Local
Rehoboth’s Clear Space Theatre regroups after commissioners reject new buildings
Opponents say officials failed to submit ‘code compliant’ application
The Rehoboth Beach Board of Commissioners voted for the second time in eight months on June 30 to overturn a decision by the beach resort city’s Planning Commission to approve plans by the Clear Space Theatre Company to build a larger theater and adjacent rehearsal theater in a new location.
Supporters of the theater project, including many of Rehoboth’s LGBTQ residents and summer visitors, expressed outrage over the Board of Commissioners 4 to 3 vote to reject the Planning Commission’s approval and deny the Clear Space application to build its proposed new theaters on Rehoboth Avenue, which serves as the city’s main commercial boulevard.
The four commissioners voting to overturn the theater’s approval were Rehoboth Mayor Stan Mills, gay Commissioner Patrick Gossett, and fellow Commissioners Susan Gay and Jay Lagree. The three who voted against overturning the approval were gay Commissioner Edward Chrzanowski, lesbian Commissioner Pat Coluzzi, and Commissioner Richard Byrne.
The controversial vote to overturn the theater project approval came in response to an official appeal against the Planning Commission’s Feb. 26 approval of the project filed by 63 Rehoboth homeowners or renters, including D.C. gay attorney Harvey Shulman, who owns one of the homes near where the new theater buildings were to be built.
Shulman said at least 15 percent of those who signed on as appellants are gay. He and other opponents have said the two proposed theater buildings — a 14,949-square-foot main theater and a 9,950-square-foot rehearsal theater — are unsuitable in the three lots on Rehoboth Avenue where they were proposed to be built. Opponents say the two theater buildings would abut a residential neighborhood that would suffer undue noise, traffic congestion, and parking problems caused by the theaters.
Clear Space submitted the two-theater building proposal after the Board of Commissioners refused to approve an exception to the zoning code requested by Clear Space for an earlier plan for one larger 25,599-square-foot theater building. City officials noted the zoning code required any building larger than 15,000 square feet to provide 100 or more indoor or onsite parking spaces, which Clear Space said it did not have the financial resources to fulfill.
In a development that angered the opponents, Clear Space submitted a new plan for the two smaller buildings, which under the zoning code does not require Clear Space to provide any parking spaces for the project.
Clear Space has said its site plan would address noise and parking issues and it complies with the city’s zoning code. Others supporting the theater have argued that anyone who chose to buy a home adjacent to a busy commercial street like Rehoboth Avenue should expect to deal with some noise and parking issues, which for years residents of the popular beach resort town have managed to deal with.
The commissioners who voted to overturn the Planning Commission’s approval of the project cited as their main concern the contention by Shulman and the other appellants that the Planning Commission approved the project without ever having received or seen a code-complaint application, including a code-compliant set of drawings or plans for the project. The appellants said the Planning Commission allegedly only had in its possession an earlier application that was not in compliance with the city’s zoning code.
Wesley Paulson, executive director of Clear Space Theatre Company, and Commissioner Chrzanowski each told the Washington Blade that the Planning Commission was informed by the city’s building inspector that the Clear Space application and building site plans fully complied with all city codes.
The two pointed out that the building inspector, in consultation with the Planning Commission, set several conditions based on an earlier Clear Space application that had a minor code violation related to ceiling heights in one or more stair wells that should be corrected. Paulson and Chrzanowski pointed out that those changes were made.
Chrzanowski said he and his fellow commissioners who voted against overturning the project’s approval strongly disagree with the rationale by Mills, who serves as mayor, and the other three commissioners that the Planning Commission acted in an “arbitrary and capricious” manner in its decision to approve the theater’s application.
“It is my opinion that they were not acting any way in that fashion,” Chrzanowski said of the Planning Commission. “The fact of the matter is these appellants, they don’t care whether or not a drop ceiling in a stairwell needed to be reduced by six inches or not,” he said.
