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Unusual ehrlich defense land sales Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
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Unusual Statement by Ehrlich Highlights Tensions of Land Sales
Updated: Wednesday, Nov. 24, 2004 - 5:33 AM
By GRETCHEN PARKER
Associated Press Writer
ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) - Gov. Robert Ehrlich, issuing an unusual written public statement, said Tuesday that his administration will publicly decide which land to keep and which to sell after an inventory of state-owned property is completed.
The statement was the Republican governor's first lengthy, public explanation of his side of the controversy surrounding his land-sale policies. He's been criticized over the past several weeks by leading Democratic lawmakers as details emerge of a now-defunct proposal to buy 800 acres of environmentally sensitive land so it could be sold to a well-connected developer.
The deal to turn over timberland in southern Maryland bought to light a larger issue - how the governor intends to inventory land and dispose of tracts that his staff deems "surplus." It also sparked a series of articles in The (Baltimore) Sun that examined the policies. The coverage was unfairly slanted, Ehrlich's office said as he ordered press officers in 19 state agencies to stop talking to the Sun's state capital bureau chief.
The land in St. Mary's County was not a part of the inventory now being compiled. The two issues are separate. But the land deal has made Ehrlich's critics skeptical of his motives for the inventory.
Ehrlich emerged Tuesday, via the e-mailed news release, to explain the statewide inventory.
It is explicitly outlining surplus land, which so far includes at least 3,000 acres of parkland and unused property managed by the Department of Natural Resources. It eventually will include land run by several other state agencies - including the Department of Transportation, which owns more land than any other department. In all, the state owns 13,000 tracts of land, about 450,000 acres.
But Ehrlich says in his 600-word statement that the land list is merely a part of a larger project to inventory all state property, including cars, yachts and airplanes. When he took office nearly two years ago, he asked what the state owned and how the stuff could be gotten rid of.
"Remarkably, no one could answer my question," Ehrlich wrote. "This was a lack of accountability for taxpayer dollars in the face of a $2 billion budget shortfall."
Although Ehrlich doesn't specifically mention the St. Mary's County timberland deal, he writes that after the inventory is complete, "we will initiate the public process" to determine which land is valuable and which land is an expensive albatross.
"That's a switch," said Democratic Sen. Brian Frosh, chairman of the Senate's justice committee. "They're obviously doing a lot of backing and filling at this point. It's pretty clear that what they were doing was assembling parks and waterfalls and bayfront property to sell to developers.
"Now that they've been caught, they say they're going to have a public process," said Frosh, who announced Monday that he'll introduce a constitutional amendment when the General Assembly convenes in January that would prohibit the governor from selling environmentally sensitive land without the approval of lawmakers.
Those sales currently only need the approval of the state Board of Public Works, a three-member panel made up of Ehrlich, Comptroller William Donald Schaefer and Treasurer Nancy Kopp.
"The governor has a lot of power when it comes to disposing of state treasures," Frosh said. "I think we just need to make sure there are checks and balances in place."
Ehrlich's administration maintains that the inventory is good government. It's foolish for the state not to have a handle on what property is a drain on state services, said Planning Secretary Audrey Scott.
"The inventory was good housekeeping, good stewardship of taxpayers' dollars," said Scott, whose office asked each state department to offer up land not critical to its short- or long-term plans. "We have asked them if they're using it, do they have a need for it in 10 years or 20 years? Where can this land be best utilized?"
Targeted parkland parcels listed by DNR include those considered isolated, inaccessible and difficult to manage with little public benefit.
"My political opponents claim this is a plan to turn parklands into condominiums. Nothing could be further from the truth," Ehrlich wrote. "They will remain an integral part of my land preservation strategy, regardless of recent media reports to the contrary."
(Copyright 2004 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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