Skip to main content

It’s a Mess!


  

So I’m not the only one who has housing on the brain these days. Have you seen the recent Baltimore Banner article?

Buying a house in Howard County? You may be waiting a while, Hallie Miller 

As per usual, I came away wondering if anyone local had shopped this topic to them or whether it was already on their radar. It would be hard to miss. Still, I’m a busybody that way.

I swear to you that the first time I saw this article online it was accompanied by the words “Housing in Howard County is mess.” Wait, here it is.





Rather blunt, but: I’d agree. Not everyone thinks so, of course. I don’t usually recommend reading the comments but in this instance they’re more educational than toxic. I’m not saying they’re helpful - - but certainly eye-opening. My personal favorite is the poster who blames all of Howard County’s housing woes on Baltimore because nobody wants to live there. 

By that sort of logic we could also blame ourselves for being too appealing. We should have tried harder to be awful, one thinks. Although we do seem to be engaged in an extremely drawn out strategy of not paying enough in taxes to adequately support our excellent school system. Who knows? That could start to pay off as potential buyers sense that trend. 

Ouch.

My general assessment (of the comments section) is that some folks would rather stand on their heads and turn themselves inside out rather than face inconvenient realities. 

There’s also a conversation about this article on the Columbia Reddit, if you are interested.

I have some opinions about this article but I’d rather have you all read it and see what strikes you rather than plant any ideas in your head first. There’s one particular quote that made all my hair fall out but that’s all I’m going to say about that. 

I continue to watch YouTube videos about Tiny Homes, Pocket Neighborhoods, Micro Neighborhoods, ADU’s, Co-housing, not to mention stories of people who retrofit school buses and vans as their primary residences. There’s a sort of novelty in all of this but I think the underlying message is troubling: people can’t afford adequate shelter. We’ve created a system that has guaranteed that following generations know they’ll never be able to afford a home. 

That, my friends is a mess, whether it’s here in Howard County or anywhere else around the country. In Howard County it’s our mess. Are we going to take responsibility for it?

I hear there are elections coming up in Howard County. What a great time to find out where the candidates stand on this issue.


Village Green/Town² Comments

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Teacher Gifts

Today is the last day of school before the Winter Break. It’s a good time to remember the far-reaching nature of our public school system. You may not have children. You may have sent your children to independent schools. It matters not. You will be impacted one way or another. Yesterday I read a long thread on Facebook about several waves of illness in the schools right now. There’s influenza A and norovirus, I believe. And of course there’s COVID. Apparently in some individual schools the rate of illness is high enough for school admin to notify parents.  When I was little the acceptable holiday gift for a teacher was one of those lovely floral handkerchief squares. (I don’t know what it was for male teachers. They were rare in my elementary years.) These days the range of teacher gifts is wider and I have fond memories of Target gift cards which I have written about before. I think it’s safe to say that giving one’s teacher Influenza, norovirus, or COVID is not the ideal holiday...
1 comment
Read more

They Can Wait

This is not a typical Saturday post. That’s because, in my community, it’s not a typical Saturday.  Oakland Mills High School, after years of deferred repair, needs massive renovation. It’s pretty simple: when you don’t fix a problem it gets bigger. The school system itself said the the OMHS school building was  "no longer conducive to learning" back in 2018.  2018 .  But Thursday the Boad of Education voted to push it out of the lineup of important projects which will be given the go-ahead to proceed soonest.  In my opinion it’s a terrible decision and sets a dangerous precedent. To explain, here’s the advocacy letter I sent in support of Oakland Mills High School. I was rather proud of it. I am writing to ask you to proceed with needed renovation at Oakland Mills High School in the most timely and comprehensive manner humanly possible. I have read the letter sent to you by the Oakland Mills Community Association and I am in complete agreement. You are extremel...
1 comment
Read more

Separate and Unequal

  Remember “Separate but equal”? Remember how that really meant that Black schools languished in  broken-down buildings without adequate heat or toilet facilities, with cast-off, ragged learning materials, underfunded and largely ignored? The Supreme Court struck that down in 1954. The evidence was clear that separate was not equal. Plessy v Ferguson had led to - - no, endorsed - - deeply unequal schooling and opportunities. We tend to think of Brown v Board as being purely about racial integration. It was not.  It was about the logical consequences of segregation. And they were not, not, not equal. The ruling in 1954 didn’t transform public education for non-whites into a land of milk and honey by any means. But it articulated some essential truths in a way that made including everyone a legal precedent which could be relied upon and built upon. It was better than what came before it but it rested upon unsteady ground. It did not necessarily change the hearts or minds ...
1 comment
Read more