TOWSON, Md. — It was a packed stage at Goucher College as candidates for Baltimore County Executive answered questions at a candidate forum.
Baltimore County Executive candidates share their plans for the county's future
Kathy Klausmeier, who's been in office since January 2025 when Johnny Olszewski left for Congress, is not running for re-election.
Rob Daniels, Julian Jones, Izzy Patoka, Mansoor Shams, Kimberly Stansbury, Nick Stewart, and Pat Young each got a chance to share why they feel they're the best person to take the seat.
Here's a summary of how they responded to questions on Wednesday night:
Question: With a significant transformation on the way for the Baltimore County Council (going from 7 to 9 seats), how will you bring them together to collaborate and move the county forward?
Daniels: "I will be their best friend in the world and collaborator, but make no mistake, if the same tomfoolery and games start that we've had all along, if councilmanic courtesy rears its ugly head, we're going to litigate. On day one, I'm going to construct a county attorney's office that that is not constitutional...I think we have to have an honest dialogue and talk about those expectations."
Jones: "I'm going to explain to them, I've been there, I've done it, I've been here for 12 years, let me tell you the way things work, and then we will lay out a course together...making sure we're bringing in the resources to take care of all the services we've come to expect."
Patoka: "I'm happy to join Councilman Marks and Councilman Ertel...in helping to guide some of the new council members so the learning curve is not so steep."
Shams: "One of the greatest disservices to this change would be electing the same...we must, as a county, really change the way we think...this is an awesome opportunity for us to elect a new way forward."
Stansbury: "This is an excellent opportunity to make sure that our new county council people know they are responsible to their constituents...let's face it, each district has its own set of problems, its own set of needs and the new councilmembers have to understand that they have to work together."
Stewart: "It's our opportunity to modernize county government, to do this in a professional way, to establish subcommittees, for example, for our county council to do things that other counties that are modern do."
Young: "At an orientation, they said there were five rules to be successful in legislature, rule number one, don't be a jerk... recognizing that no one on this council, regardless of where they come from, what area they live in, the goal has to be to make Baltimore County better."
Question: Where do you believe Baltimore County should allow more housing by right, including townhomes, duplexes, accessory dwelling units or other missing middle options, and where should growth remain more limited?
Patoka: "We should target areas that are already impervious, like our metro stations, transit-oriented developments...I created zoning tools to expand affordable housing, I also made it easier to locate residential apartment elevator...making sure that we have green space to accommodate the housing is really important to me."
Stewart: "Overturn councilmanic courtesy, where each councilmember controls everything that happens in their district like a theifdom chief. We have to overturn our practice of not planning according to law, we do a master plan and we throw it out...we have got to reform permitting, approvals and inspections."
Jones: "We need to look at things like Lutherville Station, we need to grow, we need the revenue, we need to continue to pay for the services we've come to expect, you look at all sorts of other properties throughout Baltimore county that could use serious redevelopment and that's what I offer."
Stansbury: "I'm not against development, I love development, but I am against irresponsible development...we need a dashboard, we need something that lets us know if we are building just to build, or if we're building to strengthen our community."
Shams: "We have this attitude, 'not in my district, not in my neighborhood,' I see it in Recreation and Parks all the time...we don't educate the people who are saying no. We can't make decisions for 50 people or 100 people that say no for an entire county that ends up essentially losing out."
Young: "Baltimore County has taken a laissez-faire approach to development, to planning, a hands-off approach to how we think about the future, we don't build things for the next 10 years...so we can focus on mixed-use development, like we see in Owings Mills, like we see in Baltimore City and what we see in Howard County and focus on areas that don't impact our traditional commutes."
Daniels: "We're going to make sure every property owner knows, they can age in place...Howard County's done it, Montgomery County's done it for years, we're behind."
Question: How do you plan to work with housing industry groups to foster an operative relationship with developers, builders and local government?
