Montgomery County Government to Open on Friday; Ride On Bus Service to Operate on S Service Plan

Montgomery County Government will be open with liberal leave; essential employees must report.

Ride On bus service will operate on an S Service Plan.

Parking regulations in County garages and lots in the parking districts in Bethesda, Silver Spring, Wheaton and Montgomery Hills will remain suspended through Sunday.

Solid Waste Transfer Station will open at 7 a.m. The public drop-off areas for recyclables, household hazardous waste and trash, accessed from the Route 355 entrance, will open at 10 a.m. The Recycling Center will be closed to the public. There will be no County-operated residential trash/recycling pickup. Normal collections will resume on Monday, February 15, which is not a trash collection holiday.

County operated liquor stores will be open.

Normal operations will be in effect for all other County facilities, including public libraries and recreation centers. Mongomery County Public Libraries has announced that customers with materials due from February 5 to 13 will have their due dates extended one week. No fines will be charged for the period from February 5 through 13.

The overnight shelters at Seneca Valley High School in Germantown and the Coffield Recreation Center in Silver Spring closed at 4 p.m. today. The overnight shelter at Richard Montgomery High School in Rockville will remain open. The high school is located at 250 Richard Montgomery Dr.

Trachtenberg Office Visits Montgomery County Emergency Shelters

A representative of the Trachtenberg Office visited two of Montgomery County’s emergency shelters in the aftermath of the severe winter storm that impacted the County on February 5-6, 2010. Nearly 30 inches of snow fell during the historic storm, and more than 80,000 residents lost power, at some point, during the storm.

The County had established three emergency shelters for residents: the Schweinhaut Center, 1000 Forest Glen in Silver Spring, the Longwood Center at 19300 Georgia Ave, in Brookville/Olney and Richard Montgomery High School in Rockville. Our Chief of Staff Alan Bowser visited the shelters at the Schweinhaut Center and at Richard Montgomery High School and thanked the Red Cross staff and community volunteers for their work on behalf of Councilmember Trachtenberg.

Today, the County has announced that overnight shelter operations will be consolidated at Richard Montgomery High School in order to provide a range of amenities for residents seeking shelter.

"As power is being restored to more parts of the community we want to make sure that residents seeking shelter have shower facilities, as well as other amenities," said County Executive Isiah Leggett in a statement. "We continue to monitor the need and are working with our utilities to bring power back to those affected by the outages."

Individuals planning to go to the shelter should bring all medications and personal supplies that they require. No pets are allowed at shelters except for registered service animals.

Richard Montgomery High School is located at 250 Richard Montgomery Drive in Rockville.