Preservationist Success at

Fourth of July Parade

Land-preservation Success at 4 July Parade

July 4, 2008

3:30 p.m.

With momentum continuing to grow throughout a neighborhood almost unanimous in its opposition to the development of the Baltimore Country Club acreage, the annual Roland Park Fourth of July parade received welcome news this morning.

Baltimore 6th district Councilwoman Sharon Green Middleton — whose position on the land deal had hitherto been unknown — publicly came down firmly on the side of the preservationists.

Saying that Parkies had over the previous few days sent her a “strong message,” in the form of a “load of e-mails” and a packed July 1 special community meeting, Middleton announced that she was “100 percent” behind the community in its efforts, and that Roland Park could “count on me, representing you in City Hall.” (Listen to Middleton’s speech here.)

An overjoyed Phil Spevak, Civic League president, said that the councilwoman’s statement was “huge,” though he cautioned the neighborhood not to let its guard down. “Keep up those e-mails,” he urged. A list of all Roland park area state and municipal representatives, with e-mail addresses, can be found in this web page. (Hear Spevak’s reaction here.)

Other highlights before the crowd of some 600 were Delegate Sandy Rosenberg’s reciting of the Declaration of Independence and a delightful rendition of the national anthem by a neighborhood women’s group.

Many thought it fitting that the parade’s starting point was the Roland Park branch of the Pratt library, rescued and renovated last year by a neighborhood fund drive that raised over $5 million. This, it was thought, proved Roland Park’s capacity for large-scale fund raising, making the BCC’s disinclination to deal with RP all the more mystifying.

A recent prospectus distributed by the BCC board to its membership, advocating the sale of the land to Keswick Multi-Care Center, strongly implies — without quite saying — that there have been no recent other offers on the land (the BCC booklet is here). In fact, as documented here, Roland Park has in the past made three generous offers for the tract. RP organizers contend that the community is willing to step up to the plate again.

There again, the BCC’s stated view, in the prospectus, is that it is “important that a buyer be selected” that can “complete a quality development.” Given that all the RP offers have presupposed the preservation of the land for recreational use and green space, and given that BCC appears predisposed toward the development of the land, perhaps there was never a possibility of agreement.

Only if green space is ruled out as a possibility does it make sense for the BCC to tell its members that “this [is] an extremely desirable development for all informed and concerned residents” of Roland Park.

It is not precisely clear who these “informed and concerned” residents are. Certainly they were nowhere to be seen at the July 1 RP special community meeting of 400-odd apparently unconcerned and uninformed activists opposed to the loss of the land to the 325-unit would-be mini-town.

It is worth dwelling a moment on the sheer size of a 325-unit development. The Spinnaker Bay complex that, with the Marriott, dominates Inner Harbor East has only 315 units (http://www. 4wallsinbaltimore.com/baltimore/spinnaker-bay/spinnaker-bay.htm). The massive Silo Point condo complex near Fort McHenry has just 228 units (http://findarticles.com/p/articles/ mi_qn4183/is_20080512/ai_n25423468). “Uninformed” and “unconcerned” as he or she may be, the average Parkie knows that we do not want a behemoth of this magnitude in our midst.

"It'd be like building a mall over Colonial Williamsburg," my daughter told me. She may only be nine, but that pretty much sums it up.

Happy Fourth!

D.P. Munro

Web-site Editor

RolandPark.org

rpcommunication@rolandpark.org

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Back to Keswick/BBC sale main page? Click here.

Crowd gathers outside library

Dorothy Baker,

parade organizer

Dels. Rosenberg & Carter (Dist. 41) and Councilwoman Middleton (Dist. 6)

The national anthem

An "uninformed" and "unconcerned" resident?

And another?

Enough of the politics!

All photos: D.P. Munro.

Click each for a larger image.