Advisors for our January 2126, 1PM meeting here in Lane Auditorium. Present at the dais, we have supervisors Duncan of the Jack Jewett District, Lapisto Curtley of the Ravenna District, Missal of the Samuel Miller District, Malik of the Whitehall District, Pruitt of the Scottsville District, and myself, Galloway of the Rio District. We also have our County Attorney, Mr. Andy Herrick, and our County Executive, Mr. Jeff Richardson. And, joining us as well is our, Board Clerk, Ms. Claudette Borgeson, and our Senior Deputy Clerk,
Mr. Travis Morris. I want to thank our, Albemarle County Police Department officers who are with us today, Sergeant Jason Breistat and Officer Jordan Allen. We appreciate you being here with us. If everyone would now please rise as you're able and join in the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice all. And if everyone would please join in a moment of silence.
Thank you very much. All right, Board, we have an agenda in front of us. Are there any changes or edits to the agenda? Is there a motion to adopt the final agenda? So moved. Second. All right. The motion has been made and seconded. And without objection, if the clerk would please call the roll. Ms. Duncan? Yes. Mr. Galloway? Yes. Ms. Lakisto Kirtley? Aye. Ms. Malek? Yes. Mr. Missal? Aye. Mr. Pruitt? Aye. Very good. Thank you, Board. Item number five on the agenda, brief announcements by Board members.
Supervisor Lapisto Kirtley. Announcements today? Yes. I wanted to announce that, at last, the Fire Rescue, Foundation, is now a legally a five zero one c three. And so they'll they will begin raising monies. We already there's already a board, and they will be raising money for amenities that the, that the county does not provide. Also, all the board members, have received, the photos I sent from the YMCA early learning center. I attended that on the sixteenth. What a fabulous place.
And they take in children who work at Martha Centerra and others, about a 100 and I believe around a 140 spaces or children that they can have there, from six weeks to kindergarten age. Provides, not only learning, but it's a daycare. And it's really, if you get a chance to go out there, wow, it's very, very impressive. So I was able to attend the ribbon cutting and, Bernie Boone, who's the president of the Martha Jefferson Hospital,
was there in attendance also along with a number of others. So it was really nice. On the eighteenth, I attended, I was a speaker at Women on the Run. It was a panel with Judy Lee, our school board representative from the Ravenna Magisterial District, along with myself. And this is encouraging women, at the local state federal offices to run, for office. What and it involved them asking us questions, why we ran and how we ran and things like that.
So that was very it's good to know that this organization exists to encourage women to run for office. And that's all I have. Thank you. Thank you. Supervisor Missal? Thank you. No announcements. Supervisor Duncan? I do not have anything. Supervisor Malek? Thank you. Just a couple. First of all, Encyclopedia Virginia is offering a free ebook for download called The Early Revolution in Virginia. The link is at virginiahumanities.org, one of the many, two hundred and fiftieth anniversary things which has been put together, from National Association of Counties Arts and Culture Innovation Council,
for which Fred and, Sally are now on the mailing list, and you'll be getting stuff from them. There are grant programs now offered from the National Endowment for the Arts, support for America two fifty celebrations, $16,000,000 in grants available on a rolling basis, applications February through rolling February through July, and, more information is available on the link at the National Endowment for the Arts. The general sesh general assembly session is now underway, and following bills of interest can is easy to do on lis.virginia.gov,
the legislative information system. Bills are sorted by sponsor, number, or topic. For members of the public, please let your representatives know your thoughts. Everybody has different issues of concern. Energy, clean water, sewage sludge, workforce training funds, implementing the state study to fully fund local education are just a couple of top of the many topics to be covered. Don't let your silence allow a poor bill to pass or a good bill to fail. And I just stumbled upon the Virginia General Assembly website recently. That is VGA,
for Virginia General Assembly, vga.virginia.gov. There's much in today's news we feel powerless about. Writing to your delegation at the General Assembly is one place where citizens' power quickly makes a difference. Thank you all. Thank you. Supervisor Pruitt. Yes. I would like to just briefly reiterate a point I made during our previous board meeting, and this is about the, Tenaska Power Plant in Fluvanna. So last week, I believe on Tuesday, the Fluvanna Planning Commission, voted against the Tonaska Power Plant.
This is not in Albemarle County, of course, but it does, it is adjacent to the Scottsville community, and a lot of the identified, risks and concerns of this plant expanding, would impact the Scottsville community. That includes excess mortality, essentially shortened average lifespan for nearby residents and higher incidence of respiratory illness like asthma. It is also worth noting we would not see the tax revenue of such a plan. So there are ten more days, from the vote in the planning commission to for the applicant to reconsider this and whether or not they will continue to the board of supervisors level.
I would encourage Scottsville community residents to stay involved in this process to continue to monitor it and to make sure that their, their concerns on this thing, that they don't have a direct vote but a very serious direct impact, continue to be heard. Thank you. Thank you. Board, I would just like to share that this past Saturday, I had the pleasure of joining, the Habitat for Humanity. And two homes were dedicated in the Laughlin Hill neighborhood of the Rio District, partner families Angie Bishop and Takisha Crenshaw, after having both put in a couple of 100 of sweat equity.
One family, Ms. Crenshaw, has already moved in with her family, and, Ms. Bishop will be moving in, that the home is now completed. But it was a pleasure to see such a good turnout in the community. There were, I would probably say, thirty, forty plus folks there that are just primarily neighbors and volunteers and such. But it was a pleasure to welcome them not just to the Rio District, but to Albemarle County and to see, what a meaningful impact that has meant to these two partner families, to become homeowners. So grateful to Habitat for their work. And it was again,
I was appreciative of them asking me to participate in that dedication that day. That's all I have. Thank you. Number six, we do not have proclamations or recognitions today, so we will move to number seven, which is public comment on matters previously considered or currently pending before the Board. And we do have a few speakers, I believe. So vice chair Missal will read the rules and introduce the speakers. Happy to. Thank you, chair. During the time set aside for public comment on matters previously considered or currently pending before the board,
other than scheduled public hearings, individual may address the board of supervisors concerning matters previously considered by the board or matters that are pending before the board other than items listed on the agenda for public hearing. Individuals are allowed one opportunity of up to three minutes to speak at each board meeting. The sign up sheet is managed by the clerk's office. Timekeeping is conducted through a timer, a light system at the podium. The green light will go on when you begin speaking, which begins your allotted time. The yellow light indicates you have one minute to finish speaking. The red light indicates your time has expired and you will be asked to end
your comments. In order to give all speakers equal treatment and courtesy, the board requests that speakers adhere to the following guidelines. When addressing the board, state your name and if you live in Albemarle County or Magisterial District. Address comments directly to the board as a whole. Any written statements or other supporting material may be given to the clerk. If representing a group or organization, you may ask others to present present to raise their hands in recognition. Speakers may not share any unused time with another speaker. Back and forth debate is not permitted. Do not speak out of turn, from your seat. All comments are livestreamed,
recorded, and published on the Albemarle County website. We have two three, excuse me, three signed up. The first is Gary Grant. And if, I could just give you a general reminder, which you probably already know, please introduce yourself and speak into the microphone. Thank you. Good afternoon. Just a forewarning, I am going to bleep one word in my remarks. I am Gary Grant, Rio District. The conscious communication class I'm taking is now three quarters complete. Again, today, I'd like to communicate some additional observations about this board.
No requests today, just questions. Why would supervisor Pruitt, at a December 3 public meeting with the Albemarle school board, use the words, and I quote from the public record, I bleeping love to build schools. And why hasn't he publicly apologized yet for his word choice? And why have supervisors Galloway, Malik, and Lapisto Curley, who were in attendance at that meeting, not yet publicly called for an apology from supervisor Pruitt for language that Albemarle wouldn't
want its school children to either hear or use. At your January 7 meeting, supervisor Missal thanked several groups for providing him with input on county issues, and I quote him from the public record. Their participation reflects the strength of the local democracy. I congratulate mister Missal on not saying effing local democracy. However, while an apology is not necessary, a correction is. Does he not know that Albemarle County government is not a democracy?
The board is a representative body. Supervisor Missal was elected to represent. Isn't that why all of us in the public don't get to vote with all of you on everything that you do? And finally, in December 17 letter signed by county executive Jeffrey b Richardson and address to dear Gary Grant with a return address in Georgia, there are the following quotations. We, Albemarle County, were the victim. If you have questions, please call an 866 number in central time.
And sincerely, there was also this, we strongly encourage you to take precautioning precautionary measures now. Now? That was in December, six months after the June breach of our information that Albemarle County didn't have in place the security to protect us from. And there was one quotation in the letter that actually is missing. We are sorry. No one apologized to all of us who suffered this. So, again, just some consciously communicated observations today and a few questions that this representative board seldom
answers nor apologizes for anyway. Thank you. Thank you. Next, we have Stuart Overby. Hello, everyone. Good to see you. My name's Stewart Overby and I live in the Samuel Miller District. I'm one of the founding members of, a grassroots organization called Don't Spread On Me. And I just wanted to welcome everyone first, new and returning to 2026. I trust that you all received last week's email from the Natural Heritage Committee recommending that Albemarle adopt a biosolids ordinance to help protect the biodiversity and the environment generally
of our beautiful county. Don't Spread On Me has been working lately, very much with bringing forward, a legislative agenda on the issue of sewage sludge at the state level with our collaborators under the, Virginia Conservation Network umbrella. But even if our entire wish list were to pass, the need for a testing and monitoring ordinance here at the county level would still exist. So I hope you all can bring it forward for discussion soon and we at Don't Spread Me are standing by to provide information and support during the process in
any way we can. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. Thank you. Next, we have Neil Williamson. Good afternoon, members of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors. My name is Neil Williamson. I serve as president of the Free Enterprise Forum, a public policy organization focused on Central Virginia's local governments. Doing the math, I think this is my sixth or seventh board that I get to deal with here in Albemarle County, and each one is unique. And I I thank you for your service. Today, you're gonna be discussing the Albemarle County long range planning,
specifically the capacity analysis. If you read through the report, which you guys you read through everything, which is great. You'll see that the consultant says the 2022 capacity analysis is flawed, and the 2025 analysis is based on the '22 analysis so that we have apples to apples to compare. Yeah, that's right. We're doing another flawed analysis. The consultant is projecting making some changes to do a better analysis, but there are two or three things that I really want to call out. I was in a meeting yesterday,
and I learned that there are about 2,000 homes that are being not being constructed. They are on here as buildable lots now, but they're not being constructed because the sewer infrastructure isn't there yet. Now Albemarle County Service Authority is working on this, and it will be in the next fiscal year. It it will go out to bid. It will get built. And so those will become truly buildable units. But right now, they're not for what that's worth. And that's one of the flaws in this program, but how do you fix that? I don't know,
but it's worthy to note. The other thing worthy to note that's cited in here, we did a report, golly, it's been about five years now, of density deferred density denied that showcased three particular projects that, went down in density significantly. Staff did a similar report and came up with 58 of density being approved by the board of supervisors. Thus, your theoretical density isn't truly theoretical if you choose not to approve at that density. So look at this very carefully. The other thing to know is the market has an impact.
If you can build apartments and the market wants townhouses, townhouses is what's going to get built. It's important to recognize the limits of the development area and the need to expand it. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. Thank you. And that concludes our list, sir. Thank you. All right. We appreciate those who gave comment today. We will move to item number eight, our consent agenda. Are there any items that need pulled from consent? I'm not aware of any. All right. Is there a motion to adopt the consent? So moved. Second. All right. The motion has been made and seconded.
Without objection, if the Clerk would please call the roll. Miss Duncan? Yes. Mister Galloway? Yes. Miss Lakisto Kirtley? Aye. Miss Malek? Yes. Mister Missal? Aye. Mister Pruitt? Aye. Very good. Thank you, board. And that will take us to item number nine, which is our presentation today. Our annual presentation, Mr. Lynch. Peter Lynch, our county assessor, is with us to go over the calendar year 2026 real estate reassessment update. Good afternoon, sir. Thank you very much. Let me open my presentation here. Alright. Thank you, Mr. Chair,
honorable board members. My name is Peter Lynch. I'm the county assessor. I'm your county assessor. And, it's a pleasure to be here today to present our annual reassessment results. The reassessment is basically, work throughout the entire year that culminates, unfortunately through the holidays, with, the finale of those numbers and then the results that I'm going to present to you today. So, before I start, I'm going to go through the overview, but I want to tell you that I really love my job. It can be challenging, certainly at times,
but, I understand the importance of the services that the county provides to the citizens, and I understand my office's place in fairly assessing property so that that tax burden that pays for those services can be, divided, equitably amongst the population. So in the in my presentation, this is my eleventh time doing this and I still get nervous every time I do it. So, we're gonna go over I'm gonna present the reassessment results for this year.
I'm gonna talk about the process we go through and I think it's the results are fine, but it's the process that's really important because I think it's really important for you and the public to understand how we get to those numbers, and the basis that we, the support we have and the basis that we use to determine the assessments everybody will receive. We're going to talk about ratio studies, what they are, and how they they work in this process. The reassessment notices that are going out on Friday.
We're going to talk about mass appraisal as opposed to single property appraisal. Have an overview of the review and appeal process, which is very important as part of this. We're going to talk about the change in our annual review, of properties overall. We have some general information and then we're going to discuss the land use program because we just finished a revalidation, in 2025. So overall, the tax base change this year is 6.17%. And as you can see, you know, this history shows,
you know, the financial crisis, that happened after 2008 and the years of, reduced assessments that happened in the years after that. And then we started values just started to climb over time, which is typically, which is normal, in a normal market. Of course, we had a few years that were, pretty high with the 8.4 and that 13.46 during the pandemic. A lot of interest, a lot of people moving to El Mar County. El Mar County is a great place to live, and and people want to live here. So values going up is actually a really good thing.
So but overall, that is the tax base increase based on real estate. We also always present these breakdowns by different, by the by the magisterial districts, and as you see they they are every one of these numbers I'm talking about whether it's 6.17, or it's one of these percentages on the screen right now, based on the district, or if it's based on these state property class codes of different property types, all of those are just averages of value changes for the properties within those groups.
So, and they'll vary based on the comp, the types of properties in those areas, the demand for those properties and other factors that happen. All of these results are just based on reassessment. We break out, new construction changes and any other kind of change, So that's not included in the reassessment numbers. So now sales ratios are how we determine, that what we are doing is appropriate. And I'd like to present this slide each year because it shows how we are coming up with the how are we supporting the data or supporting
the values. This year, unfortunately, what happens is, what's happened over the last few years is with the mortgage rates going up from 2% to 6% to 7% over the last four years or so, we've had a lot less volume of sales. And sometimes in the media, the volume of sales will get mixed up with, the actual value changes. So you'll hear there are a lot, you know, there that sales are going down sometimes in the news, but really the volume of those sales is going down, but the the actual prices are going up.
And as you see here, we I think the I mean, even prior to this, we were up to, like, 2,400 sales in a specific year. These are valid sales that have taken place between, you know, different parties and they're not gifts and stuff like that, other types of transactions. And the challenge here is that when we have less sales, we have less sales within specific neighborhoods and we have to have adequate sales within the neighborhood and enable to support, changes that are going on in those neighborhoods.
This is, there's a lot on the screen, and, but this is a breakdown of value range within the county, all the way from below $150,000 This is only single family homes up to properties that are over $2,000,000 in value. So, I find it interesting that we have over 1,200, homes in the county that are are, over $2,000,000 in value. But this shows that, again, average increase for each of those groups. And, and it also shows the number of sales that support each group.
And it's pretty good, except for at the very low end where we have very few sales and the quality of those sales aren't as good as we would like. The ratios, and when we I didn't talk about ratios, of the definition of ratios, especially with a few, new Board members. A ratio, an assessment ratio is basically the assessed value divided by the sale price. So if your assessed value is, dollars 450,000 and the property sells for 500,000 I'm sorry, Peter. Thank you. So if if the assessed value is 450,000
and the property sells for 500,000, that is an assessment ratio of 90%. If the assessment is 550,000 and it sells for 500,000, that's an assessment ratio of 110%. What we're looking for is we take the assessment ratio of every property that sells and we group those into, studies and the and then we're looking for the median and then the variation of those, of those ratios in those groups to see how well our model is working.
And I'll get more into the model in a little bit later in the presentation, but that's basically what mass appraisal is and what we're trying to do. Also on the screen, at the bottom here, it's always I know the board is always interested in what effect is this change in assessment gonna, gonna have on the taxes for the the owner of the median the median home valued home. So based on the average increase for a home and in that price range, which is 5.5%, the effect on taxes would be an additional $241.38.