“They just oppose the project because they don’t want it in their back yard,” he told the Blade. “It has nothing to do with a process or a code. They just don’t want it in town, and it’s unfortunate.”
Shulman disputes that claim, saying existing Rehoboth law requires that the Planning Commission could not legally approve an application that never came before it and never became available to the public for review.
“This is not a question of whether you like the theater or you don’t like the theater,” he said. “There is a process that has to be followed. And the public has a right to have input. And that didn’t happen here.”
Among the Clear Space supporters who have criticized the Board of Commissioners who voted against the theater is longtime D.C. LGBTQ rights advocate Peter Rosenstein, who has a residence just outside the Rehoboth city boundary. Among other things, Rosenstein dismisses Shulman’s claim that a significant number of gay residents wanted the Board of Commissioners to overturn the theater’s approval.
“He’s got 20 gays that don’t support it and there are 3,000 that support it,” said Rosenstein. “They can find any excuse they want,” Rosenstein said in response to claims that the Planning Commission never received the theater’s final, revised application.
“The Planning Commission didn’t make any mistake,” he said. “The theater was code compliant. They met every condition the Planning Commission wanted. Technicality or not, they were going to find an excuse to turn it down.”
Paulson, the Clear Space executive director, said he remains hopeful that Clear Space will be allowed to resubmit its final, fully code complaint application to the Planning Commission for another quick and legally mandated approval without having to start the application process over again from scratch.
Supporters say starting over could take six months or more to obtain another round of approval from multiple city agencies and inspectors, a process that would add to Clear Space’s financial burden. They note that the application process has already taken three years since Clear Space first proposed to move from its current location in a rented former church on Baltimore Avenue near the city’s boardwalk.
Paulson said another option under consideration is to take the matter to court in a lawsuit to challenge the legality of the Board of Commissioners action. But he said he would prefer not to take that action if another option becomes available.
Paulson points to Board of Commissioners member Susan Gay, who voted to overturn the Planning Commission’s approval of the project but who stated in an interview on a Rehoboth radio show the day following the Board of Commissioners’ vote that she didn’t believe the theater would have to begin a new application process.
“So, Susan, do they have to go back and start this process all over like a six-month plan again,” Radio Rehoboth talk show host Jeff Balk asked Gay in an early morning interview on July 1.
“No,” Gay replied. “So, part of Plan B is they can submit code compliant plans today,” she said. “I understand they do exist. If that’s the case, submit them. And at that point, I would hope the Planning Commission would expeditiously review it in compliance with the site plan review and it would result in a unanimous approval,” Gay said in the radio interview.
But both Chrzanowski, who wanted the city to approve the theater’s application, and Shulman, one of the lead opponents, each said that under existing Rehoboth law, a project like this must start the application process over again from scratch if it has been rejected twice by the Board of Commissioners.
“When you reject a decision by the Planning Commission for a second time, it’s dead,” Chrzanowski told the Blade. “You need to start from scratch,” he said. “There may be an administrative thing the city could do to help move it along faster, but that certainly is not Commissioner Gay’s decision,” he said. “So, she very much misspoke when she made those statements.”
Shulman told the Blade that if Clear Space chooses to start the application process over again, he believes the opponents of the project would be open to favorably consider the new application.
“If they come back with a new application, everyone will see whether it is code compliant,” he said. “I believe and the opponents have always said this – we will sit down with Donna West, who is the chair of the [Clear Space Theatre Company] board, and try to reach some agreement on what a code compliant application would be, so there is no opposition or, so the opposition is minimized.”
Rehoboth Beach
Officials raise troubling concerns about Rehoboth mayoral candidate Suzanne Goode
Homophobic emails, ‘aggressive’ behavior cited: ‘It just seems to be getting worse’
As Rehoboth Beach voters prepare to elect a new mayor on Aug. 8, some city officials and local residents are raising new concerns about the behavior of City Commissioner and mayoral candidate Suzanne Goode.
