On January 22, 2026, we talked to leading housing experts about the relationship between housing production and affordability, and explored policy tools to provide stable, affordable housing across a range of incomes.
This was the third webinar in our series on our region’s housing needs, and how researchers, policymakers, and advocates can work together towards solutions.
On Tuesday, December 9, the Montgomery County Council voted to approve the University Boulevard Corridor Plan by a vote of 7-3. The plan creates a strong framework for safer streets, a wider variety of housing options, a connected bike network, and new homes and retail near transit.
The University Boulevard Corridor Plan envisions a community with safer streets, thriving local businesses, better public transit, and more housing choices to meet people’s needs at all ages and stages of life.
Visit our landing page at smartergrowth.net/ubc to take action and learn more about the plan.
Yesterday, the Montgomery County Council voted 8-3 to pass Zoning Text Amendment (ZTA) 25-02. The legislation will allow more housing types, like townhouses or small apartment buildings, along major corridors, creating more homes near jobs and amenities.
July 23, 2025 | Ginny Bixby | Bethesda Today
The Coalition for Smarter Growth released a statement prior to Tuesday’s vote voicing support for the zoning change. The nonprofit advocates for “walkable, bikeable, inclusive, and transit-oriented communities” in the Washington, D.C. area, according to its website.
“By making it easier to build more duplexes, triplexes, and small apartments near transit and jobs, [the] ZTA is an important step toward more sustainable housing options in Montgomery County,” the statement said. “Measures like this that take on the structural problems feeding our housing shortage are a necessary step to achieve our shared vision of a sustainable, inclusive county for all.”
Read the full story here.
We urge you to adopt the recommendations of the Planning Board and remove the unbuilt northern portion of M-83 from the Master Plan of Highways and Transitways.
M-83 is not the right path forward to provide better transportation options upcounty. The ways of thinking that informed plans for this road decades ago are fundamentally out of step with what we know today about best practices to address transportation needs, and about the vital connections between environmental health, climate resilience, and human health.
Mid-County Highway Extended (M-83) wouldn’t relieve traffic upcounty long-term—but it would cut a divide through existing communities and destroy farmlands, forests, and sensitive wetlands in its path.
The County Council is finally considering removing M-83 from county plans this month, and we need you to weigh in.
June 28, 2025 | Dana Munro and Rachel Weiner | Washington Post
Also featuring Montgomery for All Steering Committee Mike Larkin!
One major concern of the free buses, Larkin said, is that the lack of revenue coming in could justify the county disinvesting in the system, especially as Montgomery County deals with the economic impacts of the Trump administration’s massive federal spending cuts and job cuts.
Carrie Kisicki, Montgomery advocacy manager with the Coalition for Smarter Growth, a group that advocates for more accessible communities around the D.C. region, agreed.
Residents and lawmakers “might see other problems going on in the community that are more visible to them or maybe more part of their everyday experience and wonder ‘should transit be a priority or not’ and it absolutely needs to be,” she said.
Read the full story here.
June 27, 2025 | Ethan Goffman | Greater Greater Washington
“This is a plan that has been on the books a long time, and they’re taking lots of steps to finally build this network out,” said Carrie Kisicki, Montgomery Advocacy Manager at the Coalition for Smarter Growth. […]
Kisicki also emphasized the need for better pedestrian comfort and safety: “It’s already a very wide road, it’s already a harrowing place for pedestrians, it’s very much built as a suburban arterial, not considering the experience of people outside of cars.” Planned expansion of the right of way for a buffer and shared-use path will be welcome, she said, and will work in tandem with improved transit. “This is a huge investment,” she emphasized. “This is our shot to do it right.”
View slides from CSG’s presentation to the Montgomery County Young Democrats on May 20, 2025.