So just to put that in perspective of what that that change means. Now the the results that we have are, you know, they're not all exactly the same. As I said, those those numbers that I presented, whether overall or by district or or whatever breakdown, those are all averages. And this slide shows that 64%, just over 64% of properties experienced between 010%. So they're somewhere around, they're pretty close around that 6%. But another 19% experienced, from 10 to 20%.
So these will be based on different neighborhoods changing and more demand in certain places and in other places, the value or the sales being lower than the previous year. Also, it would include, where we've done reviews of properties and found found that the information that we are basing the assessment on is a little bit different than what we had before and it would cause the value to go up or down. Often that happens when a property sells. We do a review of every property when it sells and we update the data if necessary. And sometimes that can cause those,
the values of those specific properties to go up more than, the average. Now the reassessment notice, and I just put a couple of snips in here to show, just what it looks like and what to look for when, when the public receives their notice. This is the top of the front page, and it'll, it'll tell you, other than telling you that, you know, it's who it's sent to and who it's from, it has a change reason that you see in the bottom right corner of that section. In this case, it says removed from land use, but it'll say reassessment. It'll have whatever the reason that this assessment has changed.
In case it's different from reassessment, it's, it's important to note what that reason says. Also, the assessor's review deadline is, March 2. By code it is, February 28, but that falls on a Saturday, so, we have until the following Monday to turn those into my office. The next section, the middle section of the reassessment notice is where all the values are. And what's important to note here is that, the top part is the market value and the bottom section is the land use
value. So 93% or more of properties are not in land use. So basically the bottom will just indicate not enrolled in land use for whichever year it applies to. We also, with approximately 1,400 properties under conservation easement, a lot of those, owners think they're in the land use program, but they're not technically in the land use program. So to provide clarity, we have put conservation easement instead of the not enrolled in land use on those
parcels. So here we just had this is just a sample. So on the right side you see where the values would show up if it was in land use at the bottom, then what it would look like for a conservation easement, what it would look like if it's not enrolled in land use. The top part, will show you the new values, but it'll also show you the previous values and it'll calculate it'll show you the change in the, the tax levy. So, the 2026, we're required to report, the tax levy based on the current tax rate. Obviously, the tax rate is part of the budget process,
which will happen after this and over the next few months. So, we don't know if there's going to be change in that or not. So so but law requires us to just put the current tax rate in here. So the percent change is basically the change between the change caused by the assessment on that first number. So in this case, the 3.1%. The prior year, the 2024 change will include not just the change in assessment, but also the change in tax rate that happened last year during the budget process. And then the different change notices or change reasons that will will be included on
the change notice is pre assessment for most people, but also, if a property is 100% complete as of January 1, we will have that reason. We are required to pick up, properties that, have a permit that is partially complete, whatever percentage that work is done as of January 1. So we'll have that change reason. A division of properties basically a new parcel created through a plat, acreage change, and all of these are really to explain there's some other thing going on in the assessment change besides just reassessment on your property if one of these other things
happens or is on this, the notice. And an important thing, removed from land use taxation, we, this is one of our big notifications to a property owner that their property has been removed from land use for whatever reason. We just had a revalidation, that ended December 5, and we had approximately 130 parcels that did not revalidate or did not, some of them did not complete the revalidation, and those 130 were removed from land use. This is the first, major notice to them that their property is no longer in land use.
So it shows up in two places at the top of that front of that notice and down in the, in the grid. The back of the notice is very important also. I don't have any slides on that, but, it it also has a lot of information on it. Also it included with the notice, we have an FAQ, which has a lot of good information. We update that every year and we've, we started adding, just, last year. Why is this notice important? It's a it's a flyer and it explains why you should pay attention to this
notice. What happens quite often is people will get their tax bill in May and they'll say, what happened to my assessment? And at that point it's too late to appeal. You're past all your appeal deadlines. So it's important to look at your reassessment notice and know, what's going on with your assessment. So if you have, kind of, you know, a concern or a question, you can contact us during before the deadline has passed. So mass appraisal and I just will spend a few minutes going through this, but, everybody is pretty much familiar with,
they get an appraisal on their house. It's done by a fee appraisal for appraiser. It's basically a single we call it a single property appraisal. It includes three to five comparables and it will adjust each of those comparables for the difference between that house and the subject property. And the appraiser will, at the bottom, they'll have a range of values that they come up with from those comparables and they'll decide on a price, on a value for the assessment, for the appraisal. Mass appraisal is just the opposite of that.
We use all of the sales that we we receive, to create a model, and we use that model, to determine the the assessments. So we're we're going backwards where we are adjusting we we are adjusting the model for the subject to the differences between the models, the model's, criteria and the subject as it compares to it. So if the model is based on a, 2,000 square foot home, it's, a C grade, and it's in a generic
neighbourhood that's not adjusted at all, it's 100%. We will then, adjust that based on different grades, on different sizes, on different, neighborhoods that are superior or inferior to that 100%, so it's a model that uses all of that information. As soon once that we run all of that, we we apply the model to all the sales that have happened, then we make adjustments to the to the model based on the ratio study that, that has taken place. So, we create the model in the first place,
we calibrate it and then we come up with the reports that tell us that we're too low, we're too high, we need to make adjustments or we're in the right and ultimately, it'll tell us that our numbers are acceptable. And I I provide a few, reports, examples so you can see what I'm talking about. This is by grade, so we can determine that our grade adjustments for each of our grades is appropriate because, and what you're seeing here is the median ratio, we want it to be 100%. These numbers at one, one is at 100% or close to it,
you can see that every one of these are between 99 and a 101% is kind of our goal, but as close to a 100% as possible. That is the that is the goal we're looking for for each one. The the COD on the right is basically your variance. We want as many of those properties to, or those ratios to be as close to that 100% as possible. And as long as that COD is low, then it's an indication that we're in the right ballpark. This is the way to look at actual year built of properties, so we can we know that we're treating properties built in the nineteen sixties or
the nineteen eighties or brand new built in 2025, properties the same way. As long as these ratios are at 100%, then our model is treating them appropriately. This is building size, so are we treating 1,500 square foot homes the same as, or appropriately and 4,000 square foot homes appropriately? And and the model is working for these also. And then the final breakdown, now there there are probably 10 or 12 different ways we look at it to make sure our model is working, but I've only shared four of them with you today. This is by neighborhood and so we will look at how many sales are in
a specific neighborhood, what the median ratio for that neighborhood is and how close that variance is. So these are the the neighborhoods with the most sales. So and I and I go through all this detail, only to to kind of show you that we have gone through all of this work to support the values that we have come up with. But then we get to the point where we, we report the values and we have, a period for property owners to request a review. And the most important thing,
that someone can do when they receive their notice and they have a question is to call my office. Occasionally they will call you, so if you would please just direct them to my office, we could we would certainly, love to talk to them and share what we have on their property. The quality of the value that we have created is based on the quality of the data that we have for their property. So if that data has not been updated for some time, it could be stale, it could be it could be incorrect. So, the first thing when they call is for my appraisers to confirm the data,
that we have on the property with the property owner. We will explain the process to them of how we create the values. We will provide sales within their neighborhood or, you know, if possible sales of properties that are similar to their home. And that's just the first step. So if you know, quite often the, the person on the phone will be, oh, that's great. That now I understand and that'll end there. But then some people will still disagree with the value or they'll say there's something, you know,
your data doesn't sound right to me. And we will, in that instance, we will set up an inspection. We will come out and look at the property and we will check all of the things that we have to make sure that they're up to date. We could remeasure the building, check what we have for quality, any one of those probably 30 or so points of data. At this point, we have, we require a review, request. It's an official process, So that review request can be found on our website or it can be, you know, received through the email or just requested from my office.
And you can provide support for why you think it's wrong. We will provide, response to that review in writing and ultimately the the result of that review, it could result in an increase, it could be a decrease or it could could be no change. Now, no changes just mean that we, the data that we have is correct and then we have no reason to change anything on inspection. It's quite often, you know, we find that that, the data will cause a reduction in value and and we will not hesitate to
reduce the value, if that is the case. It sometimes will cause an increase in value. Sometimes, the property owner says, well, I don't think you have this right about my property, but then we find that might be wrong, but something else is wrong that causes an increase. So it's not often, but it can happen. The final part of the review process, and these are separate steps and you don't have to go through all of them, But, if once you request a review and get a response,
you can and if you're not satisfied with the response to the review, you can request a Board of Equalization appeal. That is another official process. You have to contact my office for the, for the appeal form, which is a controlled form. We'll number them as we send them out and then, the Board will, the Board will have, hearings. I will present how we created, the value in the first place and the and the applicant will,
present any information they have, for the board to consider, to change the value. And the board again can either decrease, increase or carry over, the value for that is presented on the during those hearings. That is, what's important is that is an independent board. They're a board that that you, board of supervisor members, appoint. They are not, employees of the county, they're they're, residents of the county and then they're they're a third party, so they're they're a good
option for people to go to at no cost to, to raise concerns about their assessment. And I wanted to share the resources we have online. This is not updated. We're going to update it by Friday morning with the the new forms, but we'll have a a grade guide to explain, the how we determine grades on residential properties. We have the assessment FAQ flyer that will also be in with the notice. We have a residential valuation model description, which is very helpful if you want to get into the details of how that model works.
It has all of the, you know, explanation of how the, how all the parts work together in the model. And it also includes all the tables for anybody who's interested. We don't get a lot of interest in that, but, but every once in a while somebody does want to know the details. On that page, we also have our application for Veterans exemption, the application for, real estate tax relief. A few other, very helpful, applications or forms, that people can use. So that's on our, on the albemarle.org website. If you go to real estate and then documents,
you can find those. And then this is a change that we've made this year, and it's been very effective. Pictometry is an aerial photography program that we've been using for years, and it allows you to it provides not just straight down pictures of properties, but from all four sides. It allows you to measure, accurately and, you know, both area and distances, and it allows, you know, since we get these pictures every two years, we get to see properties over time. So what we have changed is that our focus before was to look at,
20% of properties every year in person, and that might include visiting for a building permit, visiting for one of the requested reviews from the public, but also, just us getting out and looking at properties to update our data. And last year I reported, it was actually I was thinking I reported it to you during my presentation, but it was in our press release, that we had looked at 10,000 properties last in the year before my I reported last year. This year because of this change, we're able to look at more properties and we're able to review more than 16,000
properties, so that we could update data on those. It's not, these are not reviews in which we get inside houses or anything. They were never that type of review before, even when we visited the properties. So we don't get every detail, but we we are able to find general data that might be different. Square footages are off, additions that were added that were not in our records, stuff like that. So it is very helpful. But that has been our focus this year. We still visit properties for every time a property sells. We go to visit for new permits.
Obviously, new construction won't show up on the pictures for a couple years. Any of those requested reviews and stuff. We're still visiting, as many properties as we need to. This is a very clear picture. It's a commercial property. Sometimes when we're looking at homes, there are a lot of trees and we can't really see. We're going to go look at those properties in person also. So, this is a way to be more efficient. It provides some safe safety for my staff also, but it also gives us, a little more, a lot more data than we would have gotten if we relied solely on in
person inspections. And then some general information for you. We, there were five twenty eight new parcels added through Platts this year, so we're now over 50,000 parcels for the first time. We're sending out their reassessment notices on Friday, the twenty third. That's all ready to go, so that should not be any problem. If if, property owners have signed up for the e statement, they will receive those notices through their email, just like they received the tax bill through their email. Otherwise they'll go in the mail on Friday. The land book is kind of the end of the process.
This is the very first step, the reassessment, then we go through the budget process for the next I say we, but I'm not part of it, but, you guys go through the budget process the next few months, and then once you set the tax rate, I believe that's at the April, then we process the land book. Land book is a snapshot of the values at that point and it is what the first half tax bills are based on. So that's the end of that process. And then GIS. We get a lot of comments about GIS, especially lately, since the cyber attack. It is,
it is, been more difficult to use GIS, but I wanted to share that there the GIS IT GIS' office in IT is working to replace it with a new system, and we're we're looking forward to that happening and it not just being an improvement over what is there now, but it should be an improvement over even what we had before. We should be able to the public should be able to, print out a property card with the data that is much more user friendly, and they'd be able to do searches,
better. So so that's that's good news, for people who use GIS, not just property owners looking for information on their properties, but appraisers and other real estate professionals, I think, are looking forward to that change. And then the, the last part of my presentation is about the land use, program. So, why is the land use program important? Land use program is really, about preserving the rural areas. The state, we have to, obviously, we follow the state law, and we have to follow the guidance that is in the in the state law,
but but the reason for the program to exist at all or especially in Albemarle County is to preserve the rural areas and also to make farming affordable for farmers in an area where values are very high with market values. What is the assessor's role in in in the land use program? We are here to make sure that properties that are qualifying for land use are following the guidelines. And they are, they are consistently doing the work that qualifies them.
Because the land use program is not a tax exemption, it is based on an act an active and consistent and constant use of the property based on the guidance of the, state code. So it's up to us to make sure that that is ongoing, and we we are we do the revalidations every two years and we gather information and, that is an excellent opportunity for us to see kind of snapshots of what's going on and to find
what qualification problems there might be out there. I'll get into a little bit more, I think, in another slide. We'll also talk about land use rates, land use deferral over time. I will show you the numbers of those. Rollback taxes, which is a really important part of the land use program and making sure it is, properly done and then we'll talk about application deadlines. So land use rates are set by SLIAX. SLIAX is the State Land Evaluation Advisory Council. They do an analysis of the agricultural properties,
what they rent for. They do an analysis of forestry by the forestry department, the set values per acre for the forestry land. And it's and it's based on the quality of the soil, so that's what why there are eight agriculture and four forestry, categories. But the actual important information here is that the values have gone up for the SILACC values, but they really are the same as they were three years ago. They they dropped for two years and then they've gone back up, at least for agriculture. Forestry is a little lower. It has been dropping for the last three years,
just just slightly. So this is kind of the overview of land use program in in in cost. So as you can see from this slide, where we had 4,500 parcels in the land use program in 2019, we have dropped consistently down, and currently have 3,569. So we've we've lost about a thousand properties out of the land use program. Some of those are due to development, some of those, you know, where a house was built or something like that, and some of them were due to that activity not taking place that needed to
qualify the property. And then as you can see, the cost of the program has still gone, even with the reduction and the thousand parcels in the program, the cost is still gone from $13,000,000 to $16,000,000 and that the current year is based on the same tax, the current tax rate. One of the things that we do find during the revalidation process is when I mentioned there were 130 properties that were removed, we start finding out after that that there is a reason why they didn't revalidate, or at least some of them, because they didn't weren't doing the activity that was needed and they didn't have anything
to report to us. So, the follow-up on the revalidation, which, you know, actually takes the two years after We collect the data, is important because we have to follow-up and make sure that we are, we are confirming what is going on in these properties. And we are either removing them from land use if there weren't some of the ones we've already removed, or that we're assessing rollback taxes, if that's appropriate. And then, speaking of rollback taxes, this is, one of the things that we've improved greatly in our office, over the last five or six years. The numbers you see on the left of this slide,
they have some large rollback numbers, but they were very specifically from a huge, large development that, that was very expensive. So they had to pay rollback taxes on that. It wasn't due to a lot of work from our office, to to make sure we captured everything. As you can see, the blue line is the number of rollbacks that we processed in each year. So we only rolled back, processed 35, 43, 47, you know, less than 50 each year during those earlier years. And we had a lot in those two years just because that that one property
that was, developed. But generally, we were we were experiencing about 300 to $700,000 in rollback taxes. Since then, we have been, we hired a new, or we you allowed me to create a, a land use administrator position, and we filled that with somebody who has analyzed these properties and kept up with changes that have happened to make sure that we're processing rollback taxes when they should be processed. So since then, each year we are pretty much over 100 properties and we're generally getting,
you know, more than $1,000,000 in rollback taxes. This is basically an offset of the slide before in the amount of deferred taxes. And the reason why it's called deferred is because it's it's gonna be recovered if the if the, if the action or the, the use is stopped. One of the most common things that puts somebody on this, this list or this amount is if they build a house on property on land that is previously qualified. So we're automatically going to roll back the area where the house is.
It may or may not cause more than just that area to be rolled back, or there may be other reasons for rollbacks, but that's the most common, number of rollbacks that we do. Land use applications, so the first part we're actually passed, but I wanna mention it, you have to apply for land use by November 1 prior to the year in which you, are applying for. If you don't apply by that date, you can still apply until January 1 with a late fee. So the initial, application fee is $125 per parcel.
