A midday agreement reached between Harford County and Havre de Grace Monday will ensure a portion of the city’s downtown parking lot will remain open to the public during the 18-month expansion of the adjacent water treatment.
While County Executive David Craig and Mayor Wayne Dougherty celebrated the agreement Monday with a joint press release, it seems Havre de Grace is conceding the most in what appears to be a lop-sided truce.
The crux of the settlement is that Havre de Grace will lift its stop work order on the project and allow work to proceed in exchange for the county’s help re-establishing a lane through the lot with some diagonal parking spaces.
But the city seems to be giving up a lot: Havre de Grace will not only lift the stop work order and sign off on all approvals and permits for the project, but must also pay for the costs of adding new parking, pay for the cost of the first two weeks worth of work delays, and make about half of nearby David Craig Park available for off-site storage and staging for the project. Oh and the city must also indemnify the county and hold it harmless for any damage caused by using the through-lane during the construction project.
The county’s major contributions are that it will split the cost of re-establishing the lane and will split the cost of damage delays with the after the first two weeks.
Here’s the official, joint press release. Please read and digest it for yourself:
Havre de Grace and Harford County Governments Arrive at Agreement
Terms are Reached for Shared Water Treatment Plant Solids Handling Project to Continue
Bel Air, Maryland –
Since the 1980’s, Harford County Government and the City of Havre de Grace have operated separate water treatment plants adjacent to each other along St. John’s Street in Havre de Grace.
In 2003 discussions began as to how best to update the two plants to meet environmental standards required by the Maryland Department of the Environment. The City and County have jointly explored several options including a pumping station to send the solids extracted during the water treatment process to the Waste Water Treatment facility at another location in the City. Based on capacity and cost concerns it was agreed by City and County that a WTP solids handling facility would be located behind the water treatment plant.
The current joint project between the City of Havre de Grace and Harford County will cost $7.7 million and will take approximately eighteen months to complete. The City is providing 40% of the construction funding for the project and the County is providing 60%.
After submitting all plans to the City and MDE,the project began shortly after the first of February. Project Engineers had submitted plans and designs that included closing the public parking and the public access lanes located behind the water treatment plant between Warren and Franklin Streets. When temporary fences were erected around the construction area several restaurants and retail shops in the downtown area voiced concerns that the lack of public parking would be extremely adverse to their bottom line.
Responding positively to the concerns brought forward by the business community and concern with public safety issues, Mayor Wayne Dougherty issued a stop-work-order at the March 3, 2008 Havre de Grace City Council meeting.
As a pre-emptive measure to ensure that the project would be allowed to continue, Harford County Attorneys’ filed a request for an injunction to rescind the City’s stop-work-order in Harford County Circuit Court on March 4, 2008. Since that time, Paul W. Ishak, attorney for the City of Havre de Grace, and Nancy L. Giorno, Deputy County Attorney, and Margaret K. Hartka, County DPW attorney have negotiated in good faith, and the parties have come to a joint settlement.
The details of the settlement are as follows:
City to lift Stop Work Order and County to dismiss its Complaint for injunctive relief
County and City to split the cost of re-establishing a 12 foot wide thru-lane 50/50 including any revisions to engineering drawings ($172,000 + engineering revisions if necessary)
City to pay 100% of cost of preserving not less than 8 diagonal parking spaces adjacent to the Thru-Lane ($13,000)
City to pay 100% of delay damages for the first fifteen days of delay @ $500 per day
City and County to split delay damages 50/50 from day 16 onward at $500 per day until day 30 and at $3,000 per day thereafter
City shall issue all approvals and permits required for the revised Project
City shall maintain the Thru-Lane and adjacent parking
City shall make slightly less than half of the parking area at the David Craig Park available for off-site storage, staging and parking by the contractor
City shall indemnify the County for any damages resulting from the use of the Thru-Lane or the adjacent parking unless caused by the negligence of the contractor
Mayor Wayne Dougherty and County Executive David Craig were informed that a settlement had been reached by lunchtime on Monday, March 10.
“I am delighted that the City and the County were able to reach an agreement that maintains public safety and considered the concerns of the business community while allowing the project to move forward. ,” the Mayor said.
Craig emphasized that Havre de Grace City residents were Harford County residents, as well. “I was always working towards mitigating any negative effects to the business community with the understanding that this is an important project that allows for the continued delivery of a clean and adequate water source for city and county residents alike.”
