By Adam Pagnucco.
Here is today’s question.
If you are elected, name three specific things you would do to make the county more affordable.
District 1
Drew Morrison (D)
- Energy prices are increasing, driven by increased demand from data centers and decreased in-state generation. To help lower costs, I will support a statewide coalition to make sure clean energy is built throughout Maryland to provide new supply. I will leverage County, MCPS, and institutional property to create more clean energy here. As I have in the past, I will work with the County Attorney’s Office and the Office of People’s Counsel to leverage Montgomery County’s position to fight against Pepco rate increases, saving residents real money.
- We should modernize our county’s Senior Property Tax Credit to give long-time homeowners relief from climbing assessments. By lowering the required time in a residence from 40 to 25 years, we can open up eligibility to more long-time residents and provide them with the financial stability to remain in Montgomery County.
- The dream of homeownership is out of reach for too many throughout the County. I will work to leverage public land to create more affordable housing opportunities. I will unlock the pipeline of projects and address policies blocking already approved housing supply from actually happening.
Debbie Spielberg (D)
First, I would preserve and expand affordable housing through stronger MPDU requirements, and ensure that new development pays infrastructure costs and delivers truly affordable units.
Second, I would support creating good jobs as I discuss above raising wages and strengthening worker protections so residents can better afford the cost of living.
Third, I would reduce the cost of doing business and building housing by streamlining the approval process and eliminating unnecessary barriers, which can lower costs for both residents and businesses.
Reardon “Sully” Sullivan (R)
To improve affordability in Montgomery County, I would focus on:
- Implementing fiscal discipline, including measures to limit spending and require prioritization of essential services. Enforce the provisions in the “Stop the Spend” ballot petition ( https://controlmocospending.com/ ) to limit spending in the County to the prior year’s rate of inflation. This will put a cap on spending and require legislators to make the hard decisions.
- Using technology, including AI, to reduce regulatory burdens and improve operational efficiency.
- Increasing transparency and accountability in government spending to ensure taxpayer dollars are used effectively including finding out where our tax dollars are going. When reviewing the County checkbook, we found over 50,000 disbursements to anonymous venders, totaling over $320 million.
- Evaluating and streamlining programs where duplication or inefficiency exists.
- Cutting back or eliminating unneeded agencies such as the green department at DEP. This is the group that promoted the banning of gas heating. Their efforts are redundant to the efforts of the industry standard, USGBC.
Julie Yang (D)
We need to build more homes in areas zoned for them and streamline the permitting process to reduce delays and costs. We should continue investing in MPDU units, redevelop outdated strip malls into mixed-use communities, and make better use of underutilized public land.
At Stone Street near the Rockville Metro, I’ve worked to relocate outdated school-system warehouses to modern facilities in an industrial park, freeing up public land for housing. That’s a win-win. Every project must be transparent, with infrastructure planned upfront and development that fits neighborhood scale.
Second, good-paying jobs helps with affordability. I was a college and career advisor, and it is my life’s work to connect people to opportunity. We should be doing far more to align education with real career opportunities. I believe in multiple pathways to success: skilled trades like HVAC and solar panel tech, programs like fire cadets and public safety careers, two-year biotech and workforce programs at Montgomery College, and four-year college degrees.
Third, energy costs. The state has taken steps to lower utility bills and invest in local energy. Now the county must deliver: help families access rebates and generate more clean energy. We can do a lot more with rooftop solar.
District 2
Marilyn Balcombe (D-Incumbent)
Did not answer the questionnaire.
Arian Borghei (R-Write-in)
First, I would oppose unnecessary tax increases and work to reduce the overall tax burden.
Second, I would expand housing supply by making it easier and faster to build new homes.
Third, I would lower costs for small businesses, which in turn helps reduce prices for consumers and creates jobs locally.
District 3
Jud Ashman (D)
I would accelerate housing production by streamlining approvals, setting clear timelines, and aligning infrastructure with growth so we can increase supply. We help our tenants and homebuyers when we give them more choices.
