An Alignment Strategy
Elizabeth's PEACE Platform comprises five high-touch areas that residents feel first: 1) how Town priorities are decided, accomplished, and communicated; 2) what the Town publishes and archives; 3) how we build on what we have; 4) how we care for the land; and 5) how financial resources are committed. During the first ninety days of the new Administration, each area will be assessed to affirm what is working and determine where greater alignment is necessary. Grounded in the Comprehensive Plan, the results will provide a clear way-ahead that establishes priorities for governing, budgeting, and action over the next four years and beyond.
Community confidence is built on resident voters trusting the decisions Town stewards make on their behalf.
Confidence grows where residents can see how everyday Town work is done: how notice is given, how public assets are cared for, and what a household pays and why. Understanding where those standards are written down, and where they are not, is a top priority.
ADMINISTRATION
Examine
Town of North Beach Beach & Boardwalk rules; the Town parking page; the Town's December 2023 water and sewer rate-sufficiency study.
Related Chapters:
Enabling transparency builds on the records the Town already publishes.
The Administration carries three things forward: decisions already on the books, the priorities that determine which actions come first, and the records stakeholders can review. Enabling transparency brings these into one place.
ADMINISTRATION
Examine
Town of North Beach Charter; Comprehensive Plan, Implementation chapter, Table IM-1; FY2027 Adopted Operating and Capital Budget; Maryland Open Meetings Act; Maryland Land Use Article § 1-207
This Town's character supports our livelihood, and protecting that character is an economic strategy.
The strategy rests on three things the Town already holds: markers that document how we grew, a working partnership with the Bayside History Museum, and design standards so the new buildings fit the street they're built on.
ADMINISTRATION
Examine
Town Code Chapter 62; the 1998 Architectural Survey; the Maryland Historical Trust's 1996 North Beach Survey District determination; Architectural Design Guidelines & Standards; the Comprehensive Plan; the Maryland Historical Trust Certified Local Government program; the Calvert County historic preservation tax credit; the Calvert County Zoning Ordinance.
Rain and rising tides are the Town's largest capital exposure.
Sound finances matter most where the work is largest, and the largest work depends on clear, continuing ownership. Engineers studied the runoff and the shoreline and documented what they found. What they found reaches past what the adopted plan prioritizes today. Beyond the Flood Committee's charter, the slopes at San Francisco by the Bay are eroding, and the Army Corps has documented marsh loss at the north end, where Route 261 and nearby development altered the water's natural flow.
ADMINISTRATION
Examine
Compound Flood Action Plan; the Army Corps of Engineers study of the north end marsh; the Army Corps public notice for the pending hybrid breakwater application (PN-26-24); the Town's listing of boards, commissions and volunteer committees; the Town Zoning Ordinance and the Comprehensive Plan environmental policies; Critical Area mapping and requirements applicable to North Beach; the Town's Sustainable Maryland certification report.
The Town's annual finances reflect real discipline.
Years of responsible budgeting, including seven consecutive years at the constant yield tax rate, leave the next Administration a stable government and real capability to act. That capability is the precondition for resilience. Responsibility asks, “Did we live within our means this year, and is the money accounted for?” Resilience asks different questions about capacity and thriving, beginning with: “Can the Town absorb what’s coming and keep going?” Capacity calls for frugality with resources and ingenuity with emerging challenges, then the effectiveness to turn both into tangible results. Answering that question begins in these six areas.
ADMINISTRATION
Examine
Town Charter; FY2027 Adopted Operating and Capital Budget; FY2027 Adopted Fee Schedule; Comprehensive Plan, Implementation chapter, Table IM-1; Comprehensive Plan, Policy EC.7; 2023 North Beach Compound Flood Action Plan; Resolution 23-08