SALISBURY, Md. - The Salisbury City Council voted Monday night to increase the density in its downtown.
After nearly an hour of public comment from those in support and against the change, the council voted 4-1.
The density amendment allows for more people to live downtown, green-lighting development plans for a new apartment complex and parking garage in downtown Salisbury.
Those supporting the density amendment argued that by allowing more people to live downtown, more people will shop, eat and work downtown, allowing businesses to flourish. Those opposed to the change argued that the downtown is already at capacity and with strained parking.
Council President D'Shawn Doughty voted in support of the text amendment and says this change will move the city in the right direction.
"We decided that this is something that we need to support. We need to support density downtown, support our businesses downtown, and our people downtown. So this is a stance, we’ve said it loud and clear," said Doughty.
The decision now goes to Mayor Randy Taylor’s desk for his approval, however Taylor says he will veto the this text amendment.
“It’s not a density issue, it’s a parking issue,” said Taylor. “Really we should reconfigure the conversation of density to parking. This is not the right approach.”
But Doughty argues there is more than enough parking downtown, and this sticking point should not hold the city back.
"Right now you have free two hour free parking downtown, you have street level parking, you have parking that is convenient for you. We’re also going to add a structure that residence in our apartment complex will be able to park in and our business owners and their tenants and their people in their consumers will be able to park in. We have all the pieces, we actually need to use them at this point," said Doughty.
Doughty says despite the Mayor's promise to veto the text amendment, Doughty says he since the issue earned a super majority vote, he is confident this text amendment will prevail.
The one dissenting vote to the decision was councilwoman Sharon Dashiell of District 3.