If you have to pay the late fee between November 2 and Jan. One, it's $250 per parcel, but like I said, we're already past that now, but I mentioned that because going forward, anybody applying for, 2027 would follow those dates. There's a second bite of the apple, that, the state code and county code allow, and that is for people who have an increase in their assessment on the notice that we're sending on Friday. So if your property has an increase from 2025 to 2026 in their assessment,
then they can apply based on these new, deadlines. You have until February 23 with the regular $125 application fee, until April 23, if not within that first period with a $250 application fee. So those properties, but they must have that, increase in their assessment on their on their reassessment notice in order to qualify for this deadline period. And that's all the information that I have for you today and I would I would love to answer questions. That's all of the information you have for us today. Alright. Supervisor Lupista Kirtley.
Thank you very much for that presentation. Always look forward to this every year and learning more and more about this. Just a couple of questions. You said because as you know, we've dealt with this before, you and I on a property. You said it has to be submitted by March 2 for the reassessment and to call your office. Is that is there if there if it's mailed in or submitted to your office? Yes, ma'am. The the rules for that the the same rules that apply to paying your tax
bill on time, apply to applying on time for one of these appeals. It must be received by my office or postmarked by the post office by that day. Okay. And one of the problems that we do have in the in the post office is that you turn in your application in in Charlottesville, and unless you ask for a stamp right there for a, postmark right there, it'll then go to Richmond and be stamped the next day. So if you're doing it on the deadline day,
you're gonna get a you're possibly gonna get a postmark on the next day. Okay. So as long as this postmark. Thank you for that clarification. That is correct. That's very good. The other thing is you talked about, basements and, in your presentation, the difference or is it assessed differently a basement, which is underground versus a walkout, which half of it is not underground? Yes, ma'am. We have, different rates for basements that are, subterranean, than we do for walkout basements. Okay. So we have a description of the type of basement.
And I think if the walkouts would be more expensive? They they are more expensive. Yes. Okay. And that, walkout, that counts for square footage of the home? It so we the square footage of the home is above grade square footage. So when we, report finished living area, it's only above grade. The basement will be reported separately as a separate square footage. Okay. And it'll be valued separately. Okay. Including a walkout? Including a walkout. That is correct. Okay. Thank you. Those are all the questions I have. Alright. Supervisor Missal? Thank you, and thank you for a great presentation.
I appreciate all of the new information and also highlighting the fact that I've got a learning curve that I'm on right now. So I'm going to ask a few questions, but I'm also really cognizant of not trying to waste anybody's time with these questions. So tax base change averaged 6.17%. I noticed, because I couldn't help myself looking at Samuel Miller, 9.8%. The difference there is based on, if I understand this correctly, the mass appraisal approach and looking at the specifics like house style, quality, grade, square footage, etcetera, within each of those districts.
Is that accurate? It would be based on probably more pinpointed, specific neighborhoods within that district and how much those properties are changing. Okay. And not necessarily it's it's really hard to look at, like, by district Yeah. And say, well, this one's going up more because of this. Okay. Sometimes the, I believe it's Rio and Jack Jewett are more urban. So Yeah. We those will change differently than, the more rural districts, but I didn't see that pattern even in the numbers this year.
So but that's still just a general idea of the change. Okay. Okay. That makes sense. So the other thing I know everything you do is an attempt to be very objective as opposed to introducing any subjectivity. As you look at the adjustments, that's the part that I'm trying to grapple with, and we don't have to spend much time on this. I'm just thinking through things like house style, quality, grade, square footage, etcetera. How do you adjust based on, let's pick one, house style, can you explain a little bit more about what that does and how that influences
the adjustment that you make? Yes. So house style is actually the basis of our model. Okay. If it's a one story, I don't I don't remember the exact numbers, but let's say if it's a one story house, we start with $131 per square foot. Got it. And that will be based on the initial study we do, in September, October, at the beginning of this reassessment process, and we will determine in order to get all of our one stories up to a 100% median ratio, it'll take changing that 131 to 140.
I see. And so that'll be the basis. It's the other things like grade Yeah. That will multiply against that rate or the depreciation based on age that will reduce that rate. That makes sense. Thank you. You're welcome. Another kind of big picture question, construction costs. How does that enter into the assessed value at all or the assessments at all, The fact that this area is obviously very high to build new construction or repair existing homes? Is that factored in all? It it it indirectly factors in, because it's the sale that we're using to determine that value.
So the sale is going to be inclusive of the cost to whether build the new home or to renovate the older home. Got it. Okay. So it's captured in there. Got it. Yes, sir. Very basic questions. When does the new GIS website, your new website, go live? They're working on procuring it right now. So my understanding, it could be a few months. Okay. A few months. And you mentioned the rollback taxes, on land use. What is the time line for the rollback? Is it five years? It is the current and five years that is assessed in the runback.
Current and five years. Yes, sir. And last question, the pictometry, I get that. Understand that. And you also, I think, gave some good examples of when you might go out to the property if the pictometry is vague or if you think you may. Have. How, well, actually, I think I I think that gave you the answer. Okay. I think I'm good. Thank you. Alright. Thank you. That's all, sir. Thank you. Supervisor Duncan? Yeah. Thank you for this. This was very thorough and explained a lot. I just had one question on the slide with the bar graphs, the taxable change groups.
This is sort of related to the question about higher, percentage changes. Is there a map that shows yes, that one. Oh, this one. Oh, I'm sorry. That one right there. Is there a map that shows, like, which neighborhoods or which parcels have changed this percentage so we could, like, see where the 10 to 20% changes versus, you know, the negative 10%? Not not a map, but I I I haven't mentioned this yet, but, every year I'm typically asked for a list of neighborhoods within each district.
I've already prepared a neighborhood list that's separated by district, and I will email that to each one of you. Oh, that would be great. And and that'll have each of the neighborhoods, and it'll be broken down by your district. Thank you so much. That's great. You're welcome. And it shows the average change for the neighborhood. Okay. Cool. That's all I have. Thank you. Supervisor Malek. Thank you very much. Having there's no such thing as everybody's a newbie at this because we've heard multiple things, and I learn lots of things every single year. So please do not ever worry about asking questions in general.
In that bar graph thing, then you mentioned the over 60% had a 0% to 10% increase. Does that cause the neighborhood data the next year to be impacted? Is there any connection? I I mean, it can't impact immediately, but am I being coherent with my question or not? How does this impact the neighborhood values in the following year? If I understand correctly, so, one thing that we will, we will see is that, you know, different areas of the county will change at different rates,
but what might often happen is that one neighborhood will experience an increase one year, but the next year have a lower than average increase and they'll kind of even out. That's not always the case because there are some sections of the county that are really sought after and they continue to increase, as much or more than the the, average. Okay. I think I understand that. In well, I guess I'll be patient to wait for the new GIS to see, but in the past, unbuilt upon rural land was just called vacant,
as if it was waiting in the GIS, as if it was waiting for some house to be built on it as opposed to some other use, you know, forestry or something like that. Is that terminology going to continue, or are you starting to put more information into your GIS? Your records about on the on the land page, for example, forestry property or whatever. I I don't see, there being a difference in the in the data itself from what, GIS used to provide Okay. To what they're going to provide. Okay. It almost seems like it's,
well, this isn't valuable because it doesn't have a house on it. That's what people have complained to me about. Why is my piece of land being shown as a piece of trash? Because it's just vacant. So, when they get the tax bill, they won't think that anymore, especially since open land has gone up 8% again. So yikes. Let's see. Let me zoom down the list here. Changes in boundary line adjustments. This is I'm jumping down into land use now. If there's a big parcel and there's a boundary line adjustment within the parcel but doesn't change any of the uses, Does does that impact there's been confusion, let's put it that way,
on whether people are thrown out for that and have to start all over again or what the process is for those kinds of things when nothing's changed other than where the line is on the Are you talking about land use qualification? Yes. There's been some confusion about that. Yes. So, state law requires, a property to reapply for land use when the acreage changes on the property. So what happens is whenever even even if just a boundary line adjustment is made to a property, that's that's an acreage change.
We automatically take the property out of land use for the next year, but we notify the owner and they have the opportunity to reapply. And as because that would cause a change, they actually qualify for the later deadline, to apply. For the March deadline. Even though it's interior and you're not selling some piece of your property, you're just I mean, I have two parcels on my place and if the boundary moved over here Right. You couldn't change anything except where the line was. But that still throws you out. As long as the acreage is changed,
yes. Per parcel, not not the aggregate anymore. It used to be the aggregate. Okay. So that's the important thing is that, hey, it's all parcel by parcel as opposed to when you have 10 forestry parcels in, not me, but somebody else, in an aggregate, all one lump. Yes, sir. They used to be taken as a lump. Yes, sir. There's more nuance to that also because, there's restrictions on aggregating parcels together to meet their minimum acreages. And if you make a boundary line adjustment on one, it can no longer be aggregated with others because it is officially subject to the
subdivision code or the subdivision ordinance. That information needs to be broadcast widely because a lot of people are making errors in that decision making because they don't know that. And so I don't know how to do that, but I think it's a real loss of lack of of and that's a lawyer's job, I guess, to know these things when they're advising their clients. Okay. So that's talk about that. You mentioned a 130 parcels did not complete revalidation. Yes, ma'am. In the past, we've gotten Excel sheets of people so that I I mean,
I called 400 the first year and 200 the next year and that kind of thing and didn't get one this year, so I assume that everybody was there. We actually have improved our communication, greatly with property owners and we have more than three out of 3,500 that are, properties in the program, we have more than 3,000 email addresses now. Okay. And, we've reached out to the property owners that had not revalid we we reached out to everybody at the beginning to say, hey, we're gonna do this, but we've reached out to multiple times through the CAPE office to people who had
not valid revalidated yet to remind them of the upcoming deadlines, whether it was the September 1 deadline or the December 5 deadline. And we also called some at the end. Through cape, that means an individual email to that person or it's something on the news? No. No. It was an individual email through a a mass email. Okay. Great. That's a huge improvement. I'm so thrilled that that is happening for the people who at least have email. The wonderful charts about the coefficient, COD, that's the range that you're seeking is below 10?
Or is it minus five to plus five? So it really matters what the property type is. Okay. If if you're talking about a, homogeneous neighborhood with all the houses are pretty much the same, it's the guidance is five, five to 10% or five to 15%. If you're talking about vacant land, especially rural vacant land, it can be as high as 20 to 25%, because you're going to have a lot more variance in that type of property. So generally you don't want to see them much lower,
you're not going to see them around one or two, because you're you're really restricting your model too much. But to be around five to 10 is is the optimal place. Great. Do you have the information on a rural property, for example, that says it's got a working septic system and things like that? I mean, I've seen now recently lots of occupied structures with no plumbing. And so I don't know if that impacts your information or that's totally because you need Department of Health and so many That certainly could affect,
our value, if if the septic system is not working at all and they don't have system. Yeah. Or or the or they don't have water, those are things that we, you know, will take into account. Of course, is that a temporary thing or is that a is that a permanent, you know, a long term thing? It sounds like the major burden still is for health department and zoning to Right. Take that off and plate. Okay. I'm zooming down the list here. You talked about the number of forms for equalization and estatement. For the estatement people, do they also get a paper copy to put in their files whenever the mail
gets it to them? Or does it totally replace It replaces the mailing. All right. And I'm really glad that you are doing the ground truthing because my driveway is still on the neighbor's property, I guess, after fifteen years. So it takes a long time to get those things corrected. And I just when in 2008, when there was a huge uproar about a whole lot of different financial things. And one of my farming constituents gave me a really good story about why the land use valuation the use value is from her history of 10 generations in Virginia,
that and she compared it to a residential value for my house. It's not commercial. Commercial's over here because it's a different use. Mhmm. So if you have a pasture and or the forest, it's not fair to charge it residential. And I thought, I can even explain that because it makes such good sense. So, anyway, that's sort of the basis for the use value tax from the state back in 7371 when it was passed. And I just wanted to share that. Alright. And, it was really
interesting. I was reading the June minutes, and you gave a presentation then about the numbers the shrinkage of the numbers of parcels. And I do remember the first year after seventeen years of trying to get revalidation established. The first year, it was like a $5,000,000 increase in the rollbacks because of the properties before Pete's time, obviously, but there have been no check ins from any people in the program since they signed up as early. I mean, we were signed up in 'seventy three and always had livestock on the place. But it was just, we've we've done well to catch up at least and not have people with absolutely
no agriculture hiding, pretending to be farmers. And all they did was make people mad at the farmers, and that really wasn't fair. So, anyway, thank you very much for all your answers. Alright. Supervisor Pruitt. Thank you. This kind of ties into a point that, mister Williamson was making during public comment, but I'm curious if we are seeing in this year's assessment, I remember what it looked like last year, but if there are strong patterns based on housing type that you're seeing. I have not seen any patterns based on type. No. That is helpful.
You may have already touched on this, and I missed it, but I don't think so. The dataset that we just had on the screen, I apologize. I know we literally just lost it. But, looking at kind of the, the blocks of range of assessment changes, does that dataset include circumstances where you might have greenfield construction on parcels or substantial renos, got renos, for existing housing? It doesn't include those renovations because those would be those would fall under new construction. Okay. But it would include anything in which there was no actual major change to the
property itself. It's just a reassessment of the same data from one year to the next or or similar data, but the property itself didn't change. Can you, enlighten me on kind of how we systematize or if there is a process to systematize, qualitative changes? Things like, oh, we had a renovation that required or we had, work that required a building permit. It increased the value of the home. How how do those come to your office? How does that get captured? We, all of these, permits that would apply, to something that would change the value are interfaced from community development system into my
system, and then we, follow-up on every one of those permits. What is the process for systematizing that value change look like? Is there, like, a that that was already very responsive to my question. I'm curious, like, do you see something as, like, oh, we're remodeling a bathroom, and you have a table that says, well, a bathroom's worth about 10 k. Or is there a different approach that's used? No. I mean, that's a pretty simplistic one, but, so we we have in our model a value for bathroom. So if if it's adding a bathroom, then it would add the value that we have for that,
for a bathroom in our in our model. If it is renovating bathrooms and kitchens, that could change the condition of the home, maybe from average to good, and that would cause the value to change. If it's an addition of square footage, that would that part would add, the value. Is there an inverse system in place for, reports from public safety, specifically fire? Right? I have a neighbor whose kitchen exploded. Yes. Okay. Yes. So, we receive fire reports,
and or or we just find out about fires at times, and we will reduce the value. The the state code basically says if a home is uninhabitable, you have to reduce the value of the home down to zero, during the time that it's uninhabitable. That could be totally destroyed or it could be just there was enough fire damage that you can't live in it. So we will, we have a category basically in our changes called fire damage, or flood damage or some other problem. Thank you. One other very quick question.
The, data that you show on the removal out of land use, you mentioned that most of these are things have been discovered to either have been noncompliant or the owner has decided to move out of land use. Does that data also capture, owners who transition from land use into conservation easements? No. No. Those are totally separate, and that those wouldn't count as a rollback at all. And, actually, you don't rollback a property once it goes into conservation easement. If you go directly from land use to conservation easement. Understood. Yeah. I was just curious if that, what was it,
4500 to 3,500 shift, if that was inclusive of any of that. It sounds like I think the majority are are that we found properties were not consistently doing the qualified use. Understood. Thank you. That's all I have. Thank you. I just want to note that we are pushed past some time. Two of my questions were going would probably take up a lot more time, so I'd like to make a request of the County Executive, Mr. Lynch, and perhaps the finance team. The focus appropriately so is on homeownership and the single family detached homes.
