Oversight Committee

TUESDAY Mental Health Agency -- The Anne Arundel County Mental Health Agency Board of Directors will meet at 4 p.m. at 2664 Riva Road, Heritage Office Complex, Annapolis, to review and implement a policy for individuals accessing public mental health services. 410-222-7858. Odenton Oversight Committee -- The Odenton Town Center Plan Oversight Committee will meet at 6:30 p.m. at the Western District Police Station, 8273 Telegraph Road. The committee is an advocate for Odenton community property owners, developers and businesses in the growth management area.

The Odenton Town Plan Oversight Committee was formed in January 1996 by the Anne Arundel County executive.The committee is made up of 11 members representing both business and citizen interests, all appointed by the executive.Recent Sun coverage about the county's purchase of land for the future West County Regional Library in Odenton has portrayed the purchase as a paycheck to Jay Winer for his support of then-County Executive John G. Gary in the November 1998 election. In the opinion of members of the Odenton Town Plan Oversight Committee, that portrayal is not true.

Developer Jay Winer should resign from an Odenton planning committee for engineering a county land deal that benefited him, Anne Arundel County Council President Daniel E. Klosterman Jr. said yesterday."

Four Mount Airy community organizations are working to heal a rift between community festivals that erupted last month when one group accused the other of stealing its vendors.The Spring Fling, a one-day festival in May in its third season, and the Fall Festival, a two-day event in October for 15 years, coexisted peacefully until last month.Then the Fall Festival committee concluded that the town wasn't big enough for both events and sent letters to the Fall Festival's artisans and food vendors.

WASHINGTON -- In Washington, you can't take friendship personally. Ask Dave Bossie.Mr. Bossie got sacked last week as the chief investigator for the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee -- the panel charged with investigating campaign-finance improprieties in 1996. He got tossed on the orders of the man who put him there, House Speaker Newt Gingrich.Mr. Bossie didn't learn of his ouster from Mr. Gingrich, of course. He got a midnight call from the Chicago Tribune and learned further details the next morning by watching television.

WASHINGTON -- House Speaker Newt Gingrich moved yesterday to shift key parts of an investigation of Democratic fund-raising away from the control of Rep. Dan Burton, whose zealous efforts to damage President Clinton have embarrassed and irritated fellow Republicans.Another round of partisan finger-pointing in Burton's Government Reform and Oversight Committee ended yesterday with Democrats refusing to grant immunity to four potential witnesses to alleged campaign finance abuses.The Democratic committee members had earlier failed in their effort to remove the Indiana Republican from the helm of the campaign finance investigation.

Essential as it is to retaliate against terrorists, it is necessary to identify them first. Otherwise, they win double.The House Government Reform and Oversight Committee holds the attorney general in contempt and vice versa. Both may be right.Consumers are confident, but what do they know?Turns out it was the rent collector to whom that Raven quoth, "Nevermore."Pub Date: 8/10/98

Baltimore's top judges are asking to take "administrative and fiscal" control of the Alternative Sentencing Unit, an unusual court program that recently has come under scrutiny for its hiring practices and management of criminals in the community.In a letter to Bishop L. Robinson, secretary of Public Safety and Correctional Services, Joseph H. H. Kaplan, administrative judge of the Baltimore Circuit Court, and Mary Ellen T. Rinehardt, administrative judge of the Baltimore District Court, said such a change would enable them to make the unit "a model program on a state and federal level."

Fourteen Republican senators asked Attorney General Janet Reno to investigate whether Commerce Secretary Ron Brown cheated on his income taxes and/or misled Congress about his business dealings. A Brown aide calls this part of a "smear campaign."There have been unfounded allegations against the secretary, and we don't doubt some Republicans in Congress will try to make political hay out of this situation. Indeed, Rep. Dan Burton, an Indiana Republican with a reputation for seeking confrontation, has already asked that President Clinton remove Mr. Brown from office while the Criminal Division at the Justice Department and congressional committees look into the matter.

WASHINGTON -- The nearly 3 million federal government employees, including 300,000 who live in Maryland, would have to contribute up to 36 percent more to their pensions under a bill expected to be approved by a House committee.The House Reform and Oversight Committee recessed yesterday to give members time to study the legislation. The bill is fiercely opposed by federal employees unions, as well as by many members of Congress and their staffs, whose more generous pensions would be reduced.

