cuts and deferring major projects, as well as tuition increases of $3 per credit hour for county residents, $6 for state residents and $9 for out-of-state students. Tuition will increase by the same amount in 2012.

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