I don't think we've gone through not to anybody's this isn't a criticism but I don't think we're capturing the story of how this hits our renters when the tax rate goes. Last year during the budget season, I found myself explaining quite a bit how multifamily is assessed and then how to draw the thread of how that goes through because it's more commercial and business in ways, but then gets translated into increased rent. So here we show that $241 is the average increase for a home of $516,000
Lost in that story is what a monthly increase in rent is for a renter. And I think it's important for us to have that conversation and for us to be aware of that. So the request I would have is to not address this today, but to perhaps, because I think it's a fifteen minute, twenty minute piece that maybe during one of our work sessions in the budget this year, so that we can help folks understand how the tax rate goes through and hits runners, that we could have that conversation or have that information presented to us. It came up, I know, in the fall during the five year financial planning,
when we're looking at how our tax base is diversified and how multifamily is an interesting animal when you look at residential, commercial and agriculture. So I'm just making that request. Yes. And if you would allow me, I just on this slide that I put back up, it shows that multifamily generally went up 4.6. Correct. And I agree. Okay. But when folks look at that, right, how does that it's clear. It's easy to get to that $241 when you pick a home point or a price point. Right. But if I'm paying $2,200
in rent, and then it's not as clean because then every person could adjust rents differently based on the tax bill that they're receiving. So I think it's important for us to understand that. If you go to your slide where the average the trend over the years of the average increases, So this year, it's 6.1%. I mean, you look at the last four or five years, we all recognize the tremendous pressure on our taxpayers that exists here. And in addition to that, we are cognizant of the tax rate increase that we added on top of these rising values. So this is not on you at all,
Mr. Lynch. This is part of the conversation and the realization of what we need to be dealing with, especially as we're approaching budget. I know I don't mean to put Andy or Jacob on the spot, but back in the fall, we had our five year financial planning. Can you remind me what the projected tax rate increase was that we were using for our planning purposes? Yes, I don't remember. And I couldn't find it in my notes, but I know Andy's probably got that number in his brain. Andy Bowman, assistant chief financial officer.
In the five year model the board saw last on November 19, there was not a contemplated change in the tax rate that during that time. But the average total revenues, there's some different assumptions in each year, but it was around 5% to 5.5% of each of the next five years. That is all revenues, property taxes, sales taxes, state, federal, and that's really based on where the county has been in history for the last ten years or so, not adjusting for tax or excuse me, adjusting for any tax rate changes. And I know we'll have more chances to to go over that. I just think it's always important to call that to attention when we have the
tax rate increase here versus what we're planning for. So thank you for that. And while we're here, dollars 20 I mean, dollars $2.41 for that homeowner is about $20 a month. You take $20 a month and just you don't this is a great slide to look at what that's probably equated to over a series of years. So I don't want to be, I don't want to be dismissive. So sometimes we show those things and it can seem like it's not a large amount. But for some folks, over a course of four or five years, if you're getting a $20 to $30 or $40 hit per month, and then that adds up cumulatively over years,
that the pressure increases, especially for those at the lower end of our income bracket. So I'm just acknowledging that. And that's something, well, I'm sure we'll be discussing more as we move into the budget season this year. And then just in the interest of time, the nice thing about the sheets that Mr. Lynch mentioned will be coming out, this is really for Sally and Fred, is it's an Excel sheet, so you really can play around with your you know, from like highest to lowest. You can pull out neighborhoods, so you can get in there and kind of do some analysis that's really helpful.
And somebody was talking about the difference by neighborhood. I think it was Supervisor Mallick. But I know in RIO, when I look at Dunlora versus Woodbrook versus Carsbrook versus the streets that run parallel, that each neighborhood really does have its own unique situations, and it's always fascinating to see how the values change year over year in each of those neighborhoods that are within a mile of each other. And a lot of it has to do with the sales data. And I guess I would the last observation I would be making is the heavy
increase in value at the higher end of the sales price spectrum, which as you follow the housing data in Albemarle, the million plus and even $2,000,000 plus home sale market is robust in our county. And that is, I think, backed up here even based on the reports that come out, whether it's us or even national entities that report housing data. But that 89%, especially at that $1,000,000 and over $2,000,000 is back or, like I said,
backs up the idea that that is a robust market in our county. Yes, sir. And I'm just making the observation. And it's pulling up. I would offer that it's pulling up the values and prices of everywhere else, in a way because it's putting pressure on, putting pressure on the market below them. Mr. Lynch, thank you today. Are there any other quick questions? Yep. Very quick. Claudia, can you find the picture? I wanted to just back regarding adding one thing to what you said about the, long time folks. Floyd Bailey was an RVDOT person in for union beginning in 1946.
He built his house for $5,000 in 1947. And in 2008 and he he was 90 years old at this point. Then in 2008, he said, so now my tax bill is $5,000 every single year, and I built my house for $5,000. And this is, I think, a a very personal but widely replicated feeling that our residents have of whatever their age is to, that this is it's not easy for sure. And, the further away you get from retirement and, it puts a lot of people at risk.
So having the real the data and the the great effort that you go to to make things fair is really important. And I just have one picture to show everybody and Pete before he leaves. You've all read the children's story under one mushroom a long time ago, probably. So, in my pasture is a tree. There's a lot wide discussion throughout the agriculture community and the state and taxes and whatever about segregating out trees from pastures in order to, not count them, you know, and have those parcels that are right on the edge. Just throw it up there. So the,
this is a tree in my pasture, and you can see underneath that this is providing fabulous shelter from ice and snow, which we're getting this weekend, and also the heat and the rain in the summertime. This is what I'm talking about when I'm talking about scattered trees in the fields and how I really want you to consider the importance of these for all of our agriculture properties. And I thank you again. Thanks. Are Are there any further questions or comments? All right. Mr. Chair, yes, sir. Real quickly, I'd like to take an opportunity to thank the team that Mr. Lynch works with in his office.
Mr. Lynch started his comments out today, board, by telling each of you and the community how much he loves his job. I'm not surprised to hear him say that because his team works every day in that spirit. They do excellent work. And so if I could take a second, Mr. Chair, and thank the folks that are here today in addition to Mr. Lynch, and that would be Billy Taylor, Louis Hernan, Sheila Conrad, Dana Grimm, Rachel Mixon, Deborah Coyer and Daniel Stein. Thank you to Pete and and his really, really top notch group of folks that work so hard every year to get us
to this point. This is a critical point in our budget process. And what I appreciate most today is how Mr. Lynch really slowed down and meticulously walked through the parts of the presentation that have to do with reaching out for questions from the community, appeals and so forth. And all the Board will hear during the budget process, which is parallel to the appeals process, from people in our community that have concerns or, in fact, want to appeal. And Mr. Lynch and his team invite this because this is a process.
It's data driven. But, our citizens have an opportunity to engage with Pete and his office if there are any questions. And they just really carry themselves in a tremendous way, representing our county in a really good way. So thank you, team. I appreciate your hard work. I really do. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Mr. Richardson, for taking a moment to do that. And I know the Board joins in that thank you as well. And the fact that we do this annually, our surrounding neighbors, I think it's Nelson County, is going went through a reassessment after six years of not doing one.
So you can imagine the impact that that's bearing out. And to their credit, they're saying we can't wait six we've got to do this every year, every other year at a minimum, because otherwise you're doing a disservice to folks when you come at them after six years and the updates that they're finding. So thank you again. Thank you. And thank you for your patience. I know there was a lot of information, but I think it's really important. I'm not trying to teach you guys how to do assessments, but I want it to be obvious that we've gone through a lot of work to get where we got. But I appreciate your time. I know your time is valuable. Thank you,
sir. Board, we are running behind. I'm going to if we could take a quick ten minute recess, as opposed to fifteen, and then we'll return for the next item on the agenda. All right, folks. Thank you. We're going to come back out of recess and move to the next item, number 10, the 2025 build out analysis update and AC44 analysis tool. And JT Newberry is with us. I see Ann Wall stepping up to the batter's box as well. Good afternoon. Yes. Good afternoon. Thank you, Chair Galloway and members of the Board. My name is JT Newberry,
and I'm a senior planner in the Department of Community Development. I'm joined today with my co presenter, Jeremy Goldstein from Line and Grave. He's sitting right here in the front row. I'm also joined by, several members of our department's leadership to help answer questions and help with the discussion of today's topic. So today is part two of a discussion that the Board had, back in September. At that meeting, we were in Phase four of the AC44 review,
and we were focused on an apples to apples comparison of the 2022 land use build out analysis to the results of the 2025 land use build out analysis. And so the, the Board adopted AC44 in mid October. And so we're transitioning out of, kind of that review and adoption phase now into the implementation phase. And so moving into today's presentation, we'll review the 25 results through a bit of a market based lens and then
review a draft AC44, analysis tool. This information is important because, to administer the updated growth management that was included in AC44, it's essential that we understand how effectively the development areas are being used. This information will help us inform, future policymaking, especially on topics related to housing and economic development, as well as several of the board's initiatives, in your strategic plan. It will also provide greater context for evaluating future development applications that will be coming
to the Board in the future. I wanted to spend just a few slides reviewing some of the broad results that we looked at back in September, and I'll begin by looking at the total maximum theoretical residential capacity. These figures at the bottom of the slide here, they combine the development pipeline, which are the projects that are under review or that have been approved but are not yet built. It combines that figure with the theoretical maximum buildout estimate.
Those are the parcels that are vacant or are at least two acres and have a land value that's greater than their improvement value. Back in September, we discussed that there was an overall decline in capacity, but that could largely be explained by the residential deliveries that had happened between 2022 and 2025. Even though these capacities were lower, they were still, exceeded the expected demand over a 20 time horizon. Likewise, we observed for nonresidential uses that the results were lower but still exceeded the twenty
year forecasted demand. One trend we observed across development applications was also that if you remove just one of the projects that was approved between 2022 and 2025, the overall trend was for approval of projects at about 70% of the comp plan max. This was an increase from the trend that was observed in the 2022 analysis, which was 58%. One last thing from as a review from our September discussion, the composition of parcels that met the definition of developable was about fiftyfifty between those
that were vacant and those that would require some amount of redevelopment. And so the overall developable acreage had decreased from 6.9% down to 6.1% for a total of fourteen forty six acres. Before I turn it over to Jeremy, I wanted to just broadly describe his work has really focused on digitizing the information that's needed for us to do this analysis on a more regular basis. So we're now in a position to implement the updated growth management policy with the
tool that Jeremy has created and that he'll go into, in greater depth in just a second. It's going to allow us to be a better partner, both internally and externally, partners like our school divisions, our utility partners. The tool will also help us analyze and put into better context those development proposals that are coming before you, for review and approval. One of the things that you'll see in the results that Jeremy will show is, the amounts divided by neighborhood. And we mean neighborhood in the context of how the comp plan describes them.
So for example, the Pantops master plan in AC44 would be described as neighborhood three. The Southern and western neighborhoods would be neighborhoods four through seven. And so just so there's no confusion, we wanted to make sure that folks were aware we're talking about neighborhoods, within this context. So with that, I'll turn it over to Jeremy Goldstein with line and grade to talk more about the tool and the results. Thanks, JT. Good afternoon, everybody. Thanks for the opportunity to speak with you today. I'm gonna have JT advance slides for me. So you wanna you'll see me point to him every once in a while.
But, I wanted to get into a little of the weeds of the tool that JT was describing that we collaboratively, developed for the purposes of enhancing, sort of upgrading your build out analysis and and the sort of analytical capabilities therein. The tool itself is Excel based. It's a it's a spreadsheet. It's a spreadsheet based tool, that, is a leave behind, by the way, for for county staff. It's meant to for them to to be able to use it in perpetuity. Like any other sort of spreadsheet model, it's got a lot of different tabs and inputs into it. But there's sort of two main things that are going on on the sort of
the input side and the output side. The input side, really breaks down between sort of, like, facts about your parcels, within the development area, how big they are, what's on them right now, what are the known improvement in land values, etcetera. And then a series of assumptions about what that sort of information may mean as it relates both to capacity and future development potential. So that can be things like what are the criteria that are used to determine if a parcel is developable in the future.
It can also include what are the types of growth that we would expect on a parcel given its its set of information. And we'll talk a little bit about how what some of the underlying assumptions are for these various scenarios and maybe even some opportunities for upgrading that, as as you move forward. So that's that's like the input side. The output side then is just the calculations about growth potential or development potential therein, based on the assumptions. And then right now, a fairly basic user user interface,
sort of friendly user interface, showing different modules that relate to these different scenarios and allowing users to make some some adjustments here and there to sort of query the scenarios as they stand now. I'm about to show you some of the findings of some of these scenarios and breakdown sort of how we got to them, but there are a couple of sort of critical caveats that I think are are important when keeping all of this in in context. And the the first bullet says quite a lot here in that, a lot of this stuff really it's it's an art, not a science. We'll show you lots of numbers. Everything is data derived.
And yet there are a lot of assumptions that have to go into making these quantitative analyses. Those assumptions themselves can be fairly qualitative, you know, or gut driven in nature. So nothing that we're really showing here has to be something that has to be assumed to be, you know, set in stone. This is the exact amount that has to come out of this. In some ways, what this is really useful for is in revealing how a change in one assumption, which can be underlying data assumption or an underlying policy, how that changes your your overall outcomes.
So the numbers themselves are sort of useful, but also the comparison, between them can be can be equally useful. Okay. With that, I think let's go ahead and start showing a few of these scenarios. And I will say that these are just the ones that have been developed to date. There's no reason this should be the the end of this sort of work. But the first part of the work that we wanted to do was to bring some of the same the same thought process that was done for the 2022 build out analysis into 2025. JT had mentioned this idea of an apples to apples comparison that was shown in
in, September, which really meant that evaluation was how did the parcels identified as developable in 2022, how did they change in 2025, and what does that tell us? This time around, what we're interested in is what if we use that same methodology but evaluated it on the existing context of of our parcels, which have changing variables? Maybe most importantly, changes as you as I think you got into the weeds on just a little while ago on improvement values and land values and the relationship therein, which is one of the which was one of the critical variables as JT mentioned
in identifying parcels as developable in the 2022 methodology. So we tried to replicate the 2022 methodology as best we could with all the available information we had from that report, but now it's in an Excel spreadsheet and one where it's easy enough to make changes to those assumptions moving forward. It's really noteworthy here. It's important to note that this scenario really, relies heavily on what is considered developable. So there are criteria, one by means of example, the only residential developable things are parcels that are two acres or above.
So if you're 1.9 acres, you're out. You know? If you're 2.1 acres, you're still in as as a potential. And and there's certainly in real life, it is never so so, you know, hard and fast. But that those are the we just try to use the same, variables that were used moving forward and and see what we see now with the with, the, with a twenty twenty five lens instead of the twenty twenty two lens. This is a table that summarizes as was done in 2022, parcels and acreage and total changes in square footage and housing not changes,
sir. Totals in, square footage and housing units across all of development areas by development area and then a total. So what that's showing is something like your max build out might be as many as 10,000 housing units and 12,000,000 square feet of commercial or industrial uses. This is again using the same methodology that was employed in the 2022 build out analysis. You you may note that these numbers are higher, especially as it relates to parcels and acreage, than was discovered in 2022.
And, our expectation is that has a lot to do with the changes in values. So there are effectively more parcels that got identified as developable under this rubric over a three year period, which does sort of speak to changing changing market conditions. So it's not particularly surprising. But we did do the due diligence of taking a look, you looking at looking at at these developable parcels on a map, making sure that they make sense, you know, scrutinizing whether or not it's still, these are these aren't this isn't a data error issue that is is the reason
for the change. And in fact, it's probably changing changing market conditions or at least changing data conditions. But JT had also mentioned that as you were looking through projects that have been approved over the last few years that we're not routinely meeting max build out. Instead, it's more like 70% of max build out is what's getting approved. So one thing that this, you know, having this now as an Excel based tool makes it easy to do is to start sort of querying that same dataset with different questions. And this question was,
well, how does total build out change if we instead of looking at max build out, we looked at something like typical build out using that 70% threshold. So the tool has a module in it, and you can just make a there's a line in there that allows you to put in whatever percentage of the max you want to see, and it spits out that, you know, the new table and that's what's on the next slide. Interestingly and really just totally coincidentally, this amount of build out is pretty well in line with the overall total that was found from the 2022 number.
It's, again, it's just it's coincidental. But just for order of magnitude, this would suggest that if typical build out is really what you wanna be thinking about from a maximum perspective, because this is taking it effectively. Instead of looking at the policy as the max build out, we really looked at what the market was doing as the max build out. You would see a number that's now closer to maybe 7,000 housing units, still developable through this process, but also many millions of square feet of commercial uses.
So now we've got our old kind of like policy based version of build out, and now we've got one that's at least slightly more market informed than that. It's using what the mark what, you know, developers are actually doing to to inform that capacity component. But the next stage really is to start evaluating capacity versus either how things are getting built or maybe more importantly, how things are expected to build moving forward. So that's the third part of this work, and that's doing a sort of a market demand scenario. There are lots of different ways you could make estimates about how things are gonna
grow, in in the future. Oftentimes, people take backward looking, you know, they look backwards at what has happened historically, and they project it forward. And maybe they make some change, to that to that backward trend, which is which is pretty which is a pretty standard way to do it. And the model has that, built in within it. But we also wanted to take a look sort of outside of just what has happened in in in the county historically and see if there's sort of outside forecast that could be used, to inform to to inform a, you know, a data oriented evaluation of future growth.
