Happy new year! I hope you had a pleasant holiday season. As we kick off the new year, I’ll be identifying legislative and other priorities for the coming year. If there’s anything you’d like me to focus on, please let me know.

We have our first meeting of the year coming up on Monday. Here are some details on that meeting.

I hope everyone had a pleasant Thanksgiving. We have another Council meeting coming up this Monday, and the big items are two appointments, legislation governing short term rentals (and limiting them, if my amendments succeed), and more legislation that would strengthen the Critical Area laws (even more so if my amendments pass). Here are some details:

Since this will likely be my last email before Thanksgiving, I’d like to wish everyone a pleasant and safe Thanksgiving holiday. I’m certainly looking forward to a break.

Here are a few updates regarding the next Council meeting and other issues going on in the City.

Our October Town Hall went well. I’d like to thank the City’s Planning & Zoning Department for coming out to brief everyone on their work on the 2020 Comprehensive Plan. If you should want to complete a survey for the plan, and ensure our voice in Ward 7 is heard, you can fill that out here. If you have any special guests you would like me to invite to our next meeting, please let me know. 

First thing I would like to update you on is that we will be having our autumn town hall meeting this Tuesday, October 15th from 7-8:30 pm. I know there’s a lot going on that evening, but that was the only date the library had available. I do apologize for any inconvenience. Staff from our Planning & Zoning Department will attend in an effort to update you, and hopefully gather your input for the 2020 Annapolis Comprehensive Plan. I expect that to only take a half hour at the most, and then I’d like to transition to our normal open question & answers format, after I give some brief remarks. I hope to see you all there! Given that this is a busy boat show weekend I’ve been short on volunteers, so if you can help distribute flyers in other parts of the Ward please let me know and I’ll let you know there areas that still need to be hit. 

September is proving to be quite a busy month as the Council gets back into the swing of things after our August break. I’ll provide a few legislative updates below. I also wanted to take a moment and let you know that I’m going to try to get a fall town hall event scheduled for either October or November, depending on the availability of the library. I’ll also probably setup at least three meetings next year, including another picnic in the summer.

I hope you have had a pleasant summer! You may have noticed that I’ve been quiet the past few weeks. That’s because the Council had an August recess, and I took advantage of that by taking a much needed vacation to Hawaii for a few weeks. I apologize if any of your emails have gone unanswered (I’m still catching up), but I pledge that I will return all of the messages I’ve received. Now I’m rested, recharged, and ready to get back to work for Ward 7! 

Of particular note I want to let everyone know that one of my keystone ordinances is up for a public hearing on Monday: the effort to create an Annapolis Department of the Environment (at no cost).

We have two Council meetings left this month until our recess for the month of August. The first meeting, on Monday, has a number of pieces of legislation up for a vote. The next is on the afternoon of the 31st, and I believe the only thing we will be doing that that meeting is voting to confirm the nominated Police Chief, but I’m not entirely sure what’s on that agenda yet. On the same day, from 6-9 is our first (hopefully annual) Ward 7 community picnic/party. More on that below. 

I hope you are staying cool during this heatwave. Ever since the budget passed (more on that below), I’ve been trying to keep cool myself and take a bit of a break. However, no rest for the weary and our next Council meeting is coming up this Monday. Here are a few updates on that and more going on in the community.

Wow, this past Monday’s Council meeting was a brutal one. 13 hours!! We went from 10AM to 11PM. The vast majority of the meeting was a deliberation on the Mayor’s proposed FY20 budget, where we had our second vote on the budget. Our third and final vote/reader on the proposed budget, as amended, will be this Monday. This will also be your final opportunity to comment on the budget before we hold our final votes. I’ll post more of an update on how this meeting went below.