In addition to a history of troubling emails in which she has used homophobic language and criticized the city’s rainbow crosswalks, Goode is being accused of inappropriate behavior by a neighbor and a fellow Commissioner related to a dispute on the Nextdoor online platform.
The Blade spoke to City Manager Taylour Tedder, Commissioner Chris Galanty, and others about Goode’s behavior during her time as commissioner.
Goode was elected commissioner in August 2024. Fellow commissioner Susan Stewart, who is also running for mayor, criticized Goode’s behavior in a March 9, 2026 meeting, bringing up emails outlining Goode’s offensive conduct toward city staff.
In one email, Goode wrote to Rehoboth Beach City Solicitor Lisa Borin Ogden: “I am sorry that I learned from Google when you were first interviewed [in the] spring [of] 2025 that you are Jewish. My opinion of my fellow Jews declined significantly thanks to you since last summer. Actually would have thought you would have more compassion than the average person, based on your late brother. Except you don’t. I am sick of your haughty attitude toward me.”
In other emails, Goode questions why city officials encouraged CAMP Rehoboth and Clear Space Theatre to apply for grant funds. She has denigrated both institutions, referring to CAMP as a “questionable non-profit” and Clear Space as “second rate” with a “woke, drag queen bent” at times. She accuses Rehoboth’s LGBTQ community of displaying “their sex lives in public view” and fears physical violence from LGBTQ activists.
Goode disputed the claims and called for the city to remove Stewart’s remarks from the website.
The following statements were included in the emails sent by Goode:
• “Gays and theatre aficionados can donate as much as they like to these pet causes. Some taxpayers think the theatre is second-rate as community theatres go, and many dislike the RB emphasis on LGBTQ when heterosexuals don’t demand equivalent display of their sex lives in public view.”
• “Just because the LGBTQ community feels oppressed and discriminated against, that doesn’t mean that those who identify as LGBTQ are better able to recognize racial discrimination than someone like myself. It might surprise some of you to learn that I briefly dated an African American fellow college student.”
• “A performing arts and LGBTQ agenda isn’t appropriate for BOC spending when the city faces over $60M in debt.”
• “But there are some folks in town, who ironically have to remain in the closet (conservatives now have to do what gays had to do in the 20th century — ah, the irony) who object to the woke, drag queen bent of Clear Space at times. They have confided this in me, and thanked me for fighting for their tax dollars. Maybe I will regret speaking up, as some LGBTQ activist will attack me physically, even though I am a complete supporter of gay rights, and have as many gay male friends as female friends now that I live in RB with a large gay population.”
In the emails, Goode also referred to City Manager Tedder as “the mayor’s whore.”
Stewart told the Blade that the troubling behavior has since escalated.
Commissioner Chris Galanty spoke to the Blade about Goode’s behavior as commissioner and her issues with the rainbow crosswalks in town.
“Suzanne told me on two separate occasions that she didn’t like the rainbow crosswalks, and she said that she didn’t understand why they had to exist, and she didn’t understand why gay people had to advertise their sexuality, and she said straight people don’t have to do that.”
Galanty said that when he challenged her on this, she “moved very quickly to another topic.” He said that she has now shifted her perspective and is more concerned that the rainbow crosswalks are an issue of labor costs.
Goode told the Blade that, “Unfortunately, the rainbow crosswalks have potentially reduced the upkeep of the conventional crosswalks. But the rainbow crosswalks are attractive in and of themselves, and they do add to our recognition of Rehoboth’s longstanding status as a gay-friendly town.”
Accusations of “aggressive” behavior by Goode aren’t limited to emails. Last summer, Goode came to the home of Diana Jones, a property owner in Rehoboth Beach who is a neighbor of Galanty’s. Jones spoke to the Blade to share her experience with Goode.
Jones is active on Nextdoor, an online social network for neighborhoods. She said that she got involved on the platform during the time of the commissioners election last summer, in which her neighbor, Chris Galanty, was elected as commissioner.
