By Adam Pagnucco.
Council Member Will Jawando, perhaps the principal figure in Montgomery County’s passage of rent control, took it to developers in yesterday’s Rent Stabilization Community Forum in Rockville. The event was located at Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Rockville and hosted by the Montgomery County Democratic Socialists. Rockville Council Member Izola Shaw was the featured speaker but no one upstages Jawando.
Agree with him or not, few local politicians can fire up a crowd like Will Jawando.
Jawando directly took on the national real estate industry for redlining MoCo due to its rent control law. He also appeared to take a swipe at the More Housing N.O.W. proposal by Council Members Andrew Friedson and Natali Fani-Gonzalez, which relies in part on subsidies to encourage residential development.
Following is his embedded X post and a transcript.
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Great energy at the Rockville Rent Stabilization Community Forum! It’s powerful to see this community coming together to demand real protections for renters. Housing must be stable and affordable for all—I look forward to fighting alongside you to make it happen!… pic.twitter.com/BAZ4xlqGcn
— Councilmember Will Jawando (@CMJawando) March 17, 2025
They want to redline us because we won’t agree to spend your taxpayer dollars to give to someone so they can make 20 percent profit and everyone in that transaction can be a millionaire except for the person renting the housing or buying the housing. Then don’t come here.
But there are other people… And you know what, that’s a, that’s… what that is, what studies have shown? When you pass rent stabilization, you might see a little period of time where people do say, OK, let’s not invest there, let’s [inaudible] get in the room, let’s not invest there for a little bit so that they see that we mean business.
But this is a desirable area. People want to live here. People want new housing here… This is a great community, like your church, like your congregation. And that is a threat. And we shouldn’t respond to threats like that. We should continue to organize and say we will not accept that. And… thank you.
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Jawando neglected to tell his audience that taxpayer dollars fund the Montgomery County Renters Alliance, which helped him pass rent control and which continues to advocate for more legislation in Annapolis. That said, it’s good to see Jawando acknowledge that rent control deters development. He is right about that.
A question for readers. If Jawando runs for county executive and gets elected, how many housing units would you expect to see built in Montgomery County?