WASHINGTON -- Before June's deadly subway crash, no federal agency stepped in to ensure that the Metro commuter rail system found and fixed the electrical circuits now suspected of contributing to the worst accident in the system's history. That's because none is authorized to. Although the federal government regulates the safe operation of buses, Amtrak, airplanes and even ferries, it cedes primary oversight of subway safety to local panels - in the case of Metro, the little-known Tri-State Oversight Committee.

TC closing was a shock Your editorial titled "TC deserves answers" (July 14) said it all. The announcement of the immediate closing of Towson Catholic High School sent my head spinning, my heart pounding and my anger rising. The more I thought about it, the more I wondered if I had missed a letter from the alumni office. There had to be a warning that I had missed. The fact that there wasn't is just so discombobulating. It is similar to putting your grandmother into a nursing home without her being notified and before checking on other resources.

TUESDAY Mental Health Agency -- The Anne Arundel County Mental Health Agency Board of Directors will meet at 4 p.m. at 2664 Riva Road, Heritage Office Complex, Annapolis, to review and implement a policy for individuals accessing public mental health services. 410-222-7858. Odenton Oversight Committee -- The Odenton Town Center Plan Oversight Committee will meet at 6:30 p.m. at the Western District Police Station, 8273 Telegraph Road. The committee is an advocate for Odenton community property owners, developers and businesses in the growth management area.

A Columbia Association oversight committee is urging that the organization continue to allow using association money to provide alcohol for meetings and social events, and reject a proposed ban on the practice. Cynthia Coyle, a board member representing Harper's Choice and a member of the oversight committee, proposed the ban on using association funds for alcohol. "It's not a matter of money so much, even though it adds up to thousands of dollars. It's more the principle and why can't they have an event without alcohol?"

Baltimore school board members voted last night to accept "in principle" an agreement with Mayor Martin O'Malley that would provide enough funding to help the school system pay its bills through the end of this school year -- and give more oversight of its financial matters to the city. The funding agreement gives the financially struggling schools a $42 million loan to ease a cash-flow problem that threatened to bankrupt the system. The proposed loan -- and plan for repayment -- will be reviewed today by the City Council and would have to be approved by the city's Board of Estimates tomorrow.

A bill that would spell out a nonprofit, public service mission for CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield and set up an oversight committee to monitor the state's largest health insurer is expected to be introduced today in the Maryland House of Delegates. As written, the bill also would end the terms of 11 of CareFirst's 21 board members by the end of September, but drafters of the bill said the provisions that would change the board are likely to be amended. Del. Shane E. Pendergrass, primary sponsor of the bill, and Del. John Adams Hurson, chairman of the House Health and Government Operations Committee, who worked on developing it, both described it as "a work in progress."

Baltimore area residents listed education, traffic congestion, and crime and drugs as three of their major concerns for the future, according to an overview of a survey conducted as a part of a 30-year plan for the Baltimore region. Details of the survey, along with 15 preliminary "vision statements" for the future of the Baltimore region, will be discussed at a public workshop tomorrow night as a part of Vision 2030, a cooperative effort between the Baltimore Regional Transportation Board and the Baltimore Metropolitan Council.

Support Vision 2030 for the future of Carroll Carroll County enjoys a proud tradition of local government and independent decision-making -- strong principles that should not change. As the head of the Vision 2030 Oversight Committee, I can assure county residents that we are not looking to impose unwanted public policy in Carroll County ("Report on metro area irks local participants," March 8). Instead, Vision 2030 is an unprecedented opportunity for Carroll citizens to share their opinions about the region's future in a spirit of cooperation.

Jay Winer, a longtime proponent of the yet-to-be-built Odenton Town Center, is resigning as chairman of the project's oversight committee to avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest as his real estate company enters into a relationship with a potential developer of the project. For six years, Winer has led the Odenton Town Plan Oversight Committee, a group appointed by the county executive to work with planners to map out growth in the area. Winer announced his resignation in letters to committee members and to Anne Arundel County Executive Janet S. Owens, who accepted it Dec. 31. He will formally announce his resignation at a Greater Odenton Improvement Association meeting at the end of the month.

Jay Winer, a longtime proponent of the yet-to-be-built Odenton Town Center, is resigning as chairman of the project's oversight committee to avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest as his real estate company enters into a relationship with a potential developer of the project. For six years, Winer has led the Odenton Town Plan Oversight Committee, a group appointed by the county executive to work with planners to map out growth in the area. Winer announced his resignation in letters to committee members and to Anne Arundel County Executive Janet S. Owens, who accepted it Dec. 31. He will formally announce his resignation at a Greater Odenton Improvement Association meeting at the end of the month.