Development Projects

The Annapolis Finance Committee will hold a public hearing tonight to consider how much money to put toward several large-scale development projects in the city next year, including a high-profile renovation of City Dock.Annapolis officials launched the $10 million project for the city's historic waterfront last month. This year, the city had hoped to put $1.5 million into the project, with the city and state contributing equal shares of the cost.The state House Appropriations Committee rejected the idea, but the state Senate Budget and Taxation Committee brokered a deal with city officials last week to grant Annapolis $500,000 for preliminary work on the project.

I applaud The Sun for its recent editorial on income inequality ("Labor reawakens," April 27). The increasing income inequality in this country affects the ability of families to survive, much less thrive, on what they earn from minimum wage jobs. The editorial highlighted a labor strike by Chicago low-wage workers and their "Fight for 15" rally. Yet the fact that Baltimore workers are organizing around "fair development" was mentioned in only one sentence. I wonder why The Sun did not find it important to cover the local "reawakening" here by reporting on the Fair Development Rally and March held April 20th.

Development projects under way last year in downtown Baltimore totaled nearly $1.9 billion, more than the area has seen for years, according to a report scheduled for release today. Much of that - about $1.6 billion worth - is still under construction, the nonprofit Downtown Partnership of Baltimore said in its annual State of Downtown report.

The City Council's finance committee chairman threatened Thursday to impose a moratorium on tax breaks for developers until City Hall implements more transparency in the process and funds more projects outside of downtown. Carl Stokes, who chairs the Taxation, Finance and Economic Development Committee, said he wants to see City Hall implement nearly a dozen recommendations from a task force composed of some of Baltimore's best-known business and political leaders before he would allow any more PILOT (payment in lieu of taxes)

The Office of Economic Development will conduct a briefing session on how to apply for a Maryland Industrial Partnerships (MIPS) grant at8:30 a.m. Mar. 20, Room 209-C, Arundel Center North, Glen Burnie.The MIPS program matches state firms with resources at the University of Maryland to develop new and improved products, services of processes that will help the firms compete in their markets and lead to economic benefit to the state. Firms need not be technology-oriented toqualify.Since January 1988, 179 matching grants have been awarded for research and development projects performed by University of Maryland faculty in partnerships with local companies.

The bill passed Monday by Baltimore's City Council that will require developers to include a percentage of affordable housing units in new developments is a welcome strategy to provide more opportunities for low-income residents to remain in the city. Similar policies have been successfully implemented in Montgomery and other counties. This major step forward should work in Baltimore - so long as it dovetails with the city's efforts to convert vacant houses into viable places to live. Like many surrounding areas, Baltimore's housing prices have climbed significantly in recent years.

The Baltimore Development Corp. is seeking proposals for two development projects on the west side of the city. The city's quasi-public development arm announced Thursday that it had reissued a request for proposal for redevelopment of the Liberty Park area, consisting of five city-owned properties along West Fayette and North Liberty streets in the Market Center Urban Renewal Area. A request last year to develop those properties drew no response, according to the BDC. The latest proposal is due Dec. 12. The second request for proposal is for Liberty Clay, two sites within the Market Center Urban Renewal Area.

A mayoral task force has come up with a new round of suggestions on how to boost Baltimore's economy, ranging from directing $20 million of the city's pension investments to local development projects to increasing the marketing budget for tourism.The Economics Incentives Task Force, created by Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke in 1992 to encourage business growth and job creation, also recommended that the mayor appoint an economic development coordinator to work out of his office and initiate a "Buy Baltimore" program for goods and services.

Baltimore voters will be asked to approve $120 million in community and economic development projects intended largely to improve neighborhoods and schools and spur business development. Voters will decide on 14 bond proposals Nov. 5. M. J. "Jay" Brodie, president of Baltimore Development Corp., the city's main economic development arm, said the borrowed money is needed to "continue to allow Baltimore to be competitive with other cities and to take advantage of the great assets and build on them."

BTR Realty Inc., a Linthicum developer that has hit hard times during the recession, said yesterday that it will fold its development division into other operations to concentrate on managing its existing properties, which include the Harford Mall and York Road Plaza.The consolidation will mean that four of the division's seven executives will leave the company, BTR President F. Patrick Hughes said. One of them, Vernon D. Kalkman, was president of BTR until Mr. Hughes replaced him in 1990.