And so for that, we look to CoStar. I don't know if folks are familiar with with CoStar, but it's it's a it's, a data service that does Very deep looks into commercial development, history, patterns, and what is what is coming alongside. So they can give you very detailed information on vacancy rates, you know, absorption rates, rents, deliveries, etcetera, by kind of any area you want. So we just pulled that for Albemarle County. But what they also have are their own forecast, near term forecasts of growth along each of these in each of these industry sectors.
So we decided to use CoStar as the sort of first foray into a market informed growth scenario. It's probably worth noting here that CoStar didn't provide single family development assumptions. So we did our own little method looking at, development feasibility basic development feasibility analyses that suggested that there's market demand for or there's the ability to make projects single family projects still pencil out in reasonable form throughout
the at the county as a whole. So if there was development in the past, there's probably sort of commensurate levels of development in the future. So a fairly kind of basic attempt to suggest that there's continued single family development for in the future and then combine that with the CoStar data to come up with this this new this new forecast. So then what we did with that with that data was to, allow a user to choose the number of years they want that forecast to be pushed out for. This table is showing four different years of that of that CoStar forecast,
so how much they're expecting to develop over one year, three years, five years, and then we push their five year forecast out to out to ten years. But the row beneath for in each parts of this table, you can see percent of max build out. And so what this is now doing is allowing you to compare that growth forecast with the, the capacity analysis, that was that was done earlier. And as you can see that as you start to approach, say, ten years, you're seeing that that that CoStar is expecting a lot more residential development demand than commercial development.
Parenthetically, this data was pulled before the announcements for AstraZeneca and I think maybe even the Manning Biotech Institute. So we did sort of add it into CoStar's numbers for five and ten years. You can see there's a big leap in industrial square footage. It's sort of a placeholder, but we wanted to acknowledge that there's some projects coming along down the line. Even if those projects haven't announced the square footage, we just have them anyway. But what this market based forecast would tell you is that in the not too distant future, you start to run into a little bit of a disconnect between the policy based
expectation for housing capacity and what the market has interest in developing from a housing perspective. And that's why you can start to see sort of numbers go from green to yellow with kind of I mean, there's an arbitrary threshold for why we turn them to yellow. As mostly, I just wanted them to be highlighted. But you can see that we're starting to have demand for housing units that effectively surpass the typical amount of development that we would expect in capacity and getting to 80% of maximum build out.
The implications of this, I wouldn't extend too far out, right now. I think what this mostly tells us is that I think there's a lot of merit in evaluating how we do a capacity analysis moving forward, especially one that's maybe a little bit more market focused. You may recall back in September as you went into more detail about how the capacity analysis portion is derived. It has to make assumptions by future land use saying, well, so for future land use x, we're gonna we're gonna apportion out some per some percentage of future growth as residential
or nonresidential by various categories. That itself is its own assumption. And it may well be that, that is an assumption that doesn't necessarily align with real market conditions. So even though the future land use assumption was that, I'm making up numbers here just for example, that 30% of future land use, mixed use would be residential. In fact, it's much more likely to be 70%, 80%, 90%. And as such, you actually have more capacity for housing than that initial analysis showed.
So mostly, we've just reached the stage where I think what we can safely say is that we provided a tool that allows for more sort of data infused information to help staff start making decisions or making leader helping leadership make make decisions moving forward, but that this is still ultimately kind of a a really good first step, more than it is a final step in this process. With that, I will turn it back over to JJ. Thank you. Thank you, Jeremy. Before we take questions and feedback from the Board, just wanted to lay out a couple of next steps for the build out analysis.
The intent is that annually to the Board, we would be providing updated figures on estimated capacity by land use type and that there would be an analysis of the previous twelve months of legislative actions just to help the board, stay in touch with, how it's, the actions it's taken is impacting capacity. And then as noted in AC44, every two years there would be an update to the more comprehensive, full build out analysis.
So with that said, before we review the AC44 analysis tool, we'll take questions and feedback on this portion of the presentation. All right. Thank you both. Supervisor Lupisto, currently? Thank you for that, for the presentation. I just have one question, and this is the theoretical build out assumption. I know I you on one slide, you had the retail at 1,800,000.0, in a square feet. I guess that was it. And I understand office and industrial being different,
but retail space, that can be, and correct me if I'm wrong, commandeered, so to speak, for housing. I mean, it's been done in Charlottesville. I see one huge area where they used to have a giant. They're gonna build 300 homes now. So I'm wondering if there's a way with your tool to to say let's say if, one of our big areas where there's not a lot happening, if that changes and I give you an example like a fashion square. Okay. We have Home Depot. We have the police department.
In the middle, that could be office with housing up above or it could all be housing. Mhmm. I don't know. But, I mean, is that been taken into account? Because that would certainly change your numbers, it seems. Oh, it it it could absolutely be taken into account. Right now, what you'll have access to is just a a a fairly clear place in which to change the underlying assumption that says x percent of this should be. We should consider that as retail and instead you changed it to a different configuration, yes,
and then you would get that. But mostly this is really done not so much right now for individual parcel analysis per se, but more aggregated, at that sort of a neighborhood level. That's where it's where it's most where it's most useful. It is I should probably note that while the tool itself has to make sort of an assumption about what goes on to a parcel, it's not designed to have that parcel make any sense on its own as like a project. It's sort of it would be saying so, you know, 30% of the available land would go to housing in on typical projects under these
conditions that this parcel meets. So you might say then you might look at the outcome of that parcel is like, well, then it's forecasting 4.2 units. It's like, well, that's gibberish. Of course, it wouldn't do that. We're not trying to make like a real project. We're just applying this math you know, equitably across all of the parcels that meet that criteria, and then it gets aggregated up. And and it's sort of the the rounded numbers by development area, maybe more important than what goes on to any individual parcel. Okay. And then my, last question. Second question and last question is that,
someone comes along, who buys up several 100 acres of of land that could go for housing units, but buys that up and does nothing with it or lets it lay foul or something like that. I mean, that that would is certainly going to but, change your your numbers, but then we could also change that, from your toolbox. Right? Mhmm. Absolutely. Yeah. Change that adjust that. Yeah. And and we bandied about different ways of having, sort of an upfront user module of picking a specific parcel and basically forcing it
to be a specific outcome. And so that's still all there. So in this case, say, we want that we want parcel number 1024 to be zero. We don't care what if it was developable or no, just make it zero, And then it would and then you would get, a new a new set of outcomes. Yeah. We mostly didn't wanna mess with the underlying data yet at this early stage, but all that's built. So if that's the direction this thing wants to go in, it's an easy it's an easy change. Thank you. That's all. All right. Supervisor Missal? Thank you. Thanks for your presentation, both of you. Appreciate it. A bunch of questions. I'll just I'll try to make them quick.
One is they sort of fall into different categories. One is growth assumptions. One is access to infrastructure. And the other is sort of the data in general. So starting with the growth assumptions, you mentioned in here and I saw in one of the charts where you assumed it looked like about a little over 600,000 additional in the five year COSTAR data, the jump. Yeah. That's for AstraZeneca. That's right. Did did the jump there also did it also include a jump for housing units assumed by that? No. There there was no, like, secondary spillover or anything.
No spillover. Yep. And no splash zone, like, well, they're coming, but so is Oh, no. No. I mean, I think that and I think that's all stuff that should be should be Baked into. Baked should be baked into it. My expectation too is if we went back in a month and and downloaded the same big CoStar data, that a lot of that would be taken care of. So, yeah, I I it's certainly I I actually think they do a they do a great job with this sort of stuff, and they know all these kinds of projects. We just happened to do this before that announcement, so it it didn't make it. But it would be probably a useful thing to to check if that's, like, the one thing that changed. Do we see some spillover in their estimate?
Ripple effect Oh, absolutely. Captured in CoStar data, or is that something that we as a county need to do a more careful job of in terms of really focusing on the existing conditions here with the Yes. And, yes, I think you probably I expect it to be in CoStar data, and it is probably worth your time to to start thinking about some of that. Yeah. What what are the downstream effects? Yeah. Because, again, it certainly won't stop at those projects. Yeah. CoStar is global in a sense. Yes. They're a huge, huge company. That's right. Okay. So now shifting to well, actually, I'll let's stay on that for now, and I'll kinda combine these.
So as we make so we're creating a we're creating a a report or a tool now Mhmm. That will be available in an Excel file to the staff. Mhmm. Does that have inputs that come in automatically from data like CoStar and other locations or is that all manual basically? It's manual at this stage and most of it is so it's often it's, it's really seeded by data that was provided by staff in the first place, either from planning staff or maybe there's some from the assessor. But it's it's a simple enough sort of copy and paste,
but, yeah, I haven't built in any kind of, yeah, any of the work to say, yeah, do data scraping and pull stuff in. That would probably all be kind of a phase a phase two if that's the direction that folks wanted to go. Yes. Okay. That's great. Next question is access to infrastructure. So we've talked so much about being proactive instead of reactive, whether it's schools, VDOT, RWSA, right, all of those different aspects. As we think about that, there may be a time where we hit kind of a bit of a soft wall where we may not be able to provide the infrastructure necessary to
create the build out that we the build out trend or to keep the trend going the way we think it should go. Is any of that data factored in here? Are we just assuming that the infrastructure is available as it's needed? That's right. Yeah. I mean, so still the capacity portion. We just decided we wanted to use the old methodology. I think once we started to see some sort of quirks as we dug in, I think it's pretty clear staff was interested in a reevaluation of some of those those those underpinnings. But just for sort of the time we had available to us, we thought let's just keep it as is and then now we'll know what it
is that we want to the changes we want to start making. But I think infrastructure access is a perfect example of the kind of upgrade that does help provide some more real world context for what things are most likely to develop and also at what intensities. Yeah. So work in progress. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. No. This is very much a work in progress. Yeah. And then, and I think, mister Newberry, you talked about this at the beginning, how this will inform schools and VDOT and other things as well and be be used by them for their strategic planning, I would imagine, and master planning and infrastructure plans. What does the involvement of those other organizations look like at this level?
Do you do you all meet with them on an annual basis to talk about these trends? Is it built into the timeline? I can look to some of my colleagues here if they have a more in-depth answer they'd like to provide, but we we get both ad hoc requests for data as different partners are updating their plans and they're do they're engaging very sophisticated consultants to build models, and there's data that they need in order to do their work. Yeah. We're responsive to those requests. And then we also meet on a regular basis,
with schools, VDOT, RWSA, ACSA, in particular, are ones where it requires constant communication around, what scale of development we're anticipating. And it gets built into their capital improvement plans, etcetera, etcetera. Okay. It would just be interesting to see how that all works, you know, like a sort of visual, but how those things this, then this, then this, then this, then this, then this, then this, then it's budget related, then etcetera. That's great. That's very helpful. That's it. Thank you. Did you have an additional any time I see staff out there moving around, I wonder all right.
Thank you. Did you have any other No, sir. I'm done. Thanks. Alright. Supervisor Duncan? When it said its market demand, I was also just kind of expecting and wondering about money and, like, the cost of land. And so kind of, you know, is that factored in at all? Like, I would assume when we hit, you know, the 80% of max build out, there's less land. The prices are going to go up. We know construction prices are already going up, and so stuff is not getting built because it's already expensive.
And so is kind of the cost of land and construction built into any of this? No, that wasn't part of their initial methodology, but again, I think an important one. Some of that will have to be really focused, data collection over the next several years to start keeping tabs on that. I'd made a sort of quick reference to doing a development feasibility analysis on different housing products for the the county, to to help infuse some of this market analysis. And it's sort of helpful as a snapshot,
but what really matters is how that's changing over time and as we can start to follow development feasibility and development outcomes, that will help, you know, seed some of this information. Because the expectation is that as cost change, as land cost changes, as construction, you know, hard cost change, that you should start to see commensurate changes in yields unless revenues can keep up. And if you start and if we start to see changes there, then that's sort of effectively answering some of that same question, but kind of from the private sector side,
from private sector slant. So but that's all, like, all we have right now is is today's snapshot. But as staff continues to use stuff like this year after year, then I think that that that data will become all the more helpful. That's all I had. Alright. Supervisor Malek? Thank you. This is a great step forward. I'm not quite sure I understand all of it, but I really appreciate the first run through. I did write down a couple of questions just because I think I misunderstood. Under your max development scenario chart Mhmm. It showed Crozet six fourteen units. Is that one year?
No. No. That's total that's all of the new development that could housing units that could go to Crozet under this under the scenario conditions. And supervisor Mallick, that does not include the development pipeline. All the projects there has 2,000 in it. Right? That's right. Okay. Yes, sir. So this is in the very few, and that 175 acres is probably big, as far as what because the question that goes along with that is where or is the constraint on a on a parcel considered in your data? Because what's left,
basically, is stream flood plains and steep slopes and things like that. So I don't know when those types of information sets get in. That's a great question. So there are within the model, the exclusion of land that overlaps flood plains and steep slopes or and easements. And in fact, for our purposes, that's actually one small change between what was done in 2022 and 2025 is that we just went ahead and excluded the entire parcel if it overlapped with any of these things. And in the past, they would just carve out those pieces.
So in some ways, we were even more conservative about land than they were and still came up with these numbers. So that information is included in that. But it's interesting. So are so you're suggesting that perhaps you you're surprised to discover that there are 80 parcels left at Crozet that are developed have development capabilities. Is that am I understanding you correctly? And this is Greenfield. You're talking about cleared out. It it can be because what counts, again, from that methodology is that as long as land value is higher than improvement value
Okay. But that's still yeah. I mean, if there's a thousand square foot house on it, that's not probably not gonna be the case. But anyway Yeah. This is where, for a community, the age of, of course, a 100 and some years old houses, lots of them Yeah. And then the new stuff that, the loss of the currently affordable NOAs is of great concern. So I just try to ask these questions to see how this is in here. So you're taking care of that one. I was fascinated by your comment that we were thinking 30% of the mixed use
was going to be residential, but it's really flipped. And I think we've seen that over the last five years in our reapplications, re changes, take away all this residential and bring in hundreds of units instead, because of the market. And so Yeah. I understand that I'm dreaming if I think retail is coming back anytime soon, but that's Well, in office, I think, in particular. So the old the old version when it talked about office demand took I think maybe it was a twenty year view. Now this was I think they probably started that work in 2021 Yeah. And the world has changed dramatically for office since then,
so it's not so much like they it was the wrong thing to do. But certainly, that is not a reasonable way to continue forecasting office demand. So, you know, we just need, need the opportunity to to make, you know, proactive changes in that and and to not be reliant on somebody like me every three years. Better to put it in smarter people's hands anyway. Very good. The, the description from mister Missal's questions about infrastructure is really important because old neighborhoods, no sidewalks, narrow streets Mhmm. Versus the newer, I'd say, since 2,000 neighborhood, year 2,000, the extra 5,000
units that have been built out there since then. Yeah. They all have sidewalks and, you know, trails and all this other stuff. So there is that inequality of life that is a great concern. So I'm Sure. Having more detail someday about that kind of thing will help me a lot. Are there somewhere that I have not seen metrics for redevelopment? So these are things that might be coming later. So this is brought to me from different constituents who have looked at the packet. Metrics for redevelopment, particularly empty parking lots. Metrics about rural preservation.
Mhmm. And and would that be in the rural area plan, for example, or would that be something where we were if we're gonna ask put all this stake in all these numbers and we keep getting thrown around Yeah. Then we better have some reality here to do that. What is well, you've answered the question, I guess, about what is redevelopable pretty well as far as the value constraint is all. Yeah. It's it's a number. I mean, it I think it's I think it's very worth getting more feedback on where that real line is. I don't think that the market response is to look for places where land value
is higher than in proven value. I'm sure there is something else that's being evaluated here, and I think it would it would behoove this analysis to to take a more private sector approach to identifying what constitutes developables whenever possible. Personal choice is important too. I mean, somebody may be saying that's for my great grandchild to live in. Oh, 100%. Gonna sit on it because I can. And that's a valid thing because Absolutely. Absolutely. Smart clean But as it relates any more dirt, so we better save it for our grandchildren. Go ahead. What do you I was just gonna say as it relates, like, say, to empty parking lots, for instance.
