Outspoken progressivism mixed with a heavy dose of nimbyism. For example, I'm Asian and have never felt as safe and accepted in Columbia and Howard County at large but I wouldn't expect my lovely neighbors to actually participate in any activism or support other than hashtags and bumper stickers. I've had people that I've done charity work with later suggest where to live in Columbia so I wouldn't be next to low income housing. It's a funny dynamic how Columbia manages to feel both corporately manufactured but also so stinking nice. No wonder why people don't want to leave.

Being a suburb of DC, people are more politically active than most of the US. However it’s not like DC where everyone you meet is a lobbyist or works on Capitol Hill. It’s a very blue district and this past election, Democrats won across the board. That being said, there’s quite a bit of Democrat infighting as there are real substantive policy differences during the primaries on issues such as housing. Columbia is a non-incorporated community so the Columbia Association is sorta the governing body of it with the Howard County Council and Executive over them. Regarding demonstrations, I tend to see less of that. if there’s a big march it would be in DC. I do encourage you to get to know your County Council and go to meetings as that is the best way to make real change.

I’m fairly new to the area so admittedly not the best person to comment on this. But my early impression so far is that local activism and engagement exists but mainly takes place at the county level—that’s especially the case with the schools (just Google “redistricting, Columbia” ). Also, in Maryland in general, counties oddly have a lot of power and take on a lot of the governing responsibilities that cities usually handle in other states. Then there’s the obvious fact that Columbia is unincorporated and technically not even a city (also oddly common in Maryland), and is largely governed by an HOA and not a mayor and city council. I think that too inhibits local engagement despite advantages an HOA may offer. For evidence of this, just read the recent posts in this sub about the crusty HOA board members who reportedly are out of touch and get little done, yet are continuously elected and face little accountability.

Overall, I will say I do love the community so far. I especially love the bike trails and parks, which ironically, exists because of the HOA.

Columbia is likely the bluest area in a blue county. With that being said, there are 3 types of Dems in the area: NIMBY Dems who are politically moderate, hate low income housing, and are in-line with Republicans at the redistricting level; Democrats who are open to the construction of low income housing no matter the environmental cost; and progressive Dems who are for low income housing only if it is sustainability built. Of course this is more simplistic than reality, but it is likely the main point of political discussion at the moment.

There are establishment-preferring residents on both sides of the aisle that are all for overdevelopment while not taking into account the environmental costs.

Even the local Facebook groups for the county are "separated" by political ideology despite not appearing to be separated at the surface level.

Think of Columbia as a weird place where the religious right takeover of the republicans never happened and the southern strategy did not take hold.

The republicans are democrats and the democrats are also democrats. There are some actual republicans but they are for the most part also democrats. There are progressives who kind of can’t stand democrats. They call themselves democrats. There is not much overt racism directed at individuals but there is a lot of accidental or systemic racism via the nimby thing. By in large I get the impression that people here largely want to do good, disagree on the details, mostly want to be welcoming but also kind like green space between buildings and wooded spaces. Re: protesting we’d go to DC for that.

It seems sometimes that surrounding areas are all trumpy and redneck (parts of jessup, out west on 32) but whenever I go somewhere that is actually like that I realize even the less (D) parts of MD are not full on crazy.

There are still isolated crazies occasionally running for school board.

I have lived in Columbia since 2005 and i think the area is pretty centrist with regards to democrats. I don't follow local politics as others here on reddit from the area but for a liberal area no mention of UBI and no public wifi for example ting that others can buy into and this area only Verizon and Comcast.

When I was 17 and in a young democrats club at my high school we attended a very contentious protest around whether or not the county would become a sanctuary and there were a ton of activists coming out, both for and against.

Generally activism happens on the county level rather than city because columbia isnt actually incorporated. I'd say if you're looking for progressive folks to organize with and stuff look for the unitarian churches.

Columbia itself is mostly split between the "moderates" who don't like public housing and don't want their school districts to be connected to them, and the progressives who are fine with it. The older areas like oakland mills, long reach, owen brown etc will generally have more progressives while the newer places like river hill will have more "moderates". Generally the republicans and whatnot are in western hoco and you wont see many unless you go out to clarksville and beyond

Left leaning and diverse embracing. Lots of inter racial families and kids (like mine)

Going to mad city for coffee, mall for towels (wife), lunch ekiben in baltimore

Life is good

While you may not find as many activists as opposed to DC, DC is probably the pinnacle. Like most of central Maryland, the area leans very left. I ran every street in Columbia two years ago, mostly around election time, and I saw countless signs for Democrats and literally only two houses with Trump signs. And one of those was a flag hanging inside a guy's garage, only open because he was washing his car. It's not common to find a place in the US where people are embarrassed to show support for Trump.

