Basic Information
Email peter@pjames.us
Website pjames.us
Second Website: http://ccaway.net/
Facebook facebook.com/peterjames4us
Twitter PeterJamesfor MoCo
Editor Note: shortly after posting received an updated version of these responses but haven’t yet updated on website.
Questions & Responses (All Candidates)
1 – What lessons learned do you have since the start of the pandemic?
Probably not a smart thing to have County Council as our board of health. Research scientists and clinical doctors in infectious disease, epidemiology, etc. are a better choice for board of health membership.
Many businesses and entities can successfully operate virtual and this could help with traffic congestion long term if telework continues to be an option.
Distance learning however is not a replacement for school.
N95 mask are so much better than surgical or cloth masks.
SARS-2 vaccines don’t prevent infection or reinfection, but appear to lessen its servility. My daughter just got COVID the second time after having two vaccines and a booster.
2 – If you could go back and do one thing differently from what was done in the last two years in Montgomery County what would you change?
Would have distributed N95 masks, as I suggest in January 2021 to County Executive and council.
I had COVID bad back in January 2021, before I was eligible for vaccine. I searched for monoclonal antibodies in Montgomery County was only available in PG and Baltimore. Would have had a site here in Montgomery County back then, as it was the best cure back then.
Would have dispersed residents of nursing home to motel with outside doors to each room as these homes were the most vulnerable places.
Would have deployed cleaning robots in hospitals, to clean buses, ambulances, police cars, prisons, fire houses, public building, etc. COVID hospital rooms couldn’t be cleaned immediately because cleaning staff had to wait several ours between patients to allow HVAC to clear air of pathogens.
Autonomous and remote controlled robots would reduce human contact and transmission rates.
3 – What do you think are the 3 biggest and most pressing issues facing our county in the next 4 years? Why?
1) Traffic Congestion. We have to stop the $3 billion planned 100 mile Bus Rapid Transit and pouring another $6 billion into light rail on the Purple Line. We need to fix traffic congestion and these two projects will make traffic worse.
2) Cost efficient open government, fiscal responsibility
The Current County Executive’s budget has the operating budget increase over the next four years by 65%. Given that we most likely are going into a recession. If the County spends that according to their budget taxes and debt will skyrocket. WSSC debt which the County guarantees is on shaky ground and the interest cost on our $3.8B debt will go from a bit less than half the cost of projects to several times the cost of construction.
3) Love them or hate them we still need a minimum number on the police force to maintain basic public safety. We are 100 officers down from a full compliment. We need to redesign how the police force engages the public to regard confidence off marginalized neighborhoods.
4 – What specifically do you plan to do in the 3 most pressing areas from Question 3?
1) By stopping the $3B Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) boondoggle, we can cut our general obligation debt in half or provide a property or income tax holiday for a year and a half for every County citizen. The operating budget for PRT is 1/10th that of BRT because there are no drivers. With saving from not building BRT we can expand our para transit operations to provide transportation to those that can not drive. This preserves the transit driver jobs and can even expand them.
Our Transportation Capital Improvements Budget is over $4B. Heavy buses and trucks cause over 90% of all road damage. Road maintenance costs will be 1/10th that of current road maintenance as ultra light PRT passenger and freight electric vehicles replace heavy vehicles on the roads.
By stopping the Purple line light rail project MoCo’s share of the savings would be roughly $3.4 billion. Which would be directed to more efficient transportation or paying down debt or having a tax Holiyear. Less than 10% of these savings is required to replace the Purple Line light rail with Personal Rapid Transit. PRT get the Purple Line finished at least two years before the light rail could be finished.
Save lives. Articulating buses, “bendies” were removed from the streets of London in 2008 when it was found they were involved in four times as many crashes as standard buses.
The first US BRT was built in Morgantown WV and hasn’t had an crash related injury in it’s entire 47 years of operations.
2) Produce a “County Operating System”, to automate the County’s operations, and online digital twin of the County and all work in progress. This online portal will allow citizens self service most of their own needs. From reporting pot holes and getting them fixed to obtaining permits and county services.
This system will reduce the non-school portion of the operating budget by roughly $660 million per year.
Switch to Dutch Auction price discovery for our General Obligation Bonds, rather than paying retail interest rates to the small group of wall street bond houses that make a mark up on our bonds.
US treasury debt uses this method to get the best price on debt issuance. By issuing small denomination bonds, we can get better interest rates from small investors.
By automating all the business processes of the government, I will slash the operating costs while increasing services and infrastructure maintenance. I will provide free license to all my technology which includes robotic mowers, weeding machine, litter pick up , recycling sorters, delivery for food and medical supplies to one bound; automation of optimal design for transportation system smart crosswalk optimal coverage to achieve maximum possible pedestrian.