So as long as we have the information on existing use, which I believe is in the is in the dataset as it is, it's certainly very easy to sort of query all of that information and say, let's pull out, like, how much of this is of the developable this this development acreage or these parcels is related to empty parking lots, is related to greenfield, is related to things that have some improvement value, you know, above some particular threshold. Once it's all in the, you know, once it's in a once it's in a database, this is the time to start finding out those questions. And, yeah, you you're certainly the best people to start asking some of those questions of the
data to get information back. I have been swimming upstream on the 58% for thirty years because no one has ever said where that number came from. At least now, we have reality that you're beginning to help us understand that I think we'll make at least some logical place to talk about this because I think we've been beating ourselves up for something that somebody decided back in 1980. And so what? And they didn't explain it then because I was here, but, they haven't yet still. So thank you. I really appreciate all of this, and I'm sure I will have many more questions as it goes along.
I'll be around. Supervisor Pruitt. You've talked about how you calculate the economic feasibility of redevelopment, basing it on land value and improvement value. My understanding is that there's no, qualitative considerations that also might go into that. Right? For instance? For instance, it is a single family home owned on three acres that might be zoned more. But someone who has a single family home on three acres is almost certainly not going to try and build, fourplex in their yard. Correct. There and, there are several other criteria for developability,
and some of them have to do with the with existing use. I think maybe single family residential use might be one of the things that precludes it. I can't remember immediately off the top of my head, I apologize, but all of that would be sort of clear in in any kind of documentation that goes along with this. So it is not just strictly a a math question. There are some, I think, as you put it, qualitative kinds of metrics as as part of that that old methodology. Sure. But, yeah, I'd I'd be I'd be anxious to explore some other additions to that methodology anyway.
Do we capture whether or not, units are or parcels rather are under some kind of restrictive covenant? I know I know I did not see that data, so I I I couldn't tell you. That I will just reflect that that feels important, but I also understand it could be hard to get the data. Can we go to the, the slide that was near the end with the color coding? Our little stoplight slide. Sure. Yeah. Okay. I I just feel the discussion's been a little anodyne, and I want to just point out that the purpose of data is always to reach a decision.
Right? We should not be taking in data that is not being used to make a decision, and, also, you can never have a perfect amount of data. Right? You're always just trying to get enough to make a decision, because otherwise you could seek data indefinitely. This is basics. Decision making class public policy. Right? I look at this and I will simply say, I see that as alarming, and it is more alarming than what I might have expected previously. 81%, I assume, is also still inclusive of about 40% of that being based on re dev. Is that is that fair? Or maybe even more, because I would imagine the low hanging fruit would get developed first.
Mhmm. So in this scenario, I don't think it would be unfair to say that the majority of remaining capacity would be redev, which probably has calendars for when it would even be available or if it's even going to be available. And so I hope I'm not, like, going out on a limb. I look at this market demand driven forecast pre AstraZeneca announcement, and it feels like it says I run out of land in a decade. I I wanna make sure I'm saying that really clearly. You run out of land. I missed the last In a decade. In a decade. Got it. Yeah. It feels like a decision point.
That feels like a sufficient amount of data to reach a decision point. And I realize that the decision point that that gestures toward is a serious one for this board. It is the proverbial, third rail. So much so that I'm not even saying what it is out loud. I'm being very careful not to say what the decision point it seems to gesture toward is. I am not clear what other data I would want at this stage to reach a decision because this feels like the minimum necessary to reach a decision, which is how decision making should work in a public,
capacity like this. And I just want to make sure I'm hanging a hat very clearly on that because because this is this is more alarming than what I thought ten days ago, five days ago. Right? This is, a a greater position of extremist than I thought the county was in. And that's that wasn't a question. I'm just getting my statement now. Supervisor Pruitt, may may I respond to that? Just if the the 81% is is based on the, the theoretical max capacity of parcels that are not already included in the pipeline.
So if we were to go back, just to look at one of our early slides, the pipeline in the 25 column in the middle here is approximately 15,000 units. So as we go back to the stoplight slide, that 81% is referencing just the theoretical, parcels, not the pipeline. Thank you. Yes. I know Supervisor Missal had a follow-up question to what, Supervisor Malorie has discussed. Thanks. Super briefly,
just one thing too. Supervisor Pruitt's comment, you know, from what I understand you to say, prior before, while this does include the AstraZeneca addition, it doesn't assume the additional residential needs based on that. It does not. Correct. So that's even on top of it. Yes, exactly. I guess my follow-up question is thank you, Chair is just you mentioned the exclusion of critical slabs, stream buffers, floodplains is built into the numbers. Correct. And I may have these things confused or may it's basically two counters, right? What's in the pipeline versus what can be built?
So the stuff that's in the pipeline already excludes that. Yes. That's not taken into account. Okay. Thank you. That was my follow-up. Thank you. And apologies for not making that clearer. I'd focused on my little narrow part, but there's larger issues here. Yeah. I think my struggle sometimes is the accepting I have to deal with squishy, and everything's squishy. And we we want to be more on solid rock when we make decisions, and you just have to pick a point of squishiness and go, that's my solid rock Mhmm. For your decision making talk. But to try to and I get that.
I mean, in any kind of projection, you're going to be there. But what I have what I struggle with when I see all of this, my brain has to really work hard to understand what my baseline reality is. Mhmm. And the assumptions, even though that can be problematic, not even just like pipeline versus what's been approved already versus what the trend has been, etcetera, but even between what the Viret uses versus what may occur some someday, And based on what your comp plan calls for or something like that.
So I'll use the little dentist office out on Woodbrook Drive. It's commercial. It's business. The gentleman came in and asked for to allow us to to build some residential units up above it. I think if I remember right, there's going to be like eleven, twelve units, something like that. So in this study, those units would just be lost in the baseline potentially because until he comes in and says, hey, maybe I could put some units up there, is this is this something y'all were good for? It's not even in our squishiness. That's right. Is that right? That's correct. So it's hard it's hard to go when you're when you're looking at going,
what exists right now at the baseline buy right. Forget what planning calls for. Forget what, potential is. Forget what theoretical is. But just current right now, when we talk 5% development area, how much is used? And that even that question is squishy. But that's a lot of times when we talk about getting worried about having the conversation of whether or not the development area should expand, needs expand, etcetera, when you can't even just get at that basic baseline point because and there's steep
slopes, there's things, there's individual owners. That's right. And the RIO 29 small area plant, how a property owner uses the property, even under the buy right, can change the baseline kind of understanding of it. So that's my struggle just from a standpoint of having to wrap my head around all this and to figure out how to use the analysis in a way to support good planning decisions, good policy decisions. Do you have any reaction to any of that? Oh, no. I do. I think they're all great points.
I think in in both cases, I'm glad this is sort of being brought to the fore. I can't help but have agreed that when things turned yellow, I noticed it noticed it as well. What I think it speaks to is, the need to move past the old methods for dealing with this build out, analysis work. There's at least enough justification for now something that's probably more detailed and focused, and perhaps market infused in its methodology to really get at how much space there
really is, what's likely to be here, how much demand is there for for growth in this area, and how quickly are we likely to to to fill this stuff in. There, you know, anecdotally, Weldon Cooper's most recent forecast, through 2050 for Albemarle County is something in, like, the 30,000 new people range. You know, Well, if that's the truth compared to what the build out analysis is saying, how is that going to be possible? Does that seem like you can absorb that level of growth?
If things start if major projects start to come to Albemarle County in, you know, at speed after AstraZeneca, what are the what are the downstream ripple effects? It looks to me like maybe you're reaching that's maybe the inflection point is that a policy led evaluation may not get you the answers that you maybe are gonna need sometime in the near ish future. Now that's still, you know, it's still ten years away, but probably best to start thinking about some of these changes now. How does this and and and,
again, working to try to get my head wrapped around this. As you were talking and and if it's been said or explained, then I apologize I didn't get it. But how would, like, example, this chart or or your other chart, this is the market demand scenario, But I'll use the RIO 29 small area plan. That's an optional overlay. So the optional is what allows for the residential portion of it. There's a theoretical build out in that optional overlay. So if for and I know that there's one project coming through,
Arden Place 2, I think, is making its way through to us, which is going to opt in, and we have the other project that's opted in. But if you plug that in as a variable, how might that change this chart? If there were, I don't know, enough units to move a percent the dentist office isn't going to move the needle on anything. 11 units probably is not really going to change anything but the end. But on a percentage, something that brings in 400 units could change it. Absolutely. So am I thinking about it in the right way that was like, oh, well, but this chart doesn't include 400 units that hasn't even been approved yet,
so they're not even considered in the pipeline. It's often the theoretical squishiness. That's right. No, you are thinking about this appropriately. And as it stands now, that specific parcel's like, development potential and development intensity is based on a an expected proportion of of, development by different by different uses, and a presumed intensity of development for each of those uses. So both of those assumptions, you know, have have are squishy in and of themselves and don't necessarily take into account,
yeah, that that specific kind of overlay change. Yeah. So there's, I think yeah. I'm wary of sort of speaking ill of I think that in 2022, that was the right methodology for the question that was being asked as it related to the comp plan. I don't know if it's necessarily the right methodology brainstorm is that for a project like that then, it would come in and it has a max build out based under the optional zoning called for, and then two things can happen to not meet the max.
The applicant may request less and or the Board may approve less. So I always thought the 58% was based on that dynamic. Not like, I got a little confused No. That's supervisor Malick's comments about that. But that's what I understood the 58% to be, was that whatever the scenarios are, there was a max possible. Yep. And whether it was applicants going, well, they don't like the max, so let's ask for less. Mhmm. And then the board may or may not say yes or no and then even reduce it further. So Ryo Point got reduced under the theoretical max,
I know. A lot of developments have. Yeah. And then we had the one out at Brookhill that has now come back in and asked for more than what they originally asked for. And they admitted that they had asked for less back then because that was politically more appeasing. Interesting. Yeah. Interesting. They have space for it, John. So this is all okay. I look, I look, I don't even remember what the hell I started this comment for. I will answer one of your questions. What the heck? Question. What the heck? What the heck? What the heck? What the heck? Well said. But the idea is that if a project comes forward, we can play around with this kind of brainstorm to decide on that project at
least moving forward with some, perhaps, better confidence of what the current scenario current reality is. Mhmm. So that we can go, if we make this decision at whatever percent, 75%, 95%, that it could, knowing it's theoretical, impact build out in the future to a plus or a minus. That's right. And you can do that with both residential and commercial. So I guess some of the I guess, in talking this out loud, the variables that I'm still hoping get put into here that I have not yet seen came up during the Wuhan Mills project a week ago,
which is the revenue impact on the county. So when we looked at that property, the tax assessment was $14,200 as it sits today. Other counties I know require an economic feasibility when applications come in, so that it's right out front and you know, if I get this approval for this rezoning, here's the current tax assessed value, here's what it will be if this gets approved. That I feel like that's important. Now, I don't mean to bring up the Wolland Mills one just because that can be a source subject based on it was split and different people felt differently about it.
But, this does come up in budget town halls sometimes when people try to think about how does this impact and why is this a good or and good or bad is probably not the right language to use. It's just a difference and a variable. So I guess I'm calling out in the build out analysis for both residential and commercial projects that come before us, thinking maybe I'm getting ahead of the tool that we're going to talk about or the scorecard or whenever that comes forward. But that's got to be part of the conversation. And I made the point during the Willam Mills piece that,
like, it seemed like the debate was, well, we don't have we have plenty of LI land. But there were more nuances and variables than just that basic conversation. And the tax revenue of what we are collecting should be part of it. And I think even the market data in terms of what, in that particular area, the the the rent per square foot is going to be. Mhmm. And I think that kind of embraces the theoretical nature of it because if you allow a lot of residential to build up in an area that hasn't had it,
then you're going to change the commercial square foot costs for a renter, a business renter, which actually will bring in more tax revenue. So it's like having trying to get all of that in here as part of the conversation, I think, is important than just talking about, are we allowing enough units, to build in the development area so that we can protect it from having to expand? There's just other things at play. I mean, that's an important one. That's a big one. That's one a lot of folks are concerned about or have opinions about for,
you know, not to put it in camps. But, you know, I want to remain cognizant of us going out in a budget town hall last year, and all our town halls saying we're going to work to diversify the tax base. And if we're not looking at projects from how it impacts the tax base, then we're not doing all of our considerations we need to do in order to make a decision on a given application, whether it's residential or commercial. It looks like this will do all that, but, man, just having to accept the fact that,
you know, in two hours from now, the point in time baseline could be very, very different. Sure. And the revenue calculations are definitely outside of what I was asked to do. But at the same time, having done work like this previously, all of this sets the stage for that work fairly seamlessly. There's not much more to be done once you know how many housing units there are to start figuring out how many school children there are, to figure out how much the tax revenue is, to figure out how much water usage there is, etcetera, etcetera. All these things are tied, tied together. And it's really just a question of where you want to take this this data
set, moving forward. And and thank you for that. And in addition to the revenue analysis, we always talk, as Supervisor Proulx alluded to, with the development area, rural area debate, but other policy goals and initiatives as well. Mhmm. So that qualitative analysis, potentially, needs to be weaved in. It perhaps could even be done in a quantitative way, where now, I, again, hate to use the Willen Mills example. Well, I don't hate to use it. I'm going to use it. The fact that we have a Broadway blueprint, and how does that factor into that?
We have a Rio Area Small Area plan with the optional overlay. How does this application work into it? We've had to make some approvals on some things in the smaller year plan since its approval that did not meet the optional, and we've had to make some decisions that did. So there's a policy conversation to be had to say, well, is it okay to accept something less than the vision we have for this area or not? And then that's not good or bad. It's just, given the context of the application, what we need to do. The same could be said of,
housing Albemarle. The same could be said of our economic development plan. But all of those policies and the strategic plan drive a certain analysis that goes beyond unit capacity, square footage and even the revenue to go, you know, this is where your qualitative factors of concerns for protection and conservation and environmental protections and education, etcetera, could could factor into going, well, where does where does this go beyond just the raw numbers of it all. So I guess that in an analysis standpoint,
I'd like to see some of that, whether it's baked into just the scorecards or the tool. Because I I mean, am I correct connecting those two, right? I mean, that's where we're going. Or just saying, well, you know, whatever time you decide to report out on your analysis, that you're really doing it. You have to do a really good job explaining, well, this report is going to capture these variables, and we did it for this reason at this point in time, and then it might be a little different a year later or two years later. I don't know. I'm just reacting.
I'm kind of thinking out loud on some of this stuff. All right. I'll stop there just in interest of time because I know we have another section to go through. Were there any additional questions or comments before we move on to the tool? Couple of quick ones. Quick ones. Okay. Thank you. So just in clarification, it was the 36 units per acre was the number I was talking about that came out of nowhere about thirty, forty years ago. The 58% only came up in the last five years or so, but that was the the WIP has always been the 36 units per acre, whether it was suitable or not for the parcel involved. That was I just wanted to clarify that.
Thank you. Diversifying the tax base is is a wonderful thing, but it only works if the residential doesn't continue to go like this because there's no way that any commercial can keep up with the kind of residential increase we've had. Now that we have the cost of services study, we know it's not a positive. So we just have to keep remembering that. When people say to me, well, you know, I pay more taxes, so that should cover everything. Well, actually, you're still 30% down. Sorry. That's the way it goes. The whole discussion is just making it more and more and more interesting, what we're talking about and trying to accomplish here.
I'm I'm not sure I could explain it to anybody else, but I really enjoy what we've had so far. And I'll stop here. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right. We got a second phase or part. Thanks, Chair Galloway. So the second part of our presentation today is meant to be more of a work session. This is a draft tool. Many of your comments, that you just made segue very nicely into, what we've drafted thus far. And so, in a way, we're trying to move, from the macro conversation in the first part of the presentation down to the micro,
the intent would be that staff would bring forward this tool, in conjunction with applications that are being reviewed under AC44. So those are going to be applications that have been submitted since January 1. And it would help us, again, to implement the updated growth management policy and follow the direction that AC44 included that was very specific that we calculate this analysis using gross density. That was direction that we did not previously have, under the previous comp plan. So we have,
taken projects from other places in The United States to use as examples of how this tool would be applied. And so we have two examples to share. The first is residential. The second will be mixed use. And so in this example, just to demonstrate how the tool would work, we're looking at a rezoning that would that proposes up to 46 units on eight acres. And the land use category in AC 44 is neighborhood residential, which calls for three to six units per acre. So the analysis that would, be brought forward would look at,
okay, what's the max recommended by the comp plan for this acreage? And so that would be, the 48 units, that would be, theoretically possible. And in this case, the applicant is proposing 46. So we would very quickly be able to see that this proposal is just two units short of the max or 4% of, what's recommended by the future land use map. Then the second part of the tool would look at it in the context of affordable housing. And in this case, in only providing 46 units instead of what the comp plan calls for in 48,
we see that there's no difference in the overall number of affordable housing units that would be, provided by the applicant should they choose to develop all 46 that the that the board approved. So that's a very quick look at at what the board could expect with a straightforward residential. If we looked at a mixed use project, it does get a little more complicated. In this case, we're looking at, on 13 acres, a property that is designated for regional mixed use, which has a variety of uses, but up to 34 units an acre,
it's proposing three twenty two units and 158,000 square feet of nonresidential. So this table now expands to include both the residential and nonresidential portions, But I want to draw the board's attention to those bolded rows at the bottom of the table, where you can see that the max recommended in regional mixed use for a project like this would would call for 133 residential units. They've proposed a minimum of two fifty or a maximum of three twenty two.