I've never lived in Boston, and only visited a few times, but I'd say it's similar enough. I'd say Boston is probably closer to Annapolis politically, where you have a good majority of Democrats, but there's enough old money people who are going to be conservative. Columbia has no old money :)

Occasionally you see protest marches in Old Ellicott City but I’ve never seen one in Columbia.

I had a friend move from Colorado and I asked her what was the biggest change moving here. She said people in this area are far more political than any other place she has lived. I haven’t noticed because I have lived here my entire adult life. But, when you’re this close to DC, there are a lot of people who work in the government.

I've seen a few in downtown.

Don't bring politics from places you are leaving. Cities, states, communities aren't copy paste, what works [or doesn't] one place does not mean it will somewhere else.

Big BLM protest after George Floyd. The (then) HoCo Police Chief, Lisa Myers, marched in solidarity with the protestors.

Did you to to OMHS? When I was there we also had a young democrats club

Yeah i did, small world isn't it?

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We had the hullaballoo about the busing/school redistricting a while back.

Yeah…I don’t think I said it should be the same. I asked if people are politically interested and active.

Columbia is, by-and-large, a Democrat stronghold full of Liberal and Progressive ideals. Overall, it promotes diversity, inclusion, education, and (despite the development) some forms of urban environmentalism. Howard County is about 48% Democrat, 31% Republican, and 21% Unaffiliated or Third Party; even then, most Republicans are either A) non-MAGA "old school" conservatives or B) live in the western areas of the county (away from Columbia proper).

You'll find gatherings or events supporting just about every disenfranchised demographic here, particularly celebrating Asian, Black, Hispanic, LGBTQIA+, and Women. Festivals and other celebrations are very common in and around Columbia; check your weekly or monthly guide and you'll hopefully find some event, even if it's just a minor ceremony.

Protests for federal issues are rarer, as both people and local government are often on the same page, but you'll find occasional demonstrations in solidarity for progressive issues. There was a march for BLM during the Floyd protests, for example, that our own police chief even joined. Most activists, however, take their stuff downtown to DC, where it has more of an impact.

As for political talk between people here, well...

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As you live here, you'll find out that Columbia is very classist. The divide here is very much by income, which makes sense given a household making less than six figures is "lower middle class" or even "working poor." And, as most know, classism is often intertwined with racism; the wealthier neighborhoods tend to be predominantly white and Asian, while the 'affordable' neighborhoods often have higher Black and Latino populations.

What you end up with is so-called 'Moderates' and 'Centrists' who are NIMBYs, liberal elite, champagne socialists, etc. People who claim to support progressivism, diversity, environmentalism, etc.... but then use their wealth (and political power) to prevent the very policies that would help those things. Some examples...

• Support immigrants but vote against sanctuary county laws
• Support diversity but protest redistricting that integrates schools based on income (which often integrates them more racially)
• Support LGBTQIA+ but question school policies on 'age-appropriate' representation in materials or rules protecting transgender students
• Applaud our green spaces but vote against laws restricting new developments (and often line their pockets with developer money)

And that's not even getting into complaints about "spikes in crime" which are often accompanied by the dog whistle about us "turning into Baltimore." (Hint: Columbia's 'worst' zip codes are 44% below the national average for crime per capita, and 59% below for violent crimes.)

Combine this with the nepotism and corruption that often follows when wealthy sit in seats of power, and you get a lot of dirty local politics. People abusing their authorities on Village Boards, coups within the Columbia Association (the closest we have to a 'governing' body), and attacks and slander throughout the election season.

Worse, those above can (and do) end up on the same side of votes as Republicans (including MAGA types), which just exacerbates the issue. Our county votes a bit more purple than you'd think, given it's demographics. We were mostly 3:1 (or more) for Democrat candidates, but only 2:1 on marijuana legalization and less than 2:1 in favor of codifying ourselves as a Sanctuary County.

Thanks to this lovely example of "Politics Makes Strange Bedfellows," we have entire social media groups dedicated to the vocal minority, full of "freedom investigators" bringing us the "truth," most of which read like FoxNews and Breitbart comments. While you can often ignore these groups just by not engaging with them, sometimes they become very loud on social media or at certain county or school meetings, especially during election time.

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tl;dr Columbia is overall Democrat/Blue/Liberal/Progressive and a place that celebrates diversity and inclusion. It's not overly political, except wherein it hosts events supporting those ideals.