Jones: "I have a very good relationship with all the stakeholders as it relates to building more affordable homes, building shopping destinations and having been a realtor for 30+ years, I know what it takes to get people into homes...have an open door, to have meetings and conversations and planning sessions on what is best for our community."
Patoka: "Find common ground...in the Patoka administration, you're going to see a complete overhaul of the permits department."
Stansbury: "I want to see when someone applies for a permit, to have someone go with them to be with them through the entire process...we need to make sure our County Council works with communities and we have enough community impact meetings."
Young: "There is nothing wrong with bringing folks to the table to talk about what the future of our county looks like to together, utilizing experts in the field, utilizing community members that are impacted by the decisions we're making at a county level."
Shams: "Part of the problem is, we don't have transparency in our politics, that's a serious issue...it's not possible when our politicians are bought."
Daniels: "The biggest impediment is the lack of transparency in our zoning. Our zoning is not transparent, it's not predictable which means most developers won't rely on it, they won't bring business to our county."
Stewart: "With a master plan that's legally binding fed by small area plans and is followed by a sewer and water master plan...and all these things work together so community members are not surprised, they're engaged."
Question: What steps will you take to ensure that there’s a pipleline of skilled workers for the construction industry?
Patoka: "Baltimore County's actually done a pretty good job at workforce development with our partners at CCBC...those are the jobs of the future."
Young: "We have to get into schools early and talk to students about opportunities that present themselves right now and we have to support them."
Daniels: "These things are all tied together, we can have great training programs, CCBC, our colleges can be great, but if our county's not affordable, and folks are going into these programs face the prospect of never owning a home here, they're not going to stay, so what problems are we solving for?"
Jones: "In the very beginning, I came up with the idea to have the College Promise program where we would allow kids in Baltimore County to go to the community college for free...everything from carpentry, to electrician, to nursing, to air traffic controlling, to truck driving, serious opportunities for every kid who graduates high school in Baltimore County."
Stewart: "People get lost, they need to be handheld, particularly in our system...we need to lower barriers to entry, this includes things like transit, this includes appealing to our diverse populations, we are a big county, people need to have access to our resources."
Stansbury: "Not all students want to go to college or can afford to go to college...we need to go back to basics, we need to make our schools where they again have shop classes, give every student a taste of electrical, plumbing, let them figure out what they want to do...let's send our kids our where they are employable."
Shams: "We don't operate as one county. Imagine for a moment if BCPS students could have a course offered by Baltimore County Police, introduction to that world, Department of Health, Social Services, recreation and Parks?"
Question: How do you plan to attract new business and create job opportunities?
Jones: "The first thing we're going to do is literally double the size of our workforce and economic development...I want to create another section and send them across the country and around the world to bring them here to Baltimore County."
Patoka: "I'm going to restructure our economic and workforce development unit to be stronger, to refocus its lens to business retention and business attraction. The other thing, I'm going to create a brand new agency called the Office of Community Conservation, a coordinating agency focused on inner-beltway neighborhoods."
Stansbury: "Baltimore County cannot just focus on large businesses, we have to focus on medium-sized and we have to focus on keeping our small businesses running at top performance...We have to keep them safe, we have to work with our chamber of commerce, we have to make sure everyone feels like they belong in Baltimore County."
Young: "Recognize the shortcomings of our Economic and Workforce Development Department. We need to focus their attention on selling our county, what opportunity we have for other business to move in and provide support."
Daniels: "We've been very good at building things, but we haven't always been great with the follow through plan, I think Towson is a great example...we have to look really closely at leadership, making sure all of our districts are fully represented."
Stewart: "We should conduct a stakeholder process to make sure we have all our resources aligned, we have got to modernize our Economic and Workforce Development Department, no other county does it like this...establishing a true office of small business assistance."
Shams: "We have no process in place to incentivize business, not from the county and not from landlord to tenant and we should talk about that, maybe we should look at different models where a landlord works in profit sharing models."
Primary Election Day is June 23.