And so when you when you do the math, you you find that it's about the minimum would be 88% of the comp plan max, and the maximum would be 142% of the comp plan max. On the nonresidential side, the total of retail, office and hotel, the minimum amount would be a little bit less than it would be 36% less than what the comp plan is calling for. And if developed at its full max under the applicant's proposal, it would be just 1% more.
And so, staff has drafted these tools as a way to help the board understand as development proposals come forward, how do they relate to the growth management policy? How do they relate to what the theoretical max of the comp plan is calling for? Just to expand on what you you just mentioned, Chair Galloway, the the tax revenue, would would have to be calculated on these minimums and maximums if that were to be added as a, as one of the factors. In this mixed use example, if we look at the affordable housing,
we see that, AC44 would be expecting about 27 units. And if the applicant, developed to their max, we would get 38 additional affordable housing units. And so again, this is just trying to quickly put into context this question around, are our projects coming forward in a way that is, consistent with the comp plan? And then to what degree is that with respect to density and affordable housing. And so this would help us with that tracking of the development areas and inform our capacity analyses,
moving forward. Overall, both of these tools at the macro level and the micro level are trying to help us understand, I think what you were referencing earlier, Chair Galloway, what are those qualitative questions? What are the right questions we should be asking? What is the data showing us that, applies to these projects as they come forward? And so, if over time we're able to observe trends, we can then use that information to inform future decision making on policy and administration. So now we're at the work session portion. There was a lot of discussion during AC44 about the topic of a scorecard.
We wanted to bring forward this tool as more of a lens to better understand development proposals. And the first question in the work session, was, is this tool responsive to what the board envision for getting more information about development proposals? And, in answering that question, what other feedback and direction would you provide to staff? All right. Supervisor Lupinso, Kermit. Well, to answer number one, I would say yes, because it seems to give us additional information that we didn't have.
But that leads to my second question. How is this, the tools you're providing? I I know it's an updated system, which I appreciate, but how is that different from the numbers we now have regarding, you know, how many bill how much you can build in on that particular parcel? It's a great question. I I think it it just brings consistency. Thank you. Yes. I think it just brings consistency to how we've answered that question. In doing the analysis for between 'twenty two and 'twenty five,
what we saw is that there was often a different approach taken to trying to analyze all these different projects, whether, how net density could be calculated, what were the particular factors that were used. AC44 is explicit to say we're gonna use gross density. And, in doing it consistently, we would have the opportunity to observe that data, over time. And so I think that's a little bit of how it would be different than what we've been receiving historically. Okay. So that is something that we have not received over time because of whatever reason
or we weren't together or maybe decisions that the board has made wanting exceptions to the rule or something. Am I going off the rails on that? No. I think the board's been receiving that information. It's just it hasn't been fully consistent across projects. And so by establishing the approach to this analysis, we could provide it in a consistent way and allow the board to, think about it in the same way, the same approach to the analysis over time. Okay. So what you're saying is we have not been in the past,
and I don't know how many years this goes back, but we have not been consistent in how we want to allocate a number of units per a parcel of land. No no, rather that the, there's been a variable approach to staff's analysis of how the density, is calculated. Okay. And so AC44 is very specific to say that we'll use gross density. And so it would be consistent moving forward. Okay. So this gives the board a template for,
parcels of land using gross density, like you mentioned, so that we can be more consistent on how many units we want per land. In other words, being able to we decide, okay, for this parcel of land using gross density, we can do the maximum amount of build out or less than that. That's right. Okay. Okay. But it gives us that information. Okay. And I see Ms. Florado coming up probably to say something. Jody Florado, Community Development Director, thank you for the opportunity to speak.
Just wanted to share a slightly different clarified perspective perhaps. What we're trying to do in response to the board's request for a better way of looking at density requests that come to you all and considering them in total, relative to the development area is we're trying to give you a lens that focuses on two things. Number one, what with this particular project that's coming before you, what does this represent in terms of density
as compared to the comprehensive plan? Because we haven't consistently provided that to you before. And then given that density that's being requested, what is that doing to our demand in the county for affordable housing? So those are the two things in particular we are trying to focus on for you because we we have heard from the board that those were particular in areas of interest, and we're trying to be more consistent and more clear. So I hope that helps a little bit. That does. That helps clarify because I think it gives us a tool,
a better tool so we can be consistent because I'm not sure if we have been that much in the past. But I think so we can be consistent in in making a decision either to go to the max on this particular property or to go less than that. But at least we have a, a guide that will say, okay, we're not adhering our to the AC 44. And maybe for valid reasons also, you know, on a particular parcel, something like that. So thank you for that clarification.
What other feedback or direction would you like to provide? I'm good so far. Thank you. Supervisor Missal? Yes. Thanks very much. I think this is a great tool. Part of me is sort of asking well, first of all, I don't think I was part of the board when the board requested this, so this is just me taking advantage of now being on the board. So, but I think it's a great tool. I think it's absolutely essential. One of the things I would, and this is now rhetorical, but I'd love to learn more about it, what does the staff think about this tool? Are there ways to make this better? Is this a helpful thing for you all to be tracking?
How does it tie back to not only affordable housing, which I think is key. You know, how are we doing? And we've talked about developments that have actually wiped out affordable housing without building as much back. So are we at a net loss of total affordable housing across the county? Questions like that, I think it can also it can help. But in addition to the affordable housing, other issues like infrastructure. Right? I keep talking about that. But how are we doing in terms of the available availability of infrastructure to serve where we're tracking in terms of trends from an affordability or from a,
housing standpoint in this case? I'll pause there. Jody Folardo, Community Development Director. I think as staff, we are excited about the possibility of bringing forward this tool to you because in the past, when we were trying to present information to the Board relative to a particular project with a specific density request And we were struggling with lots of stakeholder feedback and neighborhood feedback. We couldn't provide to you very black and white options for what does this do
if you make this choice versus that choice. Yeah. And we're hoping that through this tool, we can just lay out the numbers, and then you all will make the call as you see fit. But we I didn't feel back in the day when we had a couple of these projects come forward that we really were putting the board in the best position with the best amount of information to understand the ramifications of making a call one way or the other, and we're hoping that this will clarify that. Yeah. That's really helpful. I mean, you used the term lens. Right? And I felt like on the planning commission,
we would get these projects that would come to us, and our lens would be focused on that project. You know, we talk a little bit about some of the surrounding areas and the impacts of that, but we're really just focusing on how they deal with sidewalks. Is this gonna impact traffic? What does this do to schools? Those kinds of things for that development. This takes that lens and gives you a fish eye view. Right? It gives you a lot more wide angle approach. The other thing I think, is it'd be interesting to think from a developer's perspective what this tool offers them. And if we're serious about maximizing the density in the development areas,
does this somehow help us to, I don't want to use maybe not the word leverage, but highlight the fact that there may be room for more density, right? And we can't determine the density that a developer chooses to put on their site. It's all baked into their pro formas and everything else. But I think we can encourage and we can see that negative number and ask the question. Right? We should be pushing this to a plus whatever, as opposed to just settling for what's in there. And if and then we can ask the right questions, I think. I'll just keep rambling.
The other thing is, let's see. I think I hit them all. There's just one additional one, and it would be under number two, additional feedback. I think and maybe you're headed this way. Having a dashboard, a live dashboard on the website, that might be something that developers or other, not just developers, but others could look at and determine how we're doing and where we are would would be helpful, and it could be informed by or updated through this process. We will definitely take that under advisement. Thank you. Thank you. Supervisor Missoul, just to respond,
because this is a tool that would, to respond from staff's perspective Yeah. Because this would be in in each development application coming forward to you, I think we are anticipating some evolution of the information as we get more experience trying to apply it and understanding the different nuances that are more applicable. The point that you made just now and also at the planning commission about infrastructure, Chair Galloway's comment about tax revenue, those are good examples that are also on the minds of staff. Yeah. It's great. I mean,
one example of that is, I mean, you see where the number of students generated by some given residential development equals this. What about impacts to Rivanna water and sewer capacity? And how does that fit into the larger vision, right? We also see VDOT, and I know RWSA does comment on it, but they often say we have sufficient capacity. What does that really mean, right, in the larger context? Thanks. Supervisor Duncan? Yeah, this is really great. There's just two things that I would be interested in tracking with the tool as well.
The build out analysis had a kind of little snippet about the average cost of sold vacant land. That would be really interesting to continue tracking, kind of like with every development or, you know, periodically what what's the average cost now of sold vacant land. And then also as developments go through and stuff, kind of a continued updating of the acres that are left in the development area of the fourteen forty six that we currently have.
All right. Supervisor Mallett? Thank you. This is just getting better and better, this discussion. I'm excited to where we're going. The emphasis you've made on gross density, where do the constraints on a particular property come in? Because there are reasons why some properties have been the highest priority from use, and that is because they're more effective, easier, affordable to use, blah, blah, blah, not wet or steep or something. So if you're saying you're going to use gross density for everything, that just means that the density in
the developable section will be double or triple what it would be if it was spread over the whole acreage. Anything to share on that for me? I'll look to some of my AC44 colleagues to see if they want to add anything to it. But I think in taking a consistent approach, we would it would raise the question, why is the density so low here? And it would help us understand, okay, well, really only 20% of this parcel is developable. But even if with just that 20%, how can we get closer to what the comp plan vision is on that 20%,
is part of the intent of the tool. Okay. And I would agree that it's going to be very helpful when we have differing opinions for sure. And having been in the audience since 1982 for a lot of these things, the neighborhood comments are often concerned with constraints. They're concerned with the fact that we've been here for three generations and there are no sidewalks, and now you want 500 more cars a day or 5,000 cars a day to go through here at high speed. How does that we should have a right to say this is an impact that's
over the top. So if someday from the state legislature we get the ability again to have contributions from applications to off-site infrastructure such as sidewalks like we used to, then that's something that will be ameliorated. The closing I would have is well, two things. RMUSA, for example, their charter is to provide the water. They're not asked if Right. They should. Their charter is it's like an engineer. You hire an engineer to find a solution. You don't hire an engineer to ask them if it should be done. So this, they're not gonna say,
oh, we shouldn't provide any more water because that's not what they do. But they have provided very clearly that if the pace of growth in Crozet continues, that there will be insufficient water in 2040 Yeah. Which will mean a 200,000,000 in today's dollars pipeline to add more water to Beavercreek. Now when you talk about consistency and you talk about reasonableness, the impact on the ratepayers is going to be astronomical for that. So there may be some places where we say, you know what? We have I mean,
New York City is not freaking out about having more developable space. When we are out of our developable space, we are out of our developable space. And so I see no reason my brain can't wrap around someday being 300,000 people here. I mean, I won't be alive, but it's still my grandchildren will be here, and I just you know, maybe. And, I think there is there is a, many years ago, a a supportability that ecosystem services, this is what the population can be provided for that doesn't totally destroy everything that
provides those amenities for you, the water and the air, etcetera. So that's a concern. And the last thing I would say is up until about 2010, we had really good monthly reports about applications, numbers of units, and they all went away. And so I think that kind of thing maybe is what some were talking about for the dashboard. I'm sure in Jeff Werner's closet, he still has those legal sized charts, you know, four feet thick. But I used to meet with him Fridays before applications and get all the information because he collected it all. And that,
I think, needs to be accessible to the public in general so that they have a better chance to understand. I think what people can imagine is so much worse than often than what the reality is, and they don't have the information because it's not really available. Hard hard for me to find, so I expect it might be hard for other people to find too. And thank you very much. Alright. Supervisor, Pruett? For the questions on the board, I think this is pretty easy. Yes. This is almost exactly what I imagined when we were discussing it during AC forty four.
Meets the bullet. The only thing I might provide is to echo, supervisor Duncan's, point, which is it could be additionally helpful when reviewing if there was a running tracker of, development area capacity that we're also comparing it to, which I think would be a pretty easy solve. And I do just want to briefly kind of reflect, extemporize, on some of the points, supervisor Malik made, which I think are are well taken. Right? New York is not freaking out about the fact that they're out of development area capacity, and there's there's cost constraints, that are implicated when we talk about extending service.
And with that, there's the possibility that it outstrips the cost constraints or the cost increases of a constraint supply. I think that last point might have been something you didn't say, but I will just raise that also. There's a possibility that the utility constraint, the utility cost increases would outstrip the, the the other concerns. I am aware that it takes our ship of state about three to five years to execute a 90 degree turn. You know? We we have a wide swing. And I also was discussing earlier about how we always need enough information to make
decisions. I I don't know much. I will be very candid about what the capital cost implications of expanding RWSA service looks like. And that seems to be the the really essential kind of mechanical thing that is implicated. And it's something we have not done in a really significant way in decades because we have a a fixed service area. And I'm sure that would be a really comprehensive and significant thing for the government to embark on. And if we're looking at a decision clock that might be ticking down within a
decade, I would be interested to to hear more about what that, what that capital outlay is gonna look like sooner rather than later. I'd just raise that for the chair and vice chair to hear and for for our executive leadership to hear. If I may add one thing, and that is please take time to look at the monthly reports or the quarterly reports that come from RWSA, which has about 15 pages of capital stuff. The water supply plan, which took twenty years to get signed, is now full gas to get adopted, which is part of why there's already a $250,000,000
capital plan that's underway right now. But, I'm happy to bring you more details. That would be great. But, they're out there. Thank you. I agree that it is responsive to the board's request. I think that it's going to be something that will continually grow and evolve and change as we pull things in. I think having some baseline just raw data or quantitative data helps what I feel like can be very subjective factors, favorable, unfavorable in the staff transmittals when applications come in.
And in some ways, I say that that maybe it alleviates the pressure on staff to make a subjective call. I think what the scorecard or what this will allow the the data, just even the like, the affordable housing count alone, it puts on the board during the application conversation to say, well, if you do this, it allows for X many more affordable units. So if you don't, what's the bigger good that you're going for that outweighs the need to add the extra affordable units? So then it'll then the Board is getting at those policy questions.
I think we played some of that out in the woolen mills. There was certainly the environmental concerns versus the, you know, the then there was the engineer report, but there were the floodway versus it's more than just the place where the water goes and the levels aren't moving, there's things that live there, etcetera. So it really kind of lights up the areas that the board has to wrestle with to say, well, this factor is more a higher priority than this factor. Because sometimes you could have three or four high priorities and you've got on a
given application, you may have to pick it. So I could see this evolving into maybe the scorecard being very close, just like I start to think of the format of the transmittal the staff report where the factors you always run through the comp plan, the like, I'm thinking of a special use permit. And then the the factors favorable, unfavorable. But that scorecard, now you don't have to decide if adding 32 kids to the Agner Hirt District or to the Rio District that feeds Agner Hirt, Burley, Journey,
Albemarle, if you have a number that maybe is informed by the other thing we've been talking about, a better informed Weldon Cooper data piece that's informing all of the inputs, then the board has to wrestle with, okay, Like when I see three students in a district, I don't get too concerned because three doesn't really move the needle. Yeah, it's four kids. But if I see 35, then I'm like, that's a whole classroom. That's a bigger impact. So if I'm going, but you know, if it's going in affordable units, probably like I'll be, I would expect the new data is going to say that affordable units coming online
means more school children than the non affordable units in some way, when we're talking rentals, that they have to start kind of weighing that. Like at some point, do you stop going, well, hold on a minute. If we keep doing that, here's what we're going to do over here. So again, just reacting out loud that I think it will having that raw data will force us to have those conversations that are a little bit better. Cost of services report will probably come in. Same with road. Like when we did Southwood, we knew the intersection there was already failing and we're going to add how many units and everybody's like,
don't care. We want the units, including the residents. So it was willing to accept a failing intersection and even more failing intersection. I mean, we're getting the roundabout stuff now, but, those kind of things, I think, need to be discussed. And then I think I have thought or reflected on applications that I have approved, and that 58% number since that started being talked about publicly, it's always been the needle or the point for me to go, alright, if I don't approve over that number, then what's the really good reason why?