Jones said that she made posts supporting Galanty. She said that someone posted a link of a lawsuit that involved Goode’s husband, Jeffrey Goode, who lost his race for commissioner last summer. Jones said that she reposted the link after it was taken down.
Jones said that the lawsuit was “very relevant to somebody who is running for city commissioner.”
Jones said that Suzanne Goode showed up at her house as a result of the post. Jones was out walking her dog nearby so Goode briefly spoke with Jones’s husband who was home.
“She came over to my house because she was saying I was doxing him,” said Jones. Jones said that Goode then found her as she was walking her dog and tried to talk to her about her Nextdoor posts, saying that she “brought up a very painful time in her life.”
Jones said that she has not had any communication with Goode since.
When asked for comment on the situation with Jones, Goode responded by saying “Diana Jones’s behavior toward me was despicable, and the way she has chosen to give her side of the story to news media says more about her than it will ever say about me.”
Galanty told the Blade that Goode came to his house in late June of this year when he was not home. She then called him about Jones.
“She relayed to me that she was having a disagreement with my neighbor on the Nextdoor platform, and she asked me to intercede with the neighbor,” said Galanty. “She said, ‘Please speak to her because I am frustrated with what she is saying. She needs to stop, and you need to say something to her.'”
Galanty said that Goode called him four times and texted him 32 times in the span of three and a half hours the next day.
Galanty said that he responded the next day, telling her that her behavior was inappropriate.
“Eventually it took a couple of weeks, but she apologized in her own way. She just said we just need to let it go.”
From his perspective as commissioner, Galanty said, “She likes to re-litigate things that have happened, six months ago, nine months ago. She likes to rehash issues that are in the past.”
“She can be really aggressive, and people are just really turned off by her,” said Galanty.
Tedder, who has accused Goode of creating a “hostile work environment,” told the Blade about his experiences working with Goode.
“She does not support the staff, and constantly tells us to resign,” said Tedder.
Tedder said that Goode texted City Solicitor Ogden at 7:45 a.m. on a Saturday, telling her to resign.
“Sometimes she does have good ideas. It’s just it gets so lost in these pages and pages of emails and thousands of emails that she sends,” said Tedder.
In regards to Goode’s behavior, Tedder said it has been going on since the beginning. “It just seems to be getting worse.”
Maryland
Advocates for trans students urge Md. to fight White House threats
Four school districts under federal investigation
By JESSICA CALEFATI | Allies of transgender children are urging state education officials to fight back against the Trump-Vance administration, which has threatened to punish a growing number of Maryland school districts over local policies that affirm students’ gender identities.
The advocates testified Tuesday morning before the Maryland State Board of Education — one day after the U.S. Education and Justice departments alleged that Anne Arundel County’s school system violated federal student privacy law by withholding a student’s gender identity from their parents. A spokesperson for the district said Monday legal counsel had not yet reviewed the claims and that the district had no further comment.
School districts in Prince George’s, Montgomery, and Frederick Counties were already under investigation for allegedly violating Title IX, the civil rights law that prohibits sex-based discrimination. The federal government last month threatened to revoke funding from the districts because they allow trans students to use restrooms and locker rooms that align with their identities.
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
Maryland
White House threatens Anne Arundel schools over gender identity policy
District faces possible legal action or loss of federal funding
By JESSICA CALEFATI | The Trump-Vance administration on Monday threatened to punish Anne Arundel County’s school system with legal action or the loss of federal funding for allegedly withholding information about a student’s gender identity and transition from the child’s parents.
The U.S. Education and Justice Departments together determined that the suburban Maryland district treats students’ gender identities as confidential medical information that cannot be shared with parents, in violation of federal student privacy law, according to a news release. A federal lawsuit filed against the district earlier this month made similar claims.
“As a mother and a grandmother, it is unconscionable that any school district would hide the most sensitive information about children in their care from their own parents,” U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said in a statement. “This is not only an affront to basic moral principles, but also to parents’ rights under federal law.”
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
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