Dougherty announced the stop work order last week during a Havre de Grace City Council meeting when a group of concerned downtown business owners came forward to publicly lodge their complaints.
A bitter battle soon ensued over who was to blame for allowing the multimillion-dollar water treatment plant expansion project, and its accompanying impacts, to slip by with nary a heads-up for unsuspecting downtown business owners.
So is Monday’s agreement the compromise Havre de Grace and its downtown business community were hoping for or is this just the best deal the city’s lawyers could shake out of the county?
Can anyone explain if this “settlement” will adequately remedy the parking situation in downtown Havre de Grace for the next year-and-a-half or is the county, financier of 60 percent of the water plant project, merely throwing city business owners a bone to keep them quiet and at least temporarily content?
This could have been done without the expense of delaying the contractor. The fact remains that the city dropped the ball in information and planning.
The use of the word “DIAGINAL” intrigues me when referring to parking.
Does this include re configuring the STREET parking to make more spaces?
These issues are usialy resolved by a simple chat with the contractor. Brian must understand that this was nothing but political deflection by HdG at the tax payers expense. It should be clear now to brian that the city IS responsible for damages to the contractor…and we will pay a bill for this unnecessary folly.
This is just the latest in a collection of the absolute arrogance of the County. It’s not so much David Craig himself, but the staff as a whole has been resolute in shutting down the three municipal governments. The parking in Bel Air and Havre de Grace taken by themselves are minor incidents, but there is a whole lot more. David, and Jim before him, have been annoyed by the municipalities. They and all County Execs wish they were Jim Smith and not have to deal with these piss ants. If we were to develop an org chart of the State, you would see the County Execs and three mayors all on the same line. So many of us forget that! David is not the supervisor of the Mayors. He is their contemporary. For some reason we have allowed the County staff to tell us how to do business. The ability to plan and zone property, the ability to control our own water and sewer and the public safety issues are what make the municipalities their own unique entities. Give up the right to any of the three and we will cease to exist. Don’t be deluded, the Mayor who agrees to turn over the water and sewer control or the police force, has sold his City down the river.
Watch for more push for a “regional solution” that centrally controls the water and sewer. It sounds so politically correct, but it is the beginning of the end of life as we know it. Recently, the County pulled the rug out from under the three police forces and has set itself up to become the supreme entity for all things public safety. The wolf is wearing sheep clothing!
The bill for each HdG resident stands at 9 dollars per man woman and child as we speak…and that will increase.
9 dollars per person is about 30 per house hold
Got to agree with DaddyRabbit on this one. You’d think, having come from a municipal mayorship, that Craig wouldn’t look down on the munis as some sort of vassels in his fiefdom.
Deep down, when his head hits the pillow every night, he’s dreaming of a time where the municipal corporations are diluted and dissolved to the point of extinction.
The parking issue, the water authority, the public safety rebate (don’t hear much on that anymore…), are all signs that “There Will Be Blood.”
Dell, it’s simple. Craig wants power over the municipalities because of one huge acronym that is headed this direction. And I don’t think Bel Air is much of a concern to him(them).
He can’t get as much money for the water treatment we will need if Aberdeen and HdG need help too.
He can’t get as much money for the sheriffs Aberdeen and HdG police need help too.
yada, yada, yada
Dell,
Is Craig drinking Havre de Grace’s milkshake?
Josh,
I heard that it was Craig’s milkshake that brings all the boys to the yard.
Something about it being better than yours…????
I could tell you, but I’d have to charge.
My only question and comment until the next one is….
Will Dougherity have the same attitude as he had with the Marina issue…settle now and in a few months try to re-work it. Or will he try to take it out…the money spent…after he relizes what hes done…on somone else and try to make the lives of the restaurantiers and buisness owners a living hell…as was done to me (see marina mafia).
In affect hes has spent a lot of tax payer dollars to avoid public criticizm of what amounted to a mistake. The problem could have been rectified in a meaningfull way without the draconian stop work orders ect. The HISTORYshows that he will deal with these “trouble makers ” later. First he had to get the ball in his court.
Well, now we know why taxes are so high in HdeG, and why we just keep paying and paying and paying…mismanagement as usual…downtown always gets the shaft…
So true L
Parking update….nuts and bolts !
UPDATE….Point of order ! !….(chuckle)….On the 15th of March an article in the eximiner cited Dougherty as coming up with a plan to …can you guess…..”change traffic patterns to gain parking spaces”…..” to make certain streets in a two block area around Mcgregors a one way and Install diagnall parking.