Members of the Republican, Green and Libertarian parties are often divided by strong ideological differences in national politics. But in Baltimore, their candidates emphatically agree on at least one thing: They're fed up with the Democratic dominance of city politics. The names of 16 candidates affiliated with one of those three parties will appear on ballots in Tuesday's general election. Although they may lack the name recognition and fat campaign finance accounts of Baltimore's Democratic incumbents, they say they're running to call attention to problems exacerbated by decades of one-party rule.

The Baltimore Development Corp. is seeking proposals for two development projects on the west side of the city. The city's quasi-public development arm announced Thursday that it had reissued a request for proposal for redevelopment of the Liberty Park area, consisting of five city-owned properties along West Fayette and North Liberty streets in the Market Center Urban Renewal Area. A request last year to develop those properties drew no response, according to the BDC. The latest proposal is due Dec. 12. The second request for proposal is for Liberty Clay, two sites within the Market Center Urban Renewal Area.

Ten redevelopment projects around Maryland will receive more than $11.1 million in state grants to move to the construction stage under a program intended to encourage historic preservation and "green" building practices. Gov. Martin O'Malley announced Friday that the funds are coming from the Sustainable Communities Tax Credit program, successor to the state's old Historic Preservation Tax Credit program. Despite its name, the program was structured for 2011 to give outright grants, not tax credits.

An O'Malley administration proposal to ease Maryland's stringent new storm-water pollution rules won legislative approval Tuesday night, capping a fierce debate over whether the Chesapeake Bay would suffer from giving developers more time and leeway in having to clamp down on rainfall washing off their building projects. After a three-hour hearing, the House-Senate Committee on Administrative, Executive and Legislative Review overwhelmingly endorsed emergency changes to state storm-water pollution regulations that are scheduled to take effect in a month.

Despite neighbors' opposition, a plan to build 325 homes clustered on a portion of historic Doughoregan Manor was unanimously approved Thursday by the Howard County Planning Board. "It's one more step," said Joseph Rutter, the former county planning director who is guiding the project through the county's rezoning system for the descendants of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Some Carroll descendants still live in the mansion on the 892-acre Ellicott City property - once a Colonial estate of more than 10,000 acres.

Developers angling to build a casino in downtown Baltimore assured the state slots commission Thursday that the project is still on track, even though they have yet to pay $19.5 million in required licensing fees or reveal their mystery investor. The Baltimore City Entertainment Group had promised to wire the money and submit detailed plans to state officials by the close of business Thursday, but neither arrived. Instead, Donald C. Fry, chairman of the slots commission, said the Baltimore developers sent a brief letter asking for a "reasonable extension" of their self-imposed deadline and indicating that they are in "advanced negotiations" with a potential investor.

BTR Realty Inc., a Linthicum developer that has hit hard times during the recession, said yesterday that it will fold its development division into other operations to concentrate on managing its existing properties, which include the Harford Mall and York Road Plaza.The consolidation will mean that four of the division's seven executives will leave the company, BTR President F. Patrick Hughes said. One of them, Vernon D. Kalkman, was president of BTR until Mr. Hughes replaced him in 1990.

Developers got their first chance this week to find our what could be required of them if a proposed growth-control law is passed by the County Council.The county Department of Planning and Zoning on Monday released results of its 1991 Road Facilities Test, which examined the condition of roads and intersections serving 17 developments and gave developers options of ways to improve deficient roads.The test is the first indication of what will be in the Design Manual for roads, an integral part of the Adequate Public Faacilities Act introduced to the County Council Sept.

More than $1 billion in development projects - offices, residences, stores and hotels that would change Baltimore's skyline and help to revitalize the city - have stalled in the face of the nationwide housing slump and faltering economy. The projects, including towers that would be Baltimore's tallest, would swell the tax base and potentially attract new - and well-heeled - city dwellers. But the housing slump has dulled the market for new condominiums and houses, and the subsequent credit crunch has made financing difficult to obtain.