Village Green/Town²

This is not a restaurant review. This is the tale of a hometown adventure. My husband and I decided to try Sonoma's in Owen Brown last night. We had just enough time to have dinner before picking up our daughter from her youth group activity at the Interfaith Center. We had never eaten there, but it seemed like a no-brainer. It's right across the parking lot from OBIC. First impressions--it's one enormous room with an excess of tevevisions. And then, the realization: we have stumbled on to the Sunday football crowd. The televisions were loud, the patrons were pleasantly boisterous. We took a table and looked around for a waitress. There wasn't one. Well, actually, there was one waitress for the entire place and she was also tending bar. She was very friendly under the circumstances. She took our order promptly, got our drinks, and then... We waited. And waited. And we began to worry that we wouldn't be finished in time to get our daughter. Our phones weren...

I have been awake for several hours searching for a local story to write about this morning. So perhaps a bit of punchiness had set in when I saw this tweet from a Howard County business: Wait a minute. Am I the only person that is seeing a suggestion to slip the kids a little something in order to get Date Night underway? Yes, friends, that bedtime cup of warm milk can be the ticket to Dreamland with these exclusive deals from area merchants... You'll be out the door in a flash. Your babysitter will be amazed. No popping out of bed for glasses of water. Just a restful evening of Netflix for her and an uninterrupted night on the town for you. Ha. Actually, the accompanying photo tells a different story. Date Night apparently means alcoholic beverages on the couch. Silly me. What was I thinking? No babysitter, no worries about who will be the designated driver. No expensive tickets for concerts, theater, movies. With parents working multiple jobs, feeling exha...

Every once in a while I read a piece that makes me think, "Dang! I wish I'd written this!" This post by Grounded and Rooted in Love 's Heather Kirk-Davidoff is just such a piece. In looking at Columbia's 50th Birthday and suggesting that it presents us with a chance to recommit to the Columbia way of life, she asks: Do we still want to live in a community where "the janitor and the CEO" live nearby each other, as Rouse famously said. Maybe we have gotten ahead of ourselves in our conversations about how to build affordable house or end homelessness. Maybe we need to back up and ask the kinds of questions that would help us to remember why this was ever a value to begin with. It isn't enough to say that Columbia means something. The knowledge of exactly what that is needs to be widely shared and the commitment to living that in our community life must be an active choice. It won't just happen. In 2012 I touched on this in the piece "Look...

The big story: County Council members Jen Terrasa and Calvin Ball have filed a resolution asking the Maryland State Board of Education to contract for a performance audit of HCPSS. The language of the resolution specifically addresses: Legal fees and the use of outside legal council The procurement process Special education staffing and services, including out of school placement It appears that the tide has turned. The council has tired of dis dain and will not take no for an answer. This is a remarkable turn of events. Terrasa and Ball are responding both to council concerns in dealing with the school system, and constituent concerns. They are taking a stand for more transparency and accountability. Music to my ears. Meanwhile, a smaller story that has big implications is the news that Nayab Siddiqui, husband of BOE incumbent candidate Janet Siddiqui, is harassing poll workers for challenger candidates at early voting locations. Mr. Siddiqui and another member of the campa...

Today is the first day of early voting. I'm contemplating the steady bursts of BOE endorsements I've been seeing lately on social media. When I consider how long I've been agitating to get people excited about the BOE race, seeing all the buzz around candidates is gratifying. Finally, people are talking about the issues that are making a huge difference to our students, families and teachers. Despite my wish that the BOE race be respected as a non-partisan one, there are still plenty of folks making their choice along party lines. Strictly speaking, Dems with good sense are bypassing the incumbent and choosing the three other Democratic candidates. On the other hand, I've seen some Republicans recommending only the two R's. I don't know what the strategy is there, but in a race this important I wouldn't want to throw away even one chance at making a better board of education. I worry that a decision based solely on party lines shows less of a stand on values...

