City County

scottb@herald-mail.com Hagerstown City Council officials will meet with Washington County officials to try to find a compromise to a months-long dispute about a joint city-county sewer service agreement, Mayor William M. Breichner said Tuesday. During a discussion at Tuesday's City Council meeting, Councilmen Lewis C. Metzner and N. Linn Hendershot said a compromise needs to be found. "I think we are at loggerheads," Metzner said. After the meeting, Breichner said he will probably suggest a joint city-county sewer committee meet to try to find a way to get the two parties to reach consensus on the agreements.

scottb@herald-mail.com A joint meeting between the Hagerstown City Council and the Washington County Commissioners to try to iron out differences will not happen until after three current commissioners leave office, Commissioners President Gregory I. Snook said Friday. Hagerstown Mayor William M. Breichner and Councilman Lewis C. Metzner had expressed hope at recent council meetings that one more meeting with the current commissioners could be arranged. "That is not going to happen," Snook said.

MDE awards city-county sewer grant By SCOTT BUTKI / Staff Writer The Maryland Department of the Environment has awarded a $250,000 grant to be used toward a $1.3 million Hagerstown-Washington County sewer project, County Commissioner John L. Schnebly said. If all the money for which applications were filed is made available, sufficient funds would be available for the project, County Water and Sewer Department Director Greg Murray said. One agency from which funds have been requested has not yet officially approved the grant, he said.

When elected officials at a recent joint meeting of the Hagerstown Mayor and Council and the Washington County Commissioners began talking again - how seriously is another question - about merging some departments, I decided to check up on two nearby governments that have had a lot of success in that area. I'm referring to Winchester and Frederick County, Va., which put the idea on the ballot way back in 1968. It was defeated then, but since then the two have managed to work together to build an 85,000-square foot judicial center, a joint sewer-treatment plant, a jointly operated landfill and, with Clarke County's participation, a regional jail.

scottb@herald-mail.com The Washington County government has been billed about $100,000 over the last 10 months for outside counsel for two legal disputes with the Hagerstown City Council over a controversial annexation policy and a flow transfer agreement, county officials said Thursday. Meanwhile, Hagerstown has been billed at least $69,000 for expenses related to the disputes, almost all payments to the Hagerstown law firm of Urner, Nairn and Boyer, with whom the city contracts for legal services, Hagerstown Finance Director Al Martin said.

gregs@herald-mail.com HAGERSTOWN - The Washington County Commissioners and the Hagerstown City Council for the first time on Tuesday heard proposals designed to improve economic conditions inside and outside the city, and settle some long-standing disputes between the governments they represent. "Both sides are giving. Both sides are taking. And that's the way it's gotta work," County Commissioner John C. Munson said after the meeting. The proposals were developed in private over the past five months by councilmen Kristin B. Aleshire and Lewis C. Metzner, and commissioners Doris J. Nipps and James F. Kercheval.

scottb@herald-mail.com Negotiations between the City of Hagerstown and the Washington County Commissioners over a controversial annexation policy have stalled at least temporarily, increasing the possibility the county could lose a state grant, city and county officials said Monday. State officials say a $650,000 environmental grant that would help pay for joint city-county services could expire June 30 unless there is a settlement to the disputed policy requiring annexations in exchange for some water and sewer service.

Councilman calls for city-county meeting Hagerstown City Councilman Lewis C. Metzner asked Tuesday for a joint city-county meeting before the new Washington County Commissioners are sworn in so the two bodies can try to resolve some issues. Mayor William M. Breichner said he will call Commissioners President Gregory I. Snook today to try to arrange the meeting before the commissioners are sworn in at the Dec. 3 meeting. The city wants to try one more time to reach agreement with the current commissioners on a few issues because there will probably be a learning curve and time delays as the three new commissioners take office, Breichner and Metzner said.

Armed with a whole month's worth of experience, the three new members of Washington County's Board of Commissioners have approved filing a second lawsuit against the City of Hagerstown. In addition to the damage it does to city/county relations, the funding of the suit also raises serious questions about the commissioners' actions. The lawsuit involves the city's annexation policy, which requires developers who want municipal water and sewer service to agree to annex, when and if their properties become contiguous to the city's boundaries.

dank@herald-mail.com With Hagerstown's purchasing manager retiring this week, some changes are in the works for the city's purchasing process and department. City Purchasing Manager G. David White is to retire Thursday, but he will continue to work part time for the city handling insurance claims, City Administrator Bruce Zimmerman said. Instead of filling White's existing position, the purchasing manager position and the vacant project coordinator position will be merged to create a director of administrative services position, Zimmerman said.