However, it is a wealthy city (in a very classist county), and that leads to many egocentric Liberals of privilege who sometimes join with Conservative (and even MAGA) voices when it comes to anything that affects their money or neighborhood. While still a minority in the end, this 'alliance' can get very loud during election time (or when a 'contentious' progressive policy is in the works).

Thanks for your thorough answer

In District 1 of Howard County, which is mostly Ellicott City, there’s a lot of conservatives. Definitely saw more signs for Kittleman (the Republican county executive candidate) than for Ball (the Democrat).

The NIMBYism of severely restricting the housing market from building lower cost housing such as townhomes and apartments thus economically restricting who can live where specifically regarding school districts. This is systemically racist as it leads to de facto segregation, just looks at the demographics of Centennial high school, very few black and Hispanic students.

Dense low income housing such as apartments/condos are the most environmentally friendly thing a community can do. Housing is the single biggest carbon impact each of us has. The most environmentally destructive thing a community can do is mandate single family zoning which much of Howard County does. I would argue that the Dems who support housing but only if environmentally friendly don’t really care about either.

yeah thats where a lot of the "moderates" are who's main issues is being against school redistricting and all the other NIMBY stuff

Spot on and agree you said it better than i could have

Not sure if this is thread to bring up but i have a condominium over near Howard County hospital and i remember a few summers ago a convoy of pickup trucks with trump and rebel flags riding through Columbia and really caught me off guard. I was walking from one of trails and they were talking trash me. Pretty interesting to see in this area.

I see where you're coming from. Relative to single family zoning, low income housing is more environmentally friendly. But clearing dense vegetation areas rather than building on previously developed land isn't the way to go about it. In addition, we need to ensure that we aren't introducing too much impervious surface -- or at least offsetting it through planting more vegetation/constructing pervious surface and introducing flood mitigation measures

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Columbia is a wonderful place to live, but there is also racism. That racism reared its ugly head in the school redistricting fights. This is not just something in the news, it’s something I’ve heard in private conversations and basically anytime I just look at NextDoor. Relative to most parts of the country, I think the racism is relatively low, but I do argue that there are systems (school districting as well as the systemic blockages of new/affordable housing) that are racist in the county.

Agreed. I would much rather have increased density on already developed land such as allowing development of duplexes, quad plexus or mid-rises on single family lots. Unfortunately that has even less of a chance of happening.

> such as townhomes

Dude, townhomes in Columbia are >$600k now. IDK about new apartment complexes, but I doubt anyone living in the Merriweather District or Ten.M or whatever is going in there because it is cheap.

"High density" housing (townhomes and apartments) is not automatically "affordable". People need to realize it so we can stop gifting this stuff to developers and then scratching our heads when it's still impossible for non-rich people to live in the county.

> That racism reared its ugly head in the school redistricting fights.

I am not saying there isn't racism, but just because some schoolboard and county council members tried to make redistricting about race does not mean that opposing that redistricting plan is racist.

If you look at the results of that "successful" redistricting you'll see that it had basically no impact on school diversity but it opened up a bunch of new areas for fresh developments. It all goes back to developer money in this county.

The best way to lower housing costs for all but especially for people on the lower income ladder is to increase the supply of housing. The White House recognizes that the housing shortage increases home prices for everyone. The most expensive type of home to build and therefore buy is a single detached home. Townhomes are cheaper and apartments less than that. And yes affordable is relative to the costs of housing in the community and that cost is very high, median price 570k in HoCo.

There was one after the Dobbs decision in June. There were hundreds down by the lakefront.

I live in Columbia, earning a phd in political science, manage a pac, work with several politicians, always happy to chat and grab coffee—I really like coffee.

So redistricting can make some areas that were previously unfavorable to development suddenly favorable to it since those areas are now in a "better" school district? Which would naturally increase profits for developers. If so, do you have any past examples to share?

Weee everything and everyone is racist, well unless I say it isnt!

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I think Columbia, and Howard County in general, is a wonderful place to live all things considered. I'd say it is a definite Democratic or progressive leaning area, and has been trending more so the past couple of elections. However, it also wasn't long ago (through 2018) that Howard County had an elected Republican County Executive, so there is definitely a decent population of moderates and conservatives in the area, though probably less prominent in Columbia itself.

There is economic diversity with lower and working class neighborhoods not too far from middle and upper middle class areas. Overall it is very racially diverse, with a key factor for me being that there is some diversity in the backgrounds of the people that actually hold political power as opposed to just the basic residential demographics. There is a sizable black middle/upper middle class population in the area as well as significant East and South Asian communities which are becoming more politically engaged.