Please check Remark #1 dated march 7th 08 to “Fair warning” artical http://www.daggerpress.com/2008/03/06/fair-warning-who-knew-the-havre-de-grace-parking-debacle-was-coming-and-why-didnt-they-tell-anybody/artical which says in part…
….”Very simply it turnes the street in front of mcgregors…from the leigon to the washington st intersection to a one way with diaginal parking on one side and the current curbside parking on the other. This vastly increases the number of on street spaces.”…..
The following link from the eximiner dated March 15th shows that this idea is (at least as of that date….) his plan exactly. http://www.examiner.com/a-1280406~Traffic_changes_to_ease_Havre_de_Grace_parking_woes.html?cid=rss-Baltimore#articleComments ……… which says in part……“Between all our proposals, we’ve come up with as many parking spaces in a two-block area as we’d lose in the construction,” Dougherty said.
Two blocks of St. John Street between Warren Street and Green Street may be made one-way from south to north, clearing the way for diagonal parking on one side of the street and parallel parking on the other, Dougherty said.” …from balt eximiner………
Its a damn shame his personal ego stops him from doing right by this city
Dougherty spends TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS plus…of tax payer dollers …to avoid 10 minutes of criticizm when the solution was redily at hand !
A costly knee jerk reaction….and a self serving one !
The HdG spokesman, informed and bizzaro…are curiously quite ?
Could it be that the rants for two months, here in the dagger, have been proven to be without merritt as the rest of the petition and other complaints by them against me are? The king (Dougherty) truly has no clothes!
For referance…check this
http://www.daggerpress.com/forums/topic.php?id=305
and this…
http://www.daggerpress.com/forums/topic.php?id=104
and the “life and death in city yacht basin” artical here in the dagger!
Thanks to Del. Riley for a great evening.
Del Riley and I had a great discussion on a number of issues reguarding Havre de Grace mon evening at Coakleys in HdG. Very easy guy to speak with and we covered a lot of ground. Lots of common sense. Lots of concern at the basic level. The level that connects with citizens. He truly understands that small things are connected to big things, kinda the way a cough may not just be a cough and therefore it cannot go unchecked and possibly allow a cancer to grow to the point nothing can be done.
Thanks Dan !
Richie;
I’m glad you had the opportunity to meet with our esteemed Delegate. He and I are on the opposite side of almost any issue, but he has been a true gentleman and statesman in all of our conversations. I too have nothing but the utmost respect for the gentleman and look forward to working with him any time. The only thing that bothers me is that we always were stuck with Michelin chicken and overcooked peas whenever we were together. Maybe going to Coakley’s is the right idea. Is there any parking in that area?
Dave
Dave..
Plenty of parking in the area thanks to our, cough cough gag cough, mayors ideas on fixing it.
This is still not satisfactorily resolved!
Have any solutions been found…or has this been swept under the customery rug at a cost of 250,000 dollars to taxpayers.
Go Dagger !!!
Have any solutions been found…or has this been swept under the customery rug at a cost of 250,000 dollars to taxpayers.
Go Dagger !!!
So after all this time exactly what has mayor “he did it” Dougherty done for the downtown business’s. What solution to their parking problems have been formulated.
None I’m aware of.
The only significant change is that we are 250,000 dollars lighter in the wallet as a result of his dog and pony show to avoid a little criticism. The blaming of the county executive was outrageous…can you imagine the screaming down town if the county executive started stomping all over HdG…saying…HdG is part of the county? Just another example of “he did it” Dougherty’s tactics.
Go Dagger!
Im surprised that the buisnesses that have lost their parking have become silent.
Go Dagger !
On the HdG budget water and sewer…
The city cannot afford what was pissed away by Mayor Dougherty to avoid a little public criticism. The cost is at least 100,000 dollars. The knee jerk stop work order could have been avoided along with the legal fees involved. The same results could have been negotiated with the County. This dog and pony show is coming back to bite us in the ass. Can you spell rate hike…at least lets put Dougherty’s name on that resolution when it comes along. “The Dougherty anti criticism, water and sewer rate hike resolution” . Doesn’t it have a nice ring?
Go Dagger ! !
Never trust a guy in a dress !
i voted for dave malin
KTR…Tell us why you think Malin is (was) a good candidate. ( im not being smart or cute)
Go Dagger !
i do not think dave would have been able to sleep at night unless he was doing the right thing for everyone in hdg
Ktr…does Dave have plans to run?
I’m not sure i haven’t seen him in a while