Informal Group To Take On Owings Mills Development Growing Pains

A formal Baltimore County Council resolution that sought to create a committee to discuss future Owings Mills development , but that doesn’t mean a group won’t still be created.

County councilwoman Vicki Almond (District 2) said she and councilman Kenneth Oliver (District 4) decided it was not necessary to create the group under a legally binding resolution voted upon by the county council.

“We didn’t think it needed to be that formal,” Almond said. “We decided we could put the committee together informally and have more flexibility.” 

That flexibility includes the right to name a committee chair and the ability to “meet when we want to meet.”

Almond said large area landowners, including , and , had been contacted to gauge their interest in joining such a group.

She also said that community organizations like the Reisterstown-Owings Mills-Glyndon Coordinating Council and the ROMG Chamber of Commerce would be invited to join.

When the informal committee is formed – perhaps in the next month, Almond said – discussion would not center around which stores or businesses might set up shop in Owings Mills.

“It’s not what’s going to go in Owings Mills,” she said, “but how to improve quality of life in Owings Mills.”

Quality of life includes creating walkability and other forms of transportation – perhaps bike lanes – from area to area. She agreed that separate sections of Owings Mills were largely unconnected.

“We want to make it easy for people in New Town to walk to whatever’s at the mall,” Almond said. The committee will meet to discuss what the best ways to create that infrastructure would be and “how to make that happen.”

Though Owings Mills development would likely be the focus, the entire Reisterstown Road corridor would be discussed at the meetings.

“We all need to sit down and talk it through,” Almond said.

She also said it was Stevenson University’s aggressive expansion on Owings Mills Boulevard that was driving much of the increased talk of development in the area. 

The one-time commuter school formerly known as Villa Julie College now has about 2,000 students living in residence halls in Owings Mills. The school was also this year by U.S. News and World Report, and a new football program .

“I’ve always felt that Stevenson has become the heart of Owings Mills,” Almond said. “I think at some point in time, [Owings Mills] will be labeled a college town.”

Ultimately, Almond said she wants current business owners to be involved in conversations about new development.

But she also said she understood that talk of development and bringing in new retail centers could ruffle the feathers of some of those existing establishments – though she didn’t necessarily think that was a negative.

“When you…raise the standard of an area…the people who are already there have to raise their standard,” Almond said.