Our $3.8 billion net debt costs us $8 billion to pay it off at present interest rates and two to four times that depending how high interest rates get.
I will implement a “Citizens Control Panel” that all citizen to easily engage in the planning of their neighborhoods and the County at large.
3) Provide higher pay to recruit higher quality professional officers. Provide more time off and limit overtime to reduce job stress. Provide more mental health counseling to officers.
Implement graduated incident response similar to Britain’s policing system. In Britain, only about 10% of officers carry guns. First respondents don’t carry weapons, second stage escalated incidents are responded to with officers with non-lethal weapons and hand cuffs, third level res ponders carry grounds.
I would add to this a rapid response triage system that can also deploy mental health workers as appropriate.
I would have patrol officers wear an always-on body cameras as it has been show again and again that the best way to achieve accountability is through private citizens capture video of incidences. In situation of possible danger to officers, these video feeds will be delayed to prevent violent criminals and terrorists from gaining tactical advantage that can endanger police and citizens.
Other policies I would in place would be:
- Recording all incidents were violence occurred or use of force.
- Publish online which parties perpetrate the violence or use of force.
- Integrate use of body cam video for analysis by management for assessment of officer performance, retraining and in appropriate cases discipline or termination action.
I would also implement artificial intelligence to analyze incident videos to find optimal method for best outcomes.
Overtime, this will improve policing by finding what works best in a comprehensive array of officer encounters with the public.
5 – Would you consider supporting changes to electoral process such as open primaries or non-partisan elections in Montgomery County to allow 155,000+ registered Unaffiliated/Independents in Montgomery County to vote locally when it counts?
Absolutely! What we have now is 50% of voters have zero voice in our elections.
I would like to eliminate public funded primaries for political parties and have a general election with runoff until a plurality of votes are given to one candidate.
I strongly support open primaries and/or non-partisan elections in Montgomery County. We are hamstrung by an all-powerful one-party system where our County Council virtually always votes in lockstep. We are moving towards a Democratic machine-style government resembling Mayor Daley of Chicago in the 1960s.
That means control from the top with a false and manufactured input from citizens. Montgomery County needs to get out from under the thumb of the Takoma Park, down-county overseers that won’t share power. Like me I’ve bet you attended a meeting in the last few years held by a council member or members who claim they want citizen input on some topic, maybe traffic safety, or widening 270. It soon became clear the officials kept a tight control over all the speakers, doling out time to other elected officials, agency execs, and approved organizations that were guaranteed to repeat the Council’s line on the issue. Independent citizens were shut out of speaking. It sounds scary but frankly that’s a technique straight from the old Soviet Union. It is wrong that the only way citizens have been able to change the power structure is through referendums, not through a truly representative County Council.
Remember, referendums brought term limits on our elected officials, and placed a cap on tax increases. If those changes hadn’t been implemented we’d have a council filled with free-spending cronies imposing ever higher taxes to pay for their ‘we’re going to save the world’ policies.
Citizens working together, independently of the party machine, attempted to create a more equitable county council government in 2020. These residents banded together and created the concept of a nine-district council that had the potential to give upcounty residents as much representation as the back-slapping buddies from Takoma Park. But this reasonable proposal was subverted by the powers that be with a smoke-screen ‘alternative’ version that kept them in control of the entire county.
We desperately need fresh voices, new ideas, and new people in our county government. Open primaries will bring out people that have been kicked to the curb for years.
Questions & Responses (County Executive)
1 – What is your plan to attract and KEEP businesses in Montgomery County? How can we get more businesses across the county and especially where its lacking in the Up County and East County and compete with Northern Virginia?
I would start and focus on KEEPING and HELPING businesses already here. I don’t believe offering subsides to attract business that are not available for all.
A good transportation system is the number one driver of economic development. I will bring the County from the second worst traffic congestion in the Nation to the very best.
I will ditch the 311 system. In a time when you can order stuff online with a click and get it the same day, the County should have same day service as well. Businesses will be able to view all work process of the Government and see exactly on whose desk your permit application is on, and details of why it isn’t moving forward.
By automating all the county’s business processes, County workers will have the time needed to provide great customer service. Under my watch the County will focus on helping build your business not inder it.
Companies looking at a possible move to the County, are turn-off at the thought of their workers sitting in traffic. If business that are in the trades or need to make deliveries will greatly reduce the lost hours of there fleet vehicles sitting in traffic. What would being able to make twice as many deliveries or 20% more service call each day do for the bottom line?
Currently, the County and all the other Democratic CE candidates focusing on real estate development and the hospitality and bio-tech industries, to the exclusion of all other industries, to increase our tax base.
