2024 was a great year for the Green Towson Alliance!  Our workgroups completed projects in various areas and truly advanced our goal to achieve a cleaner, greener Towson.

BUILDING A CLEANER, GREENER TOWSON

Community Shade Trees  
In partnership with Blue Water Baltimore, GTA helped coordinate the planting of 244 trees in 14 Towson communities in autumn 2024.

Stream Clean-ups
In partnership with the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay and Baltimore County, GTA organized 198 adults and 33 children, including Girl Scouts and Towson University students, to pull 150 bags of trash out of 11 neighborhood stream sites in the spring of 2024.

ENCOURAGING NATIVE PLANTS

Native Garden Contest
Green Towson Alliance operated its fourth Towson Native Garden Contest, a project designed to celebrate local residents who plant native gardens in their yards to provide habitat for wildlife, and to protect our environment from pollutants and pesticides. (nativegardencontest.com)

Homegrown National Park Challenge 

We have set a goal of creating 50,000 square feet of native gardens to be mapped on the Homegrown National Park Map (homegrownnationalpark.org). We encourage all of our members to reduce their lawn and plant more native plants.

Implementation of the Maryland Native Plants Program GTA is a member of the implementation committee for the Maryland Native Plants Program, a bill we helped write and pass in 2023 (SB836/HB950).  The committee has been working on the Commercial Maryland Native Plant List which is now available in a draft form on the University of Maryland Extension website:  https://extension.umd.edu/resource/commercial-maryland-native-plant-list/

Biodiversity and Agriculture Protection Act SB915/HB979

As part of the Maryland Native Plant Coalition, GTA helped write and pass the Biodiversity and Agriculture Protection Act which updates and strengthens Maryland’s laws on invasive plants.  

Partnership with Wild Ones Greater Baltimore
GTA partnered with our local chapter of Wild Ones on efforts to create an hour-long education course on native garden design that was presented at the Towson branch of the Baltimore County Public Library.  We are taking the program on the road to present at additional branches in 2025.

Partnerships with Baltimore County

Work in Towson Parks

Radebaugh Park’s meadows are being expanded back to their original sizes, and signs for the meadows have been purchased and installed; deteriorating bench slats have been replaced; and the native plant gardens at the entrance at 11 Maryland Ave have continued to be maintained by a local garden club.

Habitat Stewards of Overlook Park (HSOP) have continued their work removing non-native invasive plants in the park, which has allowed many native trees, shrubs and native plants to flourish.

GTA supported the Yorkleigh community in creating a pocket park with a mulched path, native pollinator garden, and four new native trees.

Baltimore County Landscape Manual

 GTA successfully advocated for several amendments to the first update to the Baltimore CountyLandscape Manual in 24 years including:

• Minimum requirements for the use of Maryland native plants to support our ecosystems
• Minimum requirements for diversity of plant species to help mitigate the risks of disease and pests
• Elimination of harmful invasive plant species in landscape designs
• Integration of green infrastructure to help reduce runoff and aid in plant survival
• Planting practice improvements to help trees in constrained spaces survive to maturity
• Recognition that the effects of climate change – including excessive heat, rainfall, and drought – need to be considered in every landscape design

Collaboration with DPWT on Roadside Tree Law

GTA is working with the Department of Public Works & Transportation  to reduce the number of mature native trees that are cut down. We have asked DPWT to adopt these practices:

• Include language in the application informing applicants that they are required by law to plant a replacement tree within one year
• Keep detailed information on the number of complaints, tree size, species and condition, remedy used, and replacement tree planting

Invite the Department of Environmental Protection & Sustainability to provide a list of preferred tree species and to install trees at the homeowner’s expense

Creating a County Weed Warrior Program

GTA members, Baltimore Sierra Club, and Gunpowder Valley Conservancy are collaborating with the county’s Department of Recreation and Parks to initiate a “Weed Warrior” program for county parks. Baltimore County Rec and Parks will set up a volunteer invasive removal program in the Spring of 2025 in 5 county parks: Cromwell Valley Park, Oregon Ridge Park,  Benjamin Banneker Historic Park, Holt Park and Center for the Arts, and Lake Roland.

Other GTA work in Baltimore County

Sanitary Sewer Capacity in the Jones Falls Sewershed

 Due in part to questions raised by GTA during the 2023 Triennial Review of the Baltimore County Water and Sewer Supply System, MDE is considering renegotiating the 2005 Sanitary Sewer Consent Decree (CD) with Baltimore County. Four years after the CD’s deadline to eliminate all sanitary sewer overflows, the work is not complete. Renegotiation would provide the opportunity for an independent party to intervene.

Purchase of St. Pius Property by Baltimore County

GTA testified before the Planning Board and advocated with our Councilperson to down-zone the school portion of the property owned by St. Pius. We support the neighborhood advocacy goal of persuading the Baltimore County Recreation and Parks Department to purchase the property in an area that badly needs more recreational and park space.

Towson July 4th Parade

In 2024, GTA, as in previous years, was involved in marching in the Towson July 4th parade. Marchers were holding the GTA banner, and props of trees, butterflies, bees and flowers. We are always a big hit at the parade. The kids along the route are especially enthusiastic about the bees and butterflies.