Like many suburban areas, housing and schools/redistricting are the areas where you are likely to see the most political or ideological discord. There are multiple local non-profits that do advocacy and community service, as well as several and local instances/clubs tied to the Democratic and Republican Party that you can check out.

I always say we need more local coffee roasteries/cafes and fewer Dunkin' in the area!

This is incredibly spot on

Systemic doesn’t mean widespread or pervasive in this context, but rather built into the systems.

The place is an hoa, large focus on keeping housing prices up, a lot of the redistricting conversation is based on maintaining or at least not losing some of the advantage for our kids, missing out on how the eastern edge is underserved and less economically well off. Dues are based on property, not income and we inherit some regressive tax policy from the state.

Perhaps I should have used structural racism instead. I am not talking about the content of people’s hearts or their final destination in the afterlife. Just the (hopefully) unintended side effects of how things have worked. Behaviors, incentives, rules that are enforced or not, decisions we made vs how they could have been made differently.

For example, “I moved here so my kid could go to this exact highschool, why does he have to bus to another?” That’s a valid question. Makes some assumptions about how easy it is or not to pick where you buy a house, glosses over the experience of the kids who are bussing already, and doesn’t examine why we have to have fewer high schools than middle schools. How are we weighing needs? Am I personally ignoring someone else’s valid concern? Do neighboring non Columbia areas have a disadvantage in advocating for themselves due to fewer or less powerful local organizations? In this case the systemic racism would arise from people over simplifying the question through the lens of the collective experience of the majority. We potentially reinforce problems by seeking easiest path for us.

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I think you are getting a little too “someone is wrong on the internet” about this - the emphasis was on pointing out there is low rates of overt racism, using the fact we have issues places full of well meaning but not entirely fully self reflective white people do as contrast.

Over emphasis of the lack of overt individualized hate is usually a sign we are missing structural stuff or hand waving it away. I like it here. I moved here intentionally. I think Columbia can ride to the occasion and has a head start compared to most of the country. Idiot racists made a lot of laws in the 1950s and 60s and I dunno if we’ve examined them all.

I used to live in Manhattan which has got to be one of the least racist and most racist places in America, so I guess I am at peace with the ambiguity of having pride in our town but also knowing it’s probably fucked up too.

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So a little inside baseball about this. Everyone stereotypes, everyone has or will have racist thoughts at some point. What matters is what you do, and how you meaningfully atone (not perform atonement). Someone going around being like “I’m not racist” or “how dare you call me racist” what they are really doing is just identifying themselves as “not getting it”

What they are not getting is there is still work to do. That’s all. So I am unconcerned with people being hurt by the ugly word “racism” like I am unconcerned with when my kids say me telling them to cleaning their room (or whatever) isn’t fair. It’s not that I don’t know how to clean a room, or that I have a need to force them. It’s ultimately they’ll benefit from knowing how to do the work, and they are just saying “I don’t get that this is something I need to ultimately do to grow, for my benefit”

Lots of people who “get it” are called racist and their internal response is “well, ok. Probably not but hey, let’s listen and see why I make someone feel that way. Maybe I need to adjust how I am doing things here”

It’s a sort of “no one who is king has to announce they are king” kind of thing.

Even less so if we are saying maybe the way things are built benefits me more than my neighbor. It’s a weird hill to die on to be like “I am personally offended that you think this big collection of people I am not the boss of, maybe set things up unfairly before I was an adult.”

I’m a middle age white male btw. I’ll have to work a bit to give you more examples of systemic racism, but man could I give you examples of banks falling over to give me mortgages and instances of me getting way too much deference at work.

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😆

Your description is spot on.

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“Relative to single family zoning, low income housing is more environmentally friendly.”

I understand this statement in the flow of this conversation, but I do want to impress on folks that “density” does not equal “low income.” Maple Lawn is probably one of the densest areas in the county, also one of the most expensive.

Very true. Definitely didn't mean to insinuate that.

What?

Racist troll account. Look at the name. It's already been suspended by Reddit - might as well delete.

I wanted to add my two cents too the activist action ic Columbia and I feel like a large part of any seeming lack is from our closeness too dc, and the greenbelt. Personally everytime I'm participating in a March like the BLM protests and march for our lives , I'd carpool to greenbelt and metro into DC for the demonstrations on/around the mall.

I’d go for Desantis in 24, but I’m an outlier. Primarily democrats, so if that’s what you’re looking for, this is the place for you.