It's been a while since I've done a true HoCo Holler. This upcoming event definitely deserves a shout out. Columbia Association has teamed up with the Howard County Library to host a welcoming event. They are reaching out to new Columbia residents. I think that's awesome. When you are new to Columbia, you don't automatically know about CA, or James Rouse, or Tot Lots or any of that stuff. I know that may be hard to believe to those of you who have been here forever. I'm convinced that the ongoing viability of Columbia rests in outreach to new residents. A kind of community evangelism, as it were. The idea of partnering with the library is brilliant. It's a true Village Green/Town² kind of partnership. The library system is a part of so many interesting and successful partnerships in the county. Who wouldn't want to team up with them? I'm hoping that the library's involvement will extend the reach of this event and bring the word closer to new folks...

Once upon a time there was an exhorbitant tax on British tea, and the colonists would have none of it. They stopped buying it. We tend to remember very public act of dumping some in the harbor. But it was much more than that: people simply stopped buying and drinking British tea. It was an act of protest against rule from afar that was based on taxation, but no representation. Boycotts as a means of political expression go way back in history . Certainly I remember several from my childhood and young adult years: boycotting California table grapes to support farm workers, boycotting Nestle products to protest unethical promotion of baby formula. Communicating displeasure with a company by "voting with your feet" has been known to bring about positive change. That brings me to the present day, and the local gas stations posting the Janet Siddiqui BOE signs. I just can't bring myself to patronize those stations. The owners are certainly free to post those signs but, when I ...

I've been following a discussion of Question A on Facebook. In case you don't know, Question A is an initiative to get big money out of County elections by providing public funding for campaigns. There's plenty of information out there, for and against. This blog post isn't about the merits of Question A. It's about how we fight. Question A seems to have turned into a local battle between Democrats and Republicans. The particular thread I was observing brought out an interesting dynamic. Those who were for Question A, or predisposed to learn more about it, were women. Those who were completely against, were men. (This is not a representative sampling. This is one blogger's personal experience.) The women had questions, suggestions, gave answers that showed they had listened to someone else's post. The men announced, proclaimed, belittled, refused to accept any evidence that didn't agree with their own. To be clear, everyone entered the thread on t...

I've been following a discussion of Question A on Facebook. In case you don't know, Question A is an initiative to get big money out of County elections by providing public funding for campaigns. There's plenty of information out there, for and against. This blog post isn't about the merits of Question A. It's about how we fight. Question A seems to have turned into a local battle between Democrats and Republicans. The particular thread I was observing brought out an interesting dynamic. Those who were for Question A, or predisposed to learn more about it, were women. Those who were completely against, were men. (This is not a representative sampling. This is one blogger's personal experience.) The women had questions, suggestions, gave answers that showed they had listened to someone else's post. The men announced, proclaimed, belittled, refused to accept any evidence that didn't agree with their own. To be clear, everyone entered the thread o...

Saturday's adventure took me out of the Bubble to Arlington, Virginia to a place called the Iota Club and Café. My daughter is a huge fan of Dodie Clark, a YouTuber singer/songwriter from England who is presently touring the U.S. with fellow YouTubers Rusty Clanton and Tessa Violet from Nashville. There weren't any shows scheduled near us. She was mightily disappointed. And then, on Thursday, an extra show was added. "It's only about an hour away!" So we went. Somewhere between my hatred of multiple variables and my deep gut feeling that this is what a Cool Mom would do, I found the emotional wherewithal to have an adventure with my teen-aged daughter. It was a beautiful day for a drive--sunny, blue skies--although the winds buffeted us a bit. We set the MapQuest app and off we went. The Iota Club and Café is in a bustling neighborhood of Arlington that boasts a Whole Foods, a Crate and Barrel, Pottery Barn, and plenty of other shops and res...

A name came up in conversation this week while I was at the event for Dennis Lane. That name was HowChow. We must have been talking about blogs that we miss. The disappearance of HowChow has left a big hole in the HoCo blogging scene, and the HoCo food scene. I had the great fortune to meet him once. You can read about it here . This post about pretzel rolls is probably my favorite. When I got home I looked at the last post , dated January 4th. Something caught my eye: the number of comments. There are 78 comments, and the most recent one is dated October 13th. So I started to read them. The story of the comment thread is, at first, a lament of the disappearance of HowChow. But then the community of readers that have formed around the blog continue the thread by sharing their own information about local restaurant experiences. In their own way, they are keeping the HowChow community alive. There's also a mention of a subReddit for Howard County food and restaurants. On August 24t...

