Pittman will protect Anne Arundel County environment, quality of life
The conservation of our natural heritage, the restoration of our local rivers, creeks, and the Chesapeake Bay, and our quality of life are inextricably bound to the quality and commitments of our elected officials. This is why your vote in the current election will determine how the things we cherish will be improved and safeguarded.
The political system has been polluted by all too many elected officials enriching themselves or their campaigns with monies from the coterie of special interests whose environmentally destructive activities elected officials are supposed to properly regulate.
In the United States, decision making over land use is largely left to the states and they defer to local governments to make most land use decisions. In 50 years of environmental advocacy, I learned that the most abused power in the U.S. is this local authority over land use. The destruction of forests and wetlands, degradation of air and water quality, displacement and extinction of wildlife, clogging of highways with massive traffic jams, and overcrowding of schools all have their roots in poor local land use decisions.
Too many local officials have been blinded by greed and campaign contributions. Seeking development at any cost becomes a goal. A classic case now before the voters is the candidacy of Jessica Haire for county executive. In examining her campaign contributions and anti-environment votes on the County Council, I am compelled to warn those concerned with the environment and our quality of life about her candidacy.
She is awash in campaign cash from the land development industry, raising over $1 million, much of it from those reaping profits from county land use decisions. Individuals and corporations have been pouring money into her campaign coffers to defeat current County Executive Steuart Pittman because of his strong stands on the environment and proper land use.
I experienced the same when after my first term in the General Assembly, my tough conservation stands and 100% League of Conservation Voters voting record led developers and other anti-environment special interests to ply my opponent for the state Senate with campaign cash. He accumulated more PAC money than any of the other 800 legislative candidates in 1982, including incumbents. I won but it was not easy. Now, Ms. Haire has the benefit of similar funding and chooses to use fear tactics, warning that reelecting County Executive Pittman will lead to more crime despite the fact that he is fully funding public safety and has been endorsed by the Fraternal Order of Police.
Donors to her campaign include all sectors of the development juggernaut — paving, asphalt, concrete, and excavating firms, land development firms, real estate speculators, industry attorneys and lobbyists, and the Realtor PAC. An unusual coalition of county community groups called on her to return $250,000 in campaign contributions she received from the Halle Companies, a major county developer, and associated entities. Citizens have fought for decades to block Halle from constructing a huge rubble landfill in Odenton.
When the public was alerted, Ms. Haire falsely denied knowing about plans for the landfill. She accepted the money even though the developer had circumvented the $6,000 legal cap on individual contributions a person or corporation can make. The developer spread out the $250,000 in more than 40 mostly $6,000 contributions from seven other companies listed at the developer’s Silver Spring address and from employees and relatives, including eight individuals with the last name Halle! None of them lived in this county.
Ms. Haire lent $522,000 of her own money to the campaign. Her husband Dirk — chair of the Maryland Republican Party and a lawyer “ranked as one of the leading construction law attorneys in the District of Columbia,” according to his D.C. firm’s website — also lent the campaign about $50,000, which already has been paid back. Perhaps those debts were or will be paid back with donations from developers. We will know more when campaign finance numbers are released later this week.
A close examination of Ms. Haire’s donations also shows other development interests subverting the $6,000 limit with the same tactics as Halle. Her voting record on the County Council demonstrates why the development community spent so much filling her campaign treasury. She has been a consistent anti-environmental vote, voting to strip vital protections for forest from County Executive Pittman’s forest conservation bill aimed at protecting our dwindling forests from development. She also voted against stronger protections from development for the most sensitive resource conservation areas in the Critical Area. Twelve other times she voted against environmental initiatives.
That’s why the Maryland League of Conservation Voters gave her a D for her anti-environmental record. Steuart Pittman was given an A. The LCV concluded that “His outstanding record and his broad support in the environmental community lead us to score his performance A.” He also has earned the endorsement of the Sierra Club for his solid environmental achievements. Mr. Pittman was endorsed by the Teachers Association of Anne Arundel County representing more than 6,000 county educators: “County Executive Pittman promised us in 2018 he would support teachers and education — and he has delivered”.
The Baltimore Sun gave Mr. Pittman a ringing endorsement over Ms. Haire, noting how he “has demonstrated himself to be socially progressive but also fiscally prudent … setting the county on a path toward balanced budgets and much-needed school and public infrastructure improvements.
... Pittman’s commitment to greater public participation in government, public financing of political campaigns and devotion to environmental causes — and the fact that his successful 2018 candidacy was his first-ever run for public office — might earn him the title of ‘reform’ leader as well.”
Ms. Haire’s Republican primary opponent, Herb McMillan, took the extraordinary step in a Capital newspaper column of urging voters to elect Steuart Pittman because “Integrity matters. A county executive who is untrustworthy and dishonest cannot lead. … Pittman has principles; and like Aaron Burr, Haire has none, other than self-interest. Republicans must choose between draining the swamp, or simply feeding their party’s alligators.” Ms. Haire eked out a win over McMillan by 44% to 39% of the vote, failing to gain a majority.
Steuart Pittman has done an excellent job of meeting the greatest challenges facing the county — how to manage growth while maintaining and restoring the health of our environment. In March, Moody’s Investors Service bestowed a AAA bond rating, its highest, on the county for the first time ever. This is the gold standard stamp of approval from this top financial institution, showing how well Anne Arundel is run under Steuart Pittman despite his opponent’s misguided attacks. And Mr. Pittman did this while making great environmental strides.
He was born and raised on his family farm in Davidsonville where his love of nature and animals was embedded and where he raised a family of three children. He is not your typical politician and is sort of a Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.
If you care about the Chesapeake Bay and its creeks and streams, if you care about our forests and fields, if you care about our quality of life, if you care about the education of our children, and if you care about the fiscal integrity of our county, I urge you to vote for Steuart Pittman for county executive.