LISTEN: Will MOCO Lawmakers Pay For Tax Hike With Term Limits?

John Matthews
WMAL News

ROCKVILLE — (WMAL) As far as Robin Ficker is concerned, the 8.7 percent property tax increase passed unanimously by the Montgomery County Council last week was an advertisement for his referendum on term limits.

“Vote for term limits, so we can fire five of these folks in November, and we’ll get the rest of them in 2018,” Ficker told WMAL in an interview.

Ficker, a longtime private attorney and one-time Republican State Delegate from Boyds, is pushing a ballot measure that would limit council members and the county executive to three consecutive terms, and it is written so those terms would be limited retroactively.

“It’s a little like trying to save the horses after the barn has already been burned down, but at least we can slow down future tax increases if we get some fresh ideas in the county government,” says Ficker.

The property tax increase passed by the council is largely earmarked for spending on education. The size of the tax hike required a unanimous vote for approval thanks to a tax limit referendum that voters approved in 2008. That measure was also backed by Ficker.

If the term limit measure is approved by voters, it would mean that County Executive Ike Leggett and County Council members Roger Berliner, Marc Elrich, Nancy Floreen and George Leventhal couldn’t run again for their current positions in 2018. Leggett is expected to retire following his current term, and the four council members on the chopping block would all be possible candidates for Leggett’s job.