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I read that the Charles County Democratic Central Committee is looking for a recipient of their annual Truman Award. The criteria include “one who took action that was/will be considered far ahead of its time. This individual is recognized for making a difference.”
It is for that reason that Ken Robinson should be honored for installing the first (and only) residential wind turbine in Charles County. Though Mr. Robinson has received a lot of publicity including a positive editorial in the March 25, 2009, edition of this newspaper, Charles County has not, to my knowledge, honored this achievement in any way.
On Thursday, March 11, the Charles County Commissioners held a public forum for owners, operators, and residents of private water systems within the County. This forum was held as part of the outreach objectives of the Charles County Water Resources Advisory Committee which serves as a research and advisory group to the Charles County Commissioners. Private water system participants were invited to attend the forum to exchange information among other system participants, system owners and operators, as well as State and County officials. The program consisted of speakers from the Maryland Department of the Environment, the College of Southern Maryland’s Center for Environmental Training, and the non-profit organizations Maryland Rural Water Association and Maryland Rural Development Corporation.
Approximately 50 guests attended from various communities throughout the County that obtain their water supply from a private community water system. The overall purpose of the forum was to provide information to these community members and system operators with regard to current regulatory requirements, water system evaluations, funding programs for system improvements, and operational training opportunities.
[...]
Charles County Commissioner Gary V. Hodge commented that, “The completion of the Waldorf Urban Design Study is an historic step forward in the achievement of a new vision for the future of Waldorf. We have embarked on a strategy of focusing future growth in the urban core of Waldorf, and discouraging sprawl into the rural areas of the County. This Study will put in place the planning and zoning tools needed to make this vision a reality and create a vibrant new urban center with a high quality of life and future access to an efficient mass transit system.”
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The record will remain open for public comment for 10 days, until 4:30 p.m. on March 23. Comments can be submitted via e-mail to: commissioners@charlescounty.org, faxed to the Commissioners´ Office at 301-645-0560, or sent via U.S. postal mail to: Attn: Charles County Commissioners, P.O. Box 2150, La Plata, Md., 20646.
LA PLATA, Md. (March 11, 2010) - The Charles County Sheriff’s Office today released the following incident and arrest reports.
It seems the budget discussions will never end. Just about everyone at just about every level of government is crying the blues. And just about all of them are blaming someone else.
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The bad news for the county is that the state has cut its grant funding and reneged on a longtime arrangement to share gasoline taxes, both meaning millions of dollars less for county coffers.
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So listening to government officials bemoan their lot in life and blame others up and down the funding food chain for their troubles can grow tiresome. The reason times are tight in government is because times have been tight for a lot of other people for quite a while now.
Last week the Charles County commissioners approved several amendments to the pension plans for the county government and sheriff’s office retirees.
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Among the IRS required changes for both plans was an updated definition of earnings, maximum limitations of benefits based on individuals called back into active military duty and distributions to nonspouse beneficiaries.
“Previously you had to be a surviving spouse in order to have eligible rollover; now that is any designated beneficiary,” Chesshire said.
Proposes facility to recycle coal burning byproduct
Mirant Mid-Atlantic officials confirmed this week that a long-disputed fly ash landfill in Faulkner that state officials say has leached heavy metals into groundwater in the area for decades is full and a plan is under way to close the facility.
Misty Allen, director of external affairs for the power company, said Wednesday that Mirant is working with the Maryland Department of the Environment on a closure plan for the landfill that opened in 1970. A lawsuit regarding the facility that calls for the closure and cleanup of the site that was filed about two years ago is due to go to a hearing April 2 in Charles County Circuit Court in La Plata, according to state environmental officials. The MDE joined forces with the Environmental Integrity Group and the Potomac Riverkeeper environmental organization to file the lawsuit.
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Fred Mower, chairman of the county’s board of appeals, said local zoning officials are going to keep a keen eye on the Faulkner site. Mirant has 30 days to file a new special exception application and a detailed report on what is happening at the site with the county, he said, adding that a special exception is needed so that the county can continue to oversee the site during the closure process.
Performance pay a sticking point on Race to the Top
The Charles County Board of Education voted in favor of jumping on the national Race to the Top bandwagon, a federal initiative that would give funding to school systems in exchange for their starting new initiatives to help better prepare students to be college- and career-ready.
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“The wagon is leaving to go to the [Maryland State] Department of Education. How many boards are going to be on the wagon?” he asked.
Board member Jennifer S. Abell quickly responded.
“The wagon doesn’t have a horse pulling it yet,” she said, indicating that there is little information available about the details of the initiative.
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Voting against the decision were Abell, Maura H. Cook and Pamela A. Pedersen.
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“With 60 percent of our working population commuting out of Charles [County] we are a bedroom community, which is one of the many reasons I do strongly support all the projects that would bring professional jobs and prosperity to our county,” said Meredith Sweet, a Waldorf resident and member of the Smarter Growth Alliance for Charles County. “However, while the tech park can certainly fill this criterion, in this present location it would sit like a jagged scar in an area that is forested and has elementary schools and state parks for neighbors, while in Waldorf and White Plains prime industrial park real estate remains vacant.”
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“They say the park could go in Waldorf or in Indian Head but there’s no place for it. There’s not enough contiguous property,” Hungerford said. “They worry [an energetics park] is close to schools, but what we’re talking about over there is dealing with things like an airbag.
They are the most wired vehicles on the road, with dashboard computers, sophisticated radios, navigation systems and cellphones.
While such gadgets are widely seen as distractions to be avoided behind the wheel, there are hundreds of thousands of drivers — police officers and paramedics — who are required to use them, sometimes at high speeds, while weaving through traffic, sirens blaring.
The drivers say the technology is a huge boon for their jobs, saving valuable seconds and providing instant access to essential information. But it also presents a clear risk — even the potential to take a life while they are trying to save one.
The U.S. will spend about $1.8 trillion more than it gets in revenue this year. Next year, it will add an estimated $1.2 trillion to the debt.
Expenses in the billions may not attract much attention these days, but when it gets to the trillions, people sit up and take notice. In a CNN/Opinion Research poll conducted in January, 83% of those polled thought the federal budget deficit was extremely important or very important. The debt and the deficit are enormous political issues and will likely play a big role in the 2012 elections.
But there’s one big group that’s singularly unimpressed by the size of the deficit: the world financial markets.
Much of the nation may be snow-weary, but farmers and ranchers who rely on winter snowpack in the northern Rockies for irrigation during the dry months of the growing season could face water shortages this summer unless more snow arrives soon.
Wet spring and summer conditions in 2008 and 2009 helped pull the region out of a decade-long drought, but now hydrologists are once again reporting below-average mountain snowpack throughout much of the northern Rockies.
Traffic deaths in the USA last year fell to levels not seen since 1954, and the fatality rate was the lowest since the federal government began tracking it in 1966, the Department of Transportation said Thursday.
Highway deaths in 2009 dropped to 33,963, an 8.9% decline from 2008. Road fatalities have fallen every year since 2005, when 43,510 people died in crashes.
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Some road-safety advocates are not yet ready to celebrate. They say the high-unemployment economy is still the greatest factor behind the decline in traffic fatalities.
Residents eager to get their state tax refunds may have a long wait this year: The recession has tied up cash and caused officials in half a dozen states to consider freezing refunds, in one case for as long as five months.
States from New York to Hawaii that have been hard-hit by the economic downturn say they have either delayed refunds or are considering doing so because of budget shortfalls.
It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed.
~Theodore Roosevelt
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