Be careful what you wish for. Over the past few weeks - or it could be months because time really flies when you're having fun - the following comments have appeared in the comments section of stories and columns on The Herald-Mail website and in Mail Call: “I'm leaving (Hagerstown, Washington County, Maryland or the country) because of the latest thing that has happened (stadium is going downtown, is not going downtown; the BOE is going downtown, is not going downtown; the Suns are staying in town, are leaving town; the Maryland death penalty has been repealed, has not been repealed; increases in state gas taxes have been approved, have not been approved; county excise taxes are up, down; property taxes might increase, decrease; illegal immigrants are in, out; school lunches are more costly, less costly; the new mayor is good, bad; the county commissioners are smart, not so smart; the EDC is doing the “limbo”; city council members pander, don't pander, on social media; and on and on)

Downtown revitalization continues to be a topic of discussion for City of Hagerstown officials, but getting Washington County behind any major urban renewal project - at least financially - depends heavily on the city first establishing specific redevelopment plans, one county commissioner said Tuesday. “When you have a plan, we will certainly listen to it again,” Commissioner William B. McKinley told city council members during a joint meeting Tuesday between the two elected bodies at City Hall.

Officials with the Doleman Black Heritage Museum are requesting nearly $86,000 annually from City of Hagerstown and Washington County officials over the next few years to help the organization open a gallery in downtown Hagerstown. Wendi Perry, curator for the museum, said Tuesday that the request calls for two-thirds of the estimated $128,000 yearly operational expense, or $42,933.33 each, from the city and county for the gallery's first three to five years of operation. The museum would make up the final one-third of the costs, Perry told city council members and county commissioners during a joint meeting at City Hall.

While construction of the new Washington County Free Library is nearing completion, an unknown factor of the overall project has caught the eye of some City of Hagerstown officials. At the rear of the library site on the corner of South Potomac and East Antietam streets is a 2.77-acre tract purchased by Washington County in 2010 to install an accompanying parking lot. On the land are three boarded-up buildings with “historic” distinction. The entire site has about 120,000 square feet of usable space.

The Hagerstown City Council has approved a resolution to support a joint application with Washington County for the renewal and expansion of enterprise zones in and around Hagerstown. The enterprise zones - which offer businesses property tax credits for new construction or rehabilitation investments - along with income-tax credits for job creation, will be renewed for 10 years, from Dec. 14, 2012, to Dec. 14, 2022. Jill Estavillo, city economic development manager, first presented the proposal at the beginning of March, and city and county public hearings were held March 20. “We think that the enterprise zone incentive would help to foster new investment,” Estavillo has said.

A public hearing is scheduled for Tuesday afternoon to consider a joint proposal by Washington County and the city of Hagerstown for the redesignation and expansion of enterprise zones in the city and county. The hearing will take place at 4 p.m. in the City Hall council chamber at 1 E. Franklin St. Enterprise zones in and around the city promote business and offer tax breaks for new construction and rehabilitation projects, the city's Economic Development Manager Jill Estavillo said at a council work session earlier this month.

Hagerstown officials are negotiating with Hagerstown Suns owner Bruce Quinn over the terms of a potential 20-year stadium lease, Hagerstown Mayor Robert E. Bruchey II said this week during a video interview at The Herald-Mail. During that interview, Bruchey and council members Lewis C. Metzner and Ashley C. Haywood stressed that while a deal with the minor league baseball team could still be possible, their support of a stadium project has more to do with building a multiuse facility that will benefit the city no matter what happens with the Suns.

The Winchester, Va., City Council decided at a work session Tuesday to hold a public hearing on the transfer of public land for a baseball stadium, according to Winchester Mayor Elizabeth Minor. The land transfer is key to an effort by the Winchester Economic Development Authority to attract a minor league baseball team - rumored to be the Hagerstown Suns - to Winchester. “We're going to have a public hearing, a meeting with citizens, on Feb. 7 to get their input on what they think of perhaps having a minor league team here,” Minor said by phone after the work session.

Testing of discolored water seeping from the ground in the area of Washington County's Old City/County Landfill into Conococheague Creek revealed an arsenic level almost double that of the Environmental Protection Agency's standard for drinking water, a Maryland Department of the Environment spokesman said. At MDE's request, Washington County has hired a contractor to investigate the issue and develop a remedial action plan, MDE spokesman Jay Apperson said. An Aug. 3 sample of the seep area was found to have 17 parts per billion of arsenic, Apperson said.

Copper pipe theft, a problem that has plagued Hagerstown, also is keeping the Washington County Sheriff's Office busy, an officer said Tuesday. Most of the copper thefts in the county are occurring in vacant houses that are in foreclosure or up for sale, said Lt. Mark Knight of the sheriff's office. Knight said he believes the people who are stealing the copper are targeting homes by riding around and finding homes with for sale or foreclosure signs out front. For some people, targeting homes with copper that is worth up to $3.60 per pound at local scrap yards is apparently preferable to getting a job, Knight said.