Because I know that the impact puts strain on the development area meeting its comprehensive plan goals. And I know seven six, seven, eight years ago, I wasn't thinking like that outward. I was really honed in on the individual project and the immediate impact areas of the in geographically. So this is really pulling back out to go, wow, if you don't if you don't approve a a Rial Point or a Brook Hill or something like that at its full potential, you're going to have impacts not just in the immediate area. You're going to have it on on the bigger policy goal you're trying to achieve.
So this just brings that home for me. So, and I'm I'm just ready for it to evolve as we go. We'll probably be in one application, go, God, it'd be great if this was in there, and then see how we can adapt it. And just to kind of continue that brainstorm, I think about, you know, all the things subjectively that sometimes get left out of applications that we've looked at. We focused, of course, on affordable housing recently. We focus on school population. And when it comes to streets, sometimes we talk about the connectivity and the access of fire in.
But I start thinking about the police and fire reports we got in October and what their calls for service are. And when you think about adding 10,000 units into the development area under our current I mean, we're all ready, like we we we're pressed because we don't have the units for people to live affordably, and we know that's a pressure. But we're pressed right now to provide those safety elements to the population we have. So how does that factor in? So I can see these other elements of the scorecard getting really put in there. And on the reverse, the good news would be those commercial applications.
I don't want to lose sight of that, because I think those could really say, well, remember, I mean, and I feel like I keep wanting to bring up points of pain for past conversations. But the data center conversation, when you talked about how few employees are there, just from a physical standpoint once it's built, that the impacts on your roads and that density isn't part of it. Now there's a lot of other things that are to be concerned. But when we're talking commercial elements, we can talk about how that does help us provide for other density or residential
growth out there. So I don't know how to just because we're focused on these examples of residential, there's ways to get at this scorecard that's going to be helpful to us when it's just purely a commercial or a business operation that comes in as well. So that might be what other feedback or direction would you take. Like great examples today on the residential piece using rezonings and things like that. But if we had a pure, you know, I think, Ravenna Futures, I think Northpointe, I think different properties like that, if this changes commercially, how does that impact the comp plan and what we're trying to achieve,
etcetera? Let me just make sure I didn't miss in anything. Yeah. I think I'm there. Any yes, ma'am. Yes. I'm it was brought up, a running tracker. And what I keep thinking of what residents bring up a lot is that we're building so much. Don't you have enough affordable housing? We keep building and building, and I'm seeing this project and that project, all over the place. What I'm wondering, so my question relates to number two, is, could the could our toolbox, let us know for this project that we look at,
decide upon, how many homes there are being provided and how many homes are being affordable and how that relates to the need. I don't know if that's something that's possible or not, but if if I was living out, you know, as a constituent, I'd want to know, are we building basically enough affordable homes? How does it relate to the need? You know, maybe ticking down the the numbers or something? Maybe that won't work. I'm not sure, but it would be I think people would wanna know, yes, we're we're meeting our affordable housing needs or we aren't,
and this particular project helps buy so many units. That's all. Supervisor Messel, you have a Thanks. Yeah. Just one additional thought that you you, supervisor Galway, made me think about. And that is as we think about, you know, whether it's a tracker, whether it's a dashboard, it seems like it's it's essential when an application comes to us with this cool tool that we do have some sort of way to measure those other impacts because I could see examples where we might be inclined to say, wow,
we're getting plus 10% or plus 20%. That's great. Let's go there. But we're not factoring in all the other issues and considerations Because I I know we've seen applications that have come back to add density, and we've heard a lot from constituents that that is gonna actually tank the roads, right, or whatever it is. So I think we just had to be really careful, and and to see the full picture is is essential. Thanks. Yeah. Yes. Two things to add to the future list, not today. Back in the old days, there were proffers that would be so if someone came to the public hearing and
made a comment, these are gonna be affordable workspaces. And I know that you that was very compelling for some members on the board, at a recent application. But there was no guarantee that that was gonna happen. So I would have felt much more comforted if the application had said, yes, these are gonna be, they're not gonna be like Peter Jefferson Place. They're going to be places, workspaces for artisans and similar to the blueprint. The Broadway Street is affordable because it was built in the forties. And the same families owned them all these years, and they've never really raised the rents very much. Thank God.
So it's a whole different thing in my mind for that. So I don't know if this will fit in at all. The other thing I've asked for for years, and I think mister Herrick will have to probably, you know, smack me down at some other time, but I've always wanted to have people be responsible for comments that they stridently talk about at a public hearing. We're gonna do this, and we're gonna do that. And then they just walk away and never do anything. And yet the public has heard these comments. The board has heard these comments. And unless we are very careful right now to put them in the conditions,
we have nowhere to go. So please keep that in mind. Thank you. Great. Do my check-in with staff. Do you have what you need from us today? Yes. Thank you. Good discussion? Great work, everybody. Wow. Thank you very much. My brain is going to explode. All right, board. It's time for our closed meeting. Is there a closed meeting motion? I move that the Board of Supervisors convene a closed meeting pursuant to section 2.2 dash three seven one one of the code of Virginia under subsection one to discuss and consider the appointment of the director of parks and recreation and under subsection eight
to consult with legal counsel regarding specific legal matters, including the county's role in federal law enforcement, requiring the provision of legal advice by such counsel. Second. Alright. The motion has been made and seconded. Without objection, if the clerk will please call the roll. Miss Duncan? Yes. Mister Galloway? Yes. Miss Lupista Kirtley? Aye. Miss Mallett? Yes. Mister Missal? Aye. Mister Pruitt? Aye. Alright. All right. Good evening. We will come back to order. And we are coming out of closed meeting. Is there a motion to certify the closed meeting? I move that the Board of Supervisors certify by a recorded vote that to the
best of each supervisor's knowledge, only public business matters lawfully exempted from the open meeting requirements of the freedom of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act and identified in the motion authorizing the closed meeting were heard, discussed, or considered in the closed meeting. Second. Alright. The motion has been made and seconded. Without objection, if the clerk would please call the roll. Miss Duncan? Yes. Mister Galloway? Yes. Miss Lupista Kirtley? Aye. Miss Mallett? Yes. Mister Missal? Aye. Mister Pruitt? Aye. Alright. Thank you, board. And motion's coming out of closed meeting.
Yes, please. I am pleased to put forth a motion, resolution appointing Amy Smith as director of parks and recreation for this county. And is there a second, please? Second. All right. The motion has been made and seconded. Without objection, if the clerk will please call the roll. Ms. Duncan? Yes. Mister Galloway? Yes. Miss LeCaster Kirtle? Aye. Miss Mallett? Yes. Mister Missal? Aye. Mister Pruitt? Aye. Very good. And miss Smith's joining us. Mister Richardson, shy? Sir, I'll be brief. I appreciate the Board's support and the good work that has come
from County administration and working through a recruitment and selection process to replace Bob Krickenberger. Bob served the County for fifty one years and was just had an amazing career. We celebrated his retirement right out here, just outside of Lane Auditorium, about a month ago. And, our own Amy Smith, who has been the Deputy Director and has enjoyed a wonderful career serving Albemarle County, was our top candidate. And this board heard earlier this evening in closed session,
our recruitment process, our recommendation. And we are so excited, to, recommend to this board and for your affirmation of her into this position as parks and rec director. So, mister chair, thank you for the opportunity to say a few things. I know this board wants to hear hear from, miss Smith, and we appreciate her being here this evening. Good evening. Come please. Thank you. Chair Galloway, members of the board, county executive staff, just want to thank you. I'm deeply honored for your confidence in appointing me as the parks and recreation director. I want to thank my wife,
my family, my friends and my colleagues for all of their support over the years. Truly means the world to me. I believe the parks and recreation system is more than facilities and programs. It is where community is built. Our parks protect natural beauty, promote health and wellness, provide spaces for connection, and ensure that residents of all ages and abilities can enjoy the outdoors. I'm truly inspired by Albemarle's commitment to quality of life, a plan to build upon the same foundation through increasing innovation,
strategic management of resources, and furthering, uniting and empowering our dedicated parks and rec staff and our amazing community partners. I look forward to working with you, the board, county leadership and our community to expand access to parks and programs, enhance existing facilities, and ensure that our system continues to reflect the values and needs of Albemarle County today and for future generations to come. Again, thank you. I'm truly honored. Thank you. And I'm I know our supervisors want to make remarks. So we'll,
Supervisor Lupisto Kirtle. I am so happy, so proud. You have this position. I know you're going to do a great job. I have no doubt whatsoever. You were the best person, to be chosen for this job, and you're gonna do a great job for our parks and rec. I just love I've personally worked with you, so I just I love working with you. And I will I said it before, but your enthusiasm, for parks and rec really comes through. And for that, I thank you very much for your love and your enthusiasm of parks and rec.
Thank you, and congratulations. Supervisor Missal? Thank you. You know, we talk a lot about what differentiates us as a county and what makes this place special. And parks and recreation is, if not at the top of the list, among others at the top of the list, and no pressure, but we're excited for, what you will be doing to help reinforce that differentiator to make this place even more special. Thank you. Supervisor Duncan? Yes. Congratulations. I am very excited. I also just was kind of overwhelmed by your years of experience already with the county, and I just think it's really great when we can retain people and have people,
you know, build their careers here and have longevity. And, yeah, we heard you have a lot of ideas for parks, and so that also makes me very excited to see them continue to grow and thrive. So congratulations. Supervisor Malek? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for sticking with us. That is really important and wonderful. And thinking back to nineteen years of experiences and putting all those green dots on the parks thing during during the strategic planning years ago because nobody else was. So anyway but so many things on your plate with the Blue Wave and Buck
Island and and, the Brookhill Ramp and such a long, long list because there's so many places that you already manage and Arrowhead. And, I mean, the challenges are significant, but thank you so much for bringing your thoughtful process to all of it. Appreciate it. Supervisor Pruitt? Congratulations. I I wish you had the opportunity to hear all the incredible praises that were lauded on you by, the members of the selection team. It was truly striking and, I think speaks to the the quality of leadership you're gonna bring into this department.
I tell people all the time, parks and rec, it is like the secret feather in my cap. I don't have to do a dang thing as a supervisor, and I get praise for the work you're doing. They're like, hey. We love what you're doing down in Scottsville. I'm like, you're welcome. So thank you for the work that you have already done for this county, and I look forward for all the praise you're gonna earn for us in the future. I joined with my fellow supervisors in the remarks, Amy. One thing that I noted and I shared earlier with everyone was at Elmore High School when we were going over the CAC meeting with the public park, the Urban Pocket Park,
that the whole team just seems happy. You can sense that they enjoy their job. And I think that is a testament to those of you who've had many years in the park to have that culture established. And while you've been with us for so long, I suspect all along you've been thinking, well, what about this idea? What about that? And I know that the Board and the County Executive and everyone is going to be looking forward to what you do, with this Department under your leadership, and that we'll be supporting you all along the way. So thank you, and well earned. Congratulations on your new position. Thank you.
Thank you. Okay. The motion is coming out. So the first item this evening, we have from the county executive, report on matters not listed on the agenda. Do we have a report this evening, Mr. County Executive? Yes, sir. I do. Thank you very much. And thank you, Ms. Stumpf, for teeing up the county executive's report for January. Board, as you know, we will give this report monthly, and it's in an effort to connect some of the good work that's going on behind the scenes and out in the public eye that is connected back to our strategic plan, our six goals, our six strategic goals that our staff and board work together on to align our
budget, our resources, and, obviously, our performance metrics where we're trying to make a difference in the community that we serve. At the end of my presentation, I'm gonna take a minute to recognize our deputy county executive, Trevor Henry, who will step forward at the podium, and he will walk us through where we are with our storm emergency management planning, that is going on as we as we eyeball what may be coming our way this weekend. Okay? Alright. So I'm gonna dive in and get going. Board, thank you very much. And as always, questions I'll take at the end.
And also, this this board will receive this presentation in your inbox after tonight in in the event that you're in the community or you're wanting to pass information along to constituents. Use it to use it to how it works best for you. Okay. So first slide. Elmore County served as a community sponsor for the for, the Intelligence and National Alliance, INSA, event that was held last month at the Boar's Head Resort. You can see in the picture Emily Kilroy, our economic development director,
participated in a panel discussion that's focused on data driven research, workforce development, and the future of national security innovation here in our region. Many of our board members attended that morning over at the Boar's Head. It was a full house, and this is the second annual event. Some of our board members have actually got to go two years in a row after it being held last year at the Boar's Head, first time ever. Great venue, by the way. And, and we're amazed at the amount of national attention specifically coming out of Washington DC
for some of the, federal work that's going on out at Ravenna Station. Attendees represented the private sector, the public sector, and the research and education communities, including, certainly, the University of Virginia. The event also included a site tour of Ravenna Futures, which is, the property that surrounds Ravenna Station, to highlight how the property connects to the region's innovation corridor. It's really some exciting work. And I really, I really enjoyed watching Ms. Kilroy that morning because she did just a wonderful job representing our region,
representing the work of Albemarle County and our economic development focus. It's a fun day. Okay. Albemarle County was recognized as one of 59 digital inclusion trailblazers, paving the way for digitally, digitally inclusive communities across The United States. Trailblazers provide models for other local governments to aspire to as the communities build digital include inclusion ecosystems. The Broadband Accessibility and Affordability Office has supported community organizations that provide digital skills training,
telehealth resources, and workforce and employment readiness programs. They've also helped 500 households afford broadband through our Albemarle County Bridge benefit and then also provides digital navigation support for community members, providing one on one guidance as clients get connected, learn basic digital skills, use online portals to sign up for services, and to overcome digital access barriers. Again, more good work from, ABBA, on broadband accessibility. Okay.
So Alamar County Parks and Recreation Department, we just appointed our new director, and this is an interesting program. When our middle school volleyball league registrations opened across Albemar County, there was a rush of families signing up their students, for this program. Henley was was completely full within three minutes. Lakeside was full within thirty minutes. Our Parks and Recreation Department staff received multiple calls from families who were obviously disappointed because they could not register. So what the Parks and Rec Department did was step back,
reformatted the league, and they expanded capacity, ultimately registering 400 participants across all the schools, and that eliminated the wait list. So that's just that's just good customer service. And also, it's just amazing that we've got that level of interest in our community. That's really a good thing. So the behavioral health, crisis continuum quarterly meeting is a partnership that's focused on strengthening how this community responds to behavioral health crises across the full system of care.
It's supported by the US Department of Justice with a grant. These meetings bring partners in our community together, and the focus is on improving coordination, communication, and outcomes during behavioral health crises. The December meeting included 36 participants from our community representing the city, the county, social services, police and fire rescue, region ten, partner for mental health emergency communication center, Albemarle, Charlottesville Regional Jail, UVA Police, UVA Emergency Services, and UVA the UVA Behavioral Health Unit.
This year's focus will center on responding to youth in behavioral health crisis and advancing system wide improvements, including working toward form formal agreements, shared protocols, and how we define, individuals in crisis and, experience care across all the partners. So this is just good work where we're identifying that the cross coordination among agencies is paying off in a big way. Drivers in our county may be curious that they are about seeing a marked police car in Almarque County with without an officer parked along Route 29.
It's a traffic calming strategy that's seeing results. Even if an officer is not inside, the visible presence of a police vehicle encourages drivers to slow down. We've seen this reflected both anecdotally and through data. For example, at one location, reportable crashes where a car was parked has dropped more than 50% from nine crashes to four over the last month just from people slowing down when they see a police car. We also find that the police vehicle generates numerous alerts for drivers on Waze and
Google Maps, notifying them ahead of time to please slow down. Long story short, we found that the mere presence of our marked cars in strategic locations is a an effective low cost tool that deters speeding and improves safety along busy corridors, in this case, like Route 29. Ward, I'm proud to announce that the Fire Rescue Department's recruit school began last week with onboarding by the county executive's office, and a presentation on the well-being report from the Office of Equity Inclusion and a
public service access in the public service accessibility that reinforces expectations around culture, readiness, and the community that we serve. The group of 24 recruits were then sworn in to start their intensive training for the next six months as they develop skills, teamwork, and resiliency that's required of fire and EMS professionals. It's an outstanding group of recruits. We were only with them for about an hour, but it's just fun to be with them and see their commitment already to public
service, in helping those in need. Well, speaking of, public safety and helping those in need, as we do