News and Views
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Petition to Change Gas Leaf Blower Law
Read more: Petition to Change Gas Leaf Blower LawA new petition has been created on Change.org to gather community support for an Amendment to the MoC0 Gas Leaf Blower Ban. In addition to reports from private businesses expressing the need to reduce the size of their workforce to accommodate the cost of this ban, there are also growing reports from HOAs and neighborhood…
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Despite NCAA changes MCPS Still Promotes Transgender Sports
Read more: Despite NCAA changes MCPS Still Promotes Transgender SportsOn February 6th, the NCAA announced that the Board of Governors updated its policy for transgender student-athletes. The changes were in response to an executive order by the Trump administration. The new policy limits competition in women’s sports to student athletes assigned female at birth only. The President of NCAA stated: The NCAA is an…
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New MD Bill: Don’t use Grok to Mock Me!!
Read more: New MD Bill: Don’t use Grok to Mock Me!!Always on the hunt for potential mechanisms that might undermine their authority or persuade votes to question their service, MoCo Delegate Anne Kaiser has sponsored legislation in the General Assembly to: Prohibiting a person from using fraud to influence or attempt to influence a voter’s voting decision; providing that fraud includes the use of synthetic…
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Who benefits from Jawando’s zoning pause? Wealthy progressives.
Read more: Who benefits from Jawando’s zoning pause? Wealthy progressives.Michael Bell Wealthy progressives have an interesting personality duality: many of them put We Believe yard signs professing concern for the underserved, and simultaneously they struggle with entitlement. I saw this myself as I took a drive around Chevy Chase Section 5 last November. Many of that area’s palatial homes boast yard signs demanding a…
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Board of Education Compensation: Part 3—Granting talented teenagers a sense of entitlement
Read more: Board of Education Compensation: Part 3—Granting talented teenagers a sense of entitlementDelegates Vogel and Charkoudian’s giveaway to their friends on the Board of Education includes a scholarship to the student member of the board (SMOB). SMOBs already receive a $25,000 scholarship, and Vogel-Charkoudian want to increase that to the lesser of a) the highest tuition + room + board within UMD and b) 80% of a…
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Natali announces fix for snow removal
Read more: Natali announces fix for snow removalAfter receiving around 8 inches of snow this week, receiving multiple complaints about slow snow removal, and being forced to close school for 3 days, Natali-Gonzalez has a decided to take a stand. One Wednesday, she gathered with representatives from CASA to announce that she will be introducing legislation that cancels all current snow removal…
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Board of Education Compensation: Part 2—Nobody needs a full-time BoE
Read more: Board of Education Compensation: Part 2—Nobody needs a full-time BoEIn part 1 of this series we reviewed the historical narrative for granting full-time pay to MCPS Board of Education members. The overarching theme for the pay increase is that the board members are doing full-time work for part-time pay. Here is a map of the counties in the DC region. The ones shaded in…
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Board of Education Compensation: Part 1—At MCPS, friends don’t let friends make less than $124,000
Read more: Board of Education Compensation: Part 1—At MCPS, friends don’t let friends make less than $124,000MoCo delegates Lorig Charkoudian and Joel Vogel have introduced MC 7-25, which provides for the following: a) MCPS Board of Education members get pay raises to $124,000/year starting December 2026 from the current $25,000/year (BoE president gets $10,000 more); b) the student member of the board is entitled to 80% of that $124,000 to be…
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Legislative Achievements of Vice President Will Jawando
Read more: Legislative Achievements of Vice President Will JawandoWe are convinced that election to President and Vice President must be done simply on the basis of years of service and have nothing to do with successful enacting legislative priorities that benefit the county. Here is quick summary of the legislative achievements of the newly selected Vice President of the County Council, Will Jawando.…
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Hearing on BOE Adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Association definition of Antisemitism
Read more: Hearing on BOE Adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Association definition of AntisemitismOn December 5, 2024 several members of the public testified before the Board of Education against the BOE adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Association definition of Antisemitism, as the County Council did in 2022. Former MCPS parent Evelyn Frankl stated in her testimony, “In the context of Jews and Palestinians in the US, Jews are…