Ask the county council to support affordable housing, environmental sustainability, and accessible transit by passing Montgomery County’s 30-year development plan

The County Council is currently reviewing Thrive 2050, a high-level, visionary document drafted and approved by the Planning Board that provides a blueprint for how and where the county will grow over the next 30+ years. The plan focuses on economic health, equity, and environmental resilience.

The Thrive plan addresses the same major concerns AIM heard from hundreds of county residents in our listening campaigns: that today, “the high cost and limited variety of available housing exacerbate inequality and segregation by race and class” (PHED draft p. 61) and low-income, minority communities lack equitable access to jobs, resources, and transportation.

Thrive makes specific and necessary recommendations to address these inequalities, including: investing in “complete communities” in East County (p. 25), prioritizing public transit investment in underserved communities (p. 49), building more housing near transit (p.64), increasing funding to build and preserve affordable housing (p.64), and taking measures to measure and prevent gentrification and net loss of affordable units (p.65).