I would focus on growing the County’s commercial tax base – attracting and retaining private-sector jobs so we can generate new revenue without placing additional tax burden on residents. This has been our approach in Gaithersburg. The cost to provide services almost always goes up; in order to keep up with it, you either have to raise taxes or grow the tax base. I prefer the latter – and I have a record of delivering.
I would bring greater discipline to the budget by prioritizing core services, improving efficiency in how we deliver them, and avoiding broad-based tax increases wherever possible, so residents can keep more of what they earn.
Allison Eriksen (D)
Did not answer the questionnaire.
Ricky Fai Mui (R)
Affordability is definitely controversial and in many cases, a subjective issue. For residents in competitive STEM fields, their respective incomes may sustain a modest to very comfortable standard of living. What we typically regard as unaffordable resides in the our growing population of minimum wage earners, whose hourly rates in the hospitality, grocery, retail, restaurant and art-related industries do not yield a living wage in Montgomery County’s high cost of living. Again, the County cannot subsidize our solutions out of this dilemma. It is simply not sustainable within a competitive capitalistic society to increase hourly minimum wage to exceed cost of living; as all the associated elevated costs are passed onto the same consumers, employees, visitors and business owners. Within corporate America, the diminishing margins will and have forced businesses to reevaluate their staffing size or venue locations.
We must: focus our students to have consistent exposure to STEAM and legal fields, allow for competitive internships and opportunities to work before high school graduation, to leverage experience. We also must attract more of the high salary employers, to increase access and opportunity. We must shape our futures, just as previous generations have done for us.
Izola Shaw (D)
I would focus on three key actions to make Montgomery County more affordable:
- Expand Housing Options: I would promote policies that encourage the development of diverse housing types, including more affordable and workforce units to increase supply and ease housing costs.
- Support Property Tax Relief: I would work to expand property tax credits and relief programs for low and middle-income homeowners and seniors to reduce their financial burden.
- Lower Utility Costs: I would advocate for programs that help residents reduce utility bills through energy efficiency initiatives and support for renewable energy, easing monthly expenses. These steps together can help keep Montgomery County affordable while preserving the quality of life for all residents.
District 4
Paula Bienenfeld (D)
Here are three specific things I would do:
- Work to attract high-target, high-paying jobs to the county to rebalance our economy so that we can afford the good things we want to do, including building affordable housing, keeping our libraries open seven days a week, maintaining our beautiful parks, and providing social and legal services to our diverse communities, including immigrants.
- Lower the property tax and recordation fees and other fees, and work with the General Assembly delegates to lower our 46-cent gas tax temporarily, to improve the cost of living in the county.
- Provide free school lunches and provide free, no-questions-asked food on weekends to children, to be available at our county libraries. Other communities do this. We can too.
Kate Stewart (D-Incumbent)
First, housing. We have an affordable housing crisis which impacts our ability to attract people and businesses to our County.
Childcare. We need to make childcare more affordable and available for residents. Research has shown many women have not returned to work outside the home since COVID and a main driver of that is the lack of affordable childcare. It is one of the reasons I led an effort to increase the child care provider tax credit from $3,000 to $10,000 and expand eligibility. This bill made it more affordable for licensed, qualified child care providers to operate in the county.
Electricity. While the County has a limited role in addressing the cost of electricity for residents, we can continue to push forward with Community Choice Energy, which will establish a community choice aggregator to expand options in Montgomery County for more renewable and more stable energy sources.
Peter “Rocky” Whitesell (D)
- I will push urgently for changes to zoning. We need to legalize more townhomes and moderate-density housing, particularly near major transit stations.
- I also want to change how permitting works. Projects should get clearer answers much earlier in the process, with shorter timelines and earlier decision points, so developers are not taking on unnecessary financial risk just to find out a project will not move forward.
- Finally, I want to expand how the county uses its own credit to support affordable housing through HOC. I want much stronger backing for projects and targeted gap financing so more housing can actually get built.
District 5
Charles Kirchman (D)
- Control the county budget to limit the need for tax increases
- Support workforce development in our high schools and community college to get residents the skills to get better paying jobs
- Work with businesses to make Montgomery more inviting.