Remember how HCPSS was being stunningly uncooperative the auditors from Howard County Government? It seems that they didn't do so well with the State of Maryland, either. I haven't had time to read the full report, but Bill Woodcock of The 53 has. His own highlights for sharing can be found here . One year ago I posted : School System in the News Again , in which I expressed some sense of personal satisfaction that my particular concerns with HCPSS--responsiveness, transparency, and accountability--were finally coming to the top of everybody's list. Guess what? They still are, one year later, and the school system has done little, if anything, to address this. Oh, they did build a better Board room. It's up to us to build a better Board of Education.          

On an unseasonably warm October afternoon, under a white tent, with food and drink from Clyde's, the hometown crowd gathered for a singular shoutout to our hometown's best. The music that played in the background was music that I knew well enough to sing along to. The guests were friends, important people, elected officials, people I used to be friends with, and people with whom I have sparred and from whom I have retreated. People I wish I knew. Such a world of people in just one gathering. "Dennis had a knack for gathering people," said Denise Geiger. And gathered we were, sharing a beer and a story, a tear and a hug. Listening to memories, one more time, of a man who meant so much to us and to his community. Watching Democrats and Republicans take turns at the microphone with ease and good humor did my soul some good. It was not a day for points and posturing. It was a day when your big, crazy, diverse family decides they are going to get together and get along....

In August of 2007 a bright and talented young man left his home in Columbia to pursue his musical dreams at a college in New Jersey. By October he was dead: a heroin overdose. He was among the best and brightest that Columbia has to offer. I'm not going to dive into the particulars out of respect to his family. But I thought of him yesterday when he turned up in my Facebook memories and that got me thinking about the recent push in Howard County to address the opiate addiction crisis. Alcohol and substance abuse happen in Howard County. It's easy to ignore if it doesn't touch you. Recently Laurie Lundy, a parent in Howard County, has taken to social media to get people thinking and talking about addiction. Ms. Lundy suggests that Howard County needs its own treatment facility for addiction. She has shared her dream of what it might be like. Howard County should build a State of the Art Addiction Treatment and Recovery Center, next door to a Recreational Facility for addi...

Here's my write-up of the Q and A portion of the Columbia Villages Forum. I left at nine pm and it was still going on. I'm not sure how much I missed after that. As I left a parent was asking about the Wellness Policy and Recess; I'm sorry I didn't catch the candidate responses. 1. Question for Janet Siddiqui: Why did you not respond to repeated requests asking that parents be permitted to participate in special education work groups?   Siddiqui : (Responded by going on the attack against the questioner, a school parent, and undermining her credibility. Did not address issue of parents serving on the work groups. Expressed displeasure when she was cut off by the time-keeper.) A few other candidates chimed in: Delmont-Small : You need to be able to advocate for your child. Parents should be allowed to participate in those work groups. Ellis : It seems that special education parents always have to fight to get what their child needs. Coombs : The recent practice of outso...

Last night my blog crashed and I lost two hours of work on the BOE Forum . I'm going to try again this evening, with better back-up. In the meantime: Two Dudes Who Love Food visit the White House Kitchen Garden AnnieRie's update on the local restaurant scene The People's Voice reports from the trenches on the BOE race Have a great Monday and think good thoughts about my blog rewrite tonight.  

I attended the Columbia Villages Board of Education forum Thursday evening. It brought back memories of the last one I attended in 2014. The contrast was huge. Last time we had some candidates in the final six that had no earthly idea what they were talking about, which made for some rather hilarious answers during the forum. (Sadly, one of those candidates was elected.) On Thursday there were no such obvious howlers. The contrast was provided between the five challengers who are, I would suggest, more prepared than any other group of candidates before them, and the incumbent, who spoke more in generalities and cliches than to the specifics of the questions. It turns out that my notes were a lot sketchier than I thought while I was taking them. I ask your forgiveness--I'm presenting them here with only minor clean-up. Here is a summary of their five minute opening statements. Ellis: The job of the BOE member is to represent students, families, and community members as they develo...