ON THE ISSUES
Paul’s Priorities
Education
The unsustainable tax base, caused by decades of suburban sprawl, is the leading reason Baltimore County’s schools are struggling, why they lack the funds to honor teacher contracts and provide adequate supports which undermines our ability to attract and retain educators and solve discipline problems.
With fifty percent of the County’s budget going to schools, I support extending the Inspector General to provide oversight into the school system. I also believe that the County Council needs to ensure that funds reach where they are needed most.
I will encourage and support:
Increasing educator pay and planning time to reduce turnover and improve competitiveness with neighboring districts.
Ensuring school safety while supporting students — hold disruptive students accountable while providing the wraparound social services, staffing, and programs needed to help struggling or “at-risk” students become attentive, successful learners and promote equitable outcomes.
Improving communication and decision-making by giving educators a stronger voice.
Closing performance gaps through more equitable housing policies.
Revisiting developer impact fees to ensure community benefits from new development.
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Protecting the Environment
Regarding the environment, there is nothing more important than holding the Urban Rural Demarcation Line (URDL). The URDL is a planning boundary: outside the line is protected rural lands around our reservoirs that safeguard drinking water for 2 million residents; inside the line is where growth and redevelopment are meant to occur.
Some suggest moving the URDL outward to address housing affordability. This is a dangerous path for many reasons. Rural areas lack jobs, transit, and essential services, and besides developers have no history of building affordable housing there. We know, however, decades of unchecked sprawl have fueled chronic disinvestment in legacy communities, disproportionally harming marginalized residents with flooding, eroded infrastructure, and declining community confidence.
The equitable and sustainable path forward is to invest in redevelopment where it belongs, inside the URDL— near mass transit, job centers, and aging commercial corridors — while protecting open space to protect our drinking water. Doing so will allow us to expand green infrastructure, improve transit, create safer streets for walkers and cyclists, and preserve land that cleans our air, reduces flooding, and sustains wildlife.
Proven Leadership: As a member of the Sierra Club Greater Baltimore Group’s Executive Committee, I’ve fought for clean air, clean water, and natural spaces while lifting up the need to connect people to them through transit. I’ll bring that same commitment to the County Council.
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Safer Streets
Public safety is about more than policing. It requires us to deconstruct unjust systems and strengthen the social services that prevent crime before it happens. Facing challenges like inequitable housing, struggling schools, and suburban decay head-on allows us to address the root causes of crime, not just its symptoms.
Law enforcement is an integral partner for reviving neighborhoods. But to be effective, we must rebuild trust. That means holding unacceptable officer behavior accountable while expanding de-escalation training and advancing community-based policing strategies.
Safety also means ensuring our children grow up in communities with diverse role models, strong schools, and meaningful expression through arts, sports, and mentorships.
Research shows that smart growth policies reduce crime by creating vibrant neighborhoods. Daytime activity from shops, restaurants, and offices combined with the vigilance of residents at night reduces opportunities for crime.
At the same time, redevelopment is about rebuilding community confidence — and confidence is one of the most powerful tools for keeping neighborhoods safe.
Finally, expanding our capacity to treat mental illness, substance abuse, and domestic violence is essential to a comprehensive public safety strategy.
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Building Communities for Everyone
Essential workers, disabled residents, seniors who struggle to age in place and young people who want to return home, everyone deserves a safe, stable, and affordable place to live. There is no shame in needing housing; the real challenge is ensuring it is provided in ways that strengthen communities.
Neighborhoods suffering from lack of code enforcement, insufficient landlord oversight, and infrastructure deterioration are the product of development practices that extract wealth from communities to fuel suburban sprawl. This chronic disinvestment is the cause of struggling communities, not affordable housing, and hurts everyone, especially those who need affordable housing options.
To address these challenges, I will encourage and support:
Community-driven planning and engagement, ensuring residents have a seat at the table in shaping redevelopment projects and housing solutions.
Set-aside affordable units and other community benefits whenever developers request increased density and revisit past decisions, like those around Spring Grove.
Redevelopment of commercial corridors using mixed-income models to provide opportunities for residents across income levels.
Incremental growth through pre-approved, historically sensitive designs for Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) to promote multi-generational housing, preserve neighborhood character, and protect historic resources by reducing tear-down feasibility.
Improving pedestrian and bike infrastructure near mass transit, job centers, schools, and other amenities to lower dependence on car ownership that reduces living costs.
Holding commercial landlords accountable and funding expanded code enforcement to maintain community standards and reduce public apprehension on housing issues.
Thoughtful, community-focused housing policy can restore confidence and provide equitable opportunities for all residents while supporting the long-term growth and vitality of District One
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Infrastructure
Decades of car-centered planning have created a tidal wave of infrastructure liabilities, leaving roads, sewers, and stormwater systems in poor condition. Residents’ top concerns are deteriorating roads, speeding and lack of sidewalks, which threaten safety, stifle quality of life, and discourage walking or biking.
When repaving roads, every project should:
Design appropriately to distinguish between roads that move cars efficiently and neighborhood streets where community safety and slowed traffic come first.
Build flood resiliency with green infrastructure.
Protect pedestrians and bicyclists with safer crossings and connected routes.
Ensure equitable maintenance so all communities receive fair investment.
Use pop-up traffic-calming experiments to test what works before major construction, prioritizing paint, plastic, and other measures to slow traffic efficiently and cost-effectively.
Ensure proper project sequencing so that roads are not torn up by utility contractors after repaving.
Most of all, our tax base must be able to support the infrastructure we already have. Smart Growth strategies create a more efficient tax base to repair roads, sewers, and stormwater systems, while stopping the cycle of adding infrastructure unsupported by revenue.
Infrastructure is more than roads and pipes — it is the backbone of public confidence. By prioritizing safety, equity, and Smart Growth, we can repair what’s broken, protect our neighborhoods, and build a community residents can be proud of in Baltimore County.
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Job Creation
Redevelopment is more than repairing aging infrastructure—it’s about creating thriving local economies where businesses and families can succeed. When we bring new life to our commercial corridors and neighborhoods, we create more customers for local businesses—people who not only shop locally but also care deeply about their community.
Smaller-scale, incremental development supports local trades—carpenters, electricians, plumbers, and other contractors—keeping dollars circulating in our community. Large projects that receive public financing should be tied to Project Labor Agreements (PLAs) or similar requirements, ensuring they provide well-paying jobs that support working families.
Small businesses rely on the spaces that developers construct, and successful building projects require creative, collaborative solutions. Uncontrolled development without adequate community engagement has led to a rejection of all development. As a grassroots publicly financed candidate, unencumbered by special interests, I will build the trust required to grow the economy equitably.
From every angle, redevelopment becomes the economic backbone of District One—strengthening businesses, creating good jobs, supporting families, and building communities that thrive.