Kristin Mink (D-Incumbent)
Did not answer the questionnaire.
Josephine Salazar (R)
- Cutting fraud and waste.
- Not duplicating resources for different programs.
- Investing in the education of our students by ensuring they have access to valuable resources to succeed in their studies.
District 6
Natali Fani-González (D-Incumbent)
Did not answer the questionnaire.
Sonia Garcia (D)
First, I would close affordability loopholes in existing legislation and activate housing already in the pipeline. The county has approved significant density but too many projects stall. I would pursue “use-it-or-lose-it” permit rules, require that any project receiving public subsidy deliver genuinely affordable units priced at what teachers, first responders, and service workers actually earn, and enforce strict anti-flip restrictions so affordable units reach people who need them rather than investors.
Second, I would restore and fully fund the County’s Earned Income Tax Credit at its original rate before the Council reduced it last year. The EITC is one of the most effective anti-poverty tools available. It reduces poverty directly, helps families manage rising costs for groceries and rent, and is structured to incentivize work among low-to-moderate-income earners. Cutting it was the wrong call at exactly the wrong time, when families are already being squeezed from every direction.
Third, I would prioritize economic opportunity alongside housing policy. Affordability is not just about housing costs, it is also about income. I would support small business growth, expand workforce development, and grow the county’s private-sector job base so working families have the economic foundation to stay here. That includes partnering with state-level programs like the Maryland Women’s Business Center, which provides training and resources to help entrepreneurs, especially women and underserved business owners, launch and grow businesses in our region. We cannot price residents out while also failing to create the jobs that would allow them to keep up.
Louella Tham (R)
Did not answer the questionnaire.
District 7
Van Free (D)
First, I would limit unnecessary tax increases and focus on responsible budgeting to reduce the financial burden on residents.
Second, I would expand housing supply by streamlining approvals and encouraging a mix of housing types. Increasing supply is key to stabilizing costs over time.
Third, I would support small businesses and job growth so residents can earn a good living locally. A strong local economy reduces commuting costs and strengthens financial stability for families.
Affordability isn’t just about one policy, it’s about aligning taxes, housing, and economic opportunity to work together.
Sharif Hidayat (D)
Did not answer the questionnaire.
Dawn Luedtke (D-Incumbent)
- Enable more housing production aimed at workers and working families that may earn more than allowed to qualify for income-restricted affordable housing but not enough to afford a home at the sharply rising median home price.
- Expand investment in early childcare vouchers, make it easier for additional childcare providers to set up and find physical space to offer more childcare options, and fix some of the laws and regulations at both the County and State levels that are driving childcare costs up.
- Establish more flat fees for permitting approvals and end the need for the Department of Permitting Services to fund itself via permit processing fees so there is no motivation to make businesses, nonprofits, and homeowners apply and pursue multiple and sometimes redundant permitting requirements.
Harold Maldonado (R)
When elected, I’d take three concrete steps to make MoCo more affordable by directly addressing the core drivers of high costs: government spending growth, housing policy, and enhancing the investment environment.
First, I’d implement strict budget discipline and a comprehensive audit of county spending to identify waste, duplication, and non-essential programs. My priority is to ensure taxpayer dollars are focused on core services like public safety, education, and infrastructure—not administrative expansion or low-impact initiatives. Restoring fiscal discipline is the most direct way to prevent unnecessary tax increases and relieve pressure on residents. I’d also push for a two-year freeze on all taxes and utility rate hikes.
Second, I’d work to reduce the cost burden on households by supporting policies that increase housing supply and affordability, including streamlined permitting, reduced regulatory barriers, and reforms that make it easier to build workforce and middle-income housing. When supply increases, long-term affordability improves without requiring constant government intervention.
Third, I’d focus on making MoCo more competitive for businesses and job creation, centered on Small Businesses: lowering barriers to entry, cutting red tape, and supporting a more pro-growth environment so companies can open shop here. A stronger private sector expands the tax base and reduces pressure on residents over time.