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Area favorites Fink and Marxer throw a musical pajama party in Takoma Park. A-13
The Gazette POTOMAC | NORTH POTOMAC
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Wednesday, December 4, 2013
25 cents
Leggett to sign wage increase on Thursday n
Law will raise county’s minimum to $11.50 an hour by 2017 BY
RYAN MARSHALL STAFF WRITER
PEGGY MCEWAN/THE GAZETTE
Members of the Little Farms Garden Club of Potomac stand in front of Great Falls Tavern Visitors Center on the C&O Canal in Potomac after their annual day of decorating Monday. Club members have decorated the tavern with fresh greens for 35 years.
Great Falls Tavern gets holiday makeover Women consider time and talent a gift to community
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BY
PEGGY MCEWAN STAFF WRITER
’Tis the season for making lists: 13 evergreen swags, 25 red bows and enough pine roping to deck two balconies and one portico, along with pine cones, fresh apples and many willing hands. All of that and more went into decorating Great Falls Tavern Visitors Center on the C&O Canal in Potomac on Monday. In less than four hours, the women of
Little Farms Garden Club of Potomac transformed the tavern, inside and out, into a holiday delight using plant materials and the greens and reds of the season. “This is a great way to start the week after Thanksgiving, decorating with friends,” club member Deb McDonald said. McDonald knelt on the walk outside the tavern, wiring together Fraser fir, white pine, magnolia leaves and holly. She handed the finished swags off to other members to place on window sills surrounding the main entrance to the building. She said she also creates fresh green decorations for her own home, but has not started yet.
“This will get me motivated,” she said. Sydney Ferzacca is a new member of the club, enjoying her first year of decorating at the tavern. She said she was just a laborer, helping to decorate the mantles inside the tavern. “This is unbelievable,” she said. “In a few hours, 30 ladies have gotten [this done]. It’s a labor of love.” Members of the Little Farms Garden Club of Potomac have decorated the tavern for 35 years, President Debbie Beatley said, and some of the women working Monday have been regulars for more than 20 years
See TAVERN, Page A-9
Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett is scheduled to sign a bill Thursday that will raise the county’s minimum wage to $11.50 an hour by 2017. The County Council passed the increase 8-1 after a sometimes contentious discussion on Nov. 26. Councilman Philip M. Andrews (D-Dist. 3) of Gaithersburg, who expressed a desire to wait for a vote to see whether the General Assembly will take action on a statewide minimum wage increase from the current rate of $7.25 an hour, opposed the measure. The vote will gradually raise the county’s wage by Oct. 1, 2017, a year later than in the original proposal sponsored by Councilman Marc Elrich (D-At Large) of Takoma Park. The first increase in the rate will be next Oct. 1, when the minimum wage rises to $8.40 an hour. The bill doesn’t tie the wage to a consumer price index that would allow it to keep pace with inflation, unless the state passes an increase that’s indexed. After the vote, Elrich said he still considered the vote a victory, despite the extra year to implement it. “It would have been a victory whatever we passed,” he said. The bill’s supporters said it was necessary to allow workers to survive Montgomery’s high standard of living, while its opponents argued that minimum wage jobs are meant to be entrylevel jobs and that almost all the workers in the county make more than the current minimum. The bill requires employers of tipped workers to provide a base pay equal to half of the state minimum wage, with an obligation to make up the difference in any pay up to the county’s minimum wage; eliminates a credit for employers that provide health care to employees; exempts workers 18 years old and younger who work 20 hours a week or less; requires the county executive to delegate enforcement of the law to a state agency that enforces the state wage laws and is authorized to enforce a county minimum wage law; prevents employers from retaliating against
See INCREASE, Page A-9
Bill aims to add lands to deer bow hunting Alcohol measures also on tap for upcoming General Assembly
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BY
KATE S. ALEXANDER STAFF WRITER
A Montgomery County lawmaker will try again to give archery hunters more room to help cull the county’s growing deer population. Del. Eric Luedtke again has proposed a local bill to shrink the safety zone around Montgomery County buildings from 150 yards to 50 yards for bow hunters. Current state law prohibits shooting any firearm or deadly weapon, like a bow, within 150 yards
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of an occupied home, church or other building or camp. Around schools, the safety zone is 300 yards. Under Luedtke’s proposal, Montgomery County would be lumped with Carroll and Frederick counties, which have a 50-yard safety zone. With the exception of Harford County, which has a 100-yard buffer, the rest of the state must follow a 150-yard safety zone. Luedtke (D-Dist. 14) of Burtonsville proposed a similar bill in the 2013 legislative session that became a point of significant debate among the delegation and did not advance. Few solutions are effective for deer management in Montgomery, but about a
dozen citizens who testified in favor of the bill at a delegation hearing Monday say giving archers more room to hunt will go a long way in controlling the deer population. Many who testified told of complications suffered from Lyme disease, a debilitating disease carried by ticks that often feed off the blood of deer. Others spoke of the many deer killed each year along their streets by motorists. Kevin Kommitt of the Sycamore Acres Citizens Association told the delegation that it needs to support the bill to protect children and residents in the county. “Odds are [a deer-auto collision] will
When Black Friday comes
DAN GROSS/THE GAZETTE
Shoppers stroll through the Montgomery mall in Bethesda on Friday. Thousands flocked to snatch up holiday discounts at chain stores.
See HUNTING, Page A-9
HIGH SCHOOL BASKETBALL PREVIEW
At the annual snow show, SHA officials show off the latest snow-fighting equipment.
Region becoming a hotbed for schools that specialize in developing top college basketball players.
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