May 20, 1999
Meeting Cancellation
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A Message from GACA's President ...
As we conclude another year, I'd like to take a moment to reflect on some of our accomplishments for 1998/1999, as well as our goals for 1999/2000:
This year, we resumed a more active meeting schedule with featured speakers including Sheri Bell of Catholic Charities, Betty Okonsky of the Southwest Emergency Services, our Code Enforcement Officers Ron Turner and Joe Glorioso, and Brion Townshend of Save our Streams. Next year we will pursue the same format and continue to present speakers on a broad range of topics of interest to the community.
In September, GACA held a Candidates Forum to permit the community to present direct questions to the candidates for office in our district.
GACA continued to work with Linda Marsiodis and other representatives to re-energize the Arbutus Shopping Plaza. Construction of the new Mars Supermarket has gone a bit more slowly than we would like, but the anticipated opening date is September. We think it will be worth the wait.
Councilman Sam Moxley appointed a panel to meet and work on the Community Plan. GACA has three members on the committee, which will meet over the next year to formulate the plan.
GACA has also been represented on the Arbutus Streetscape Advisory Board. Baltimore County is studying traffic conditions at Sulphur Spring Rd. and East Drive for possible improvements. The plans for streetscape are continuing although the scheduling has been delayed.
Our annual community clean up day included a new project: storm drain painting. Along with the dumpsters and general trash removal work, GACA painted 27 storm drains in the area.
A strong zoning committee was able to reverse the granting of a special exception in a two to three apartment conversion case, and along with other community associations and the People's Counsel, defeat an effort to permit a tow truck operator to use his home (on a residential street) as a base of operations.
What are our goals for next year? Getting more people actively involved, continuing work on the Community Plan, working with Realtors to effectively market our community to prospective home owners, and most importantly, serving as a conduit for ideas.
We hope you'll continue to be a essential part of our efforts. We look forward to seeing you at our September meeting!
Paula Wolf