I will extend the local business procurement preference to all procurement not just the small ones.
Silver Spring’s urban district has 25% to 30% office space vacancy. It has two opportunity zones. The big advantage of an opportunity zone is that any capital gains held for 10 years in a OZ is tax free. We have been focusing on promoting these zones to real estate developers where capital gains is limited.
I will instead find potential “Unicorns” (billion dollars companies) and bring them to the County. This is a huge carrot for company founders who want to build billion/trillion dollar companies.
Silicon Valley became the home of the semiconductor industry by build and inert gas pipeline that made it the best place to put a semiconductor factory.
Northern Virginia is cleaning our clock not just because they are so much more business friendly, but because they got “May East” located there. This makes it attractive to large internet companies like AOL, Google, etc. May East is one of just a few internet ISP in the nation.
If elected, the County will purchase a quantum computer to optimize traffic flow in the county in real-time. I will make available at night for startups that are developing quantum computer applications. I am the only candidate that has the expertise to know which high-tech companies to pursue.
Currently, it is tough for small businesses to get capital and loans. It is more likely than not this will get worse in the coming years. I would help to startup an interest free construction and business loan currency system similar to the Wir Bank in Switzerland. The Wir Bank was formed in the 1930s and has been provide interest free funding to its business members for over 90 years.
2 – How will you hold developers accountable for past, present, and future infrastructure commitments (schools, transit, roads, etc.)?
For 20 years, the County has been controlled by big developers, that have gotten their projects through without the County building sufficient infrastructure to support the development.
I will compel developers that have not met their commitments, by halting or canceling all their other projects and bringing them to court if necessary.
By simulating all present and future development on the Citizen Control Panel digital twin all infrastructure impacts like roads, parking, imperious surface, storm water, school enrollment, etc., will be simulated so citizens can see not just the project itself in 3D but how the project will effect their neighborhood and their quality of life.
3 – What do you plan to do about the increase in incidents of carjackings and homicides in the county and decline of applicants and morale in the police force?
Raise pay. Provide workforce housing with interest free mortgages. This cuts house payments in half. The raise in car jacking was in part because the auto theft unit was disbanded. It is now back.
I have already placed vehicle detection on all state highway cameras in the county. I will add vehicle make, model, year and license plate recognition. The system will immediate find the location of stolen cars and direction of travel. This should virtually eliminate car theft. To protect citizen privacy only the stole car’s data will be recorded and license plates will only be read for match make, model and year.
By using artificial intelligence to pre-screen candidates for not just police but all hiring, we can greatly improve diversity and quality of the candidates. A diversity that keeps pace with our existing population’s diversity. Goldman Sacs tried this and they got 26% more diversity in their hiring.
4 – What do you see as your biggest advantage or positive that you bring to the table over your competitors?
I have the most experience optimizing the wide array of large multi-billion operating entities. I have the ability to come up with innovative solution that can achieve the greatest bang for the smallest buck.
I am the only candidate that understands a elephant can’t jump and a flea jumps 100 times its body weight. With the many technical challenges of transportation, public health, climate change, etc., we need a county executive that has a wide range of expertise needed to understand the complexities of problems that need to be solved. As well as the ability to think “outside the box” to find innovative solutions to problems that have plagued us for years.
All my opponents say they will hire experts to solve our problems. I am running for County Executive because I do not believe they are capable of evaluating the experts available. For instance, their climate plan the County Executive submitted and the one approved by the Council approved $100K to hire a “climate” expert. That’ about $65K take home pay! What kind of an expert will that buy?
I have 45 years experience working with experts in diverse areas, from around the world and have them in my rolodex. I have traded ten of millions of stock for our family funds examining thousand of financial statement and preforming risk analysis on these companies’ capital and operating budgets.
I have automated processes for fortune 500s, Inc 100s, startup, city, county, state and national governments and have the ability break large operations down into the moving parts. I understand the trade-offs between variable costs and fix costs in the impact on an operating entity.
My company was a finalist to redesign MCDOT’s 22 transportation systems, we lost to Siemens who has been a long term contractor with the County and has been able to fix the traffic system yet.
I will provide the County with a free license to my many technologies to:
- improve road traffic
- control weeds without pesticides
- provide delivery robots for home bound residents
- Build neighborhood maker spaces and robotic greenhouse
- pickup litter
- road inspection
- road, park and athletic field mowing and trimming
- robotic tree planters to reforest the AG at 1,000,000 trees a year
- capture CO2 and Nitrogen current off-gassed from composting
- measure greenhouse gas emission on every block
- provide free electric cars using Federal $7500 tax credit
- Use AI to:
- increase hiring diversity
- optimize transportation design
- assure all communities are getting a fair share of county Funds