Metropolitan Baltimore is at risk from a regional development pattern characterized by suburban sprawl and uncontrolled development in some areas and neglect of older, established communities elsewhere. This pattern is driven by taxpayer subsidies and policies that pit jurisdiction against jurisdiction in a destructive competition for new tax base and infrastructure.

The result: A regional development pattern characterized by outward migration and sprawl instead of redevelopment and revitalization of existing communities.

The cost: Billions of tax dollars wasted on new infrastructure. Older communities abandoned and neglected. Increased air and water pollution threatening our natural resources and the Chesapeake Bay.

The trends and policies undermining community quality of life in metropolitan Baltimore demand regional responses.

CPHA's Campaign for Regional Solutions has identified three areas in particular where regional strategies can have an immediate impact.

Transportation Planning: Three-quarters of a billion dollars a year of transportation investments are already decided at the regional level by the Baltimore Metropolitan Council's Transportation Steering Committee. But the latest 20-year plan projects worsening congestion and more pollution. Worst of all, it includes nearly $1 billion for hundreds of lane-miles of new and wider highways in outer-suburban and rural areas, promoting sprawl and uncontrolled development, driving the outmigration that undermines existing communities. Instead, those funds should be invested in maintaining the vitality of older communities and building a decent transit system. Click here for more information about regional transportation issues.

Tax Base Sharing: Competition for new tax base puts rapidly growing outer counties on a treadmill - and older jurisdictions on a downward slide. The result is the worst of both worlds: growing disparities and ever-accelerating sprawl. Elsewhere around the nation, metropolitan areas such as Minneapolis-St. Paul have begun to move toward more of a unified regional tax base, fostering a more unified approach to meeting the challenges of growth and development, and generating a regional revenue pool to address shared regional priorities. Click here for more information about regional tax base sharing.

Missing: A Vision: Regions as diverse as Portland, Oregon and Chattanooga, Tennessee have carried out community visioning exercises that involved thousands of people in a process of deciding their communities' future - similar to Howard County's recently completed "United Vision" process. Until metropolitan Baltimore does likewise, we will remain stuck in a pattern of scattered decision-making, continuing a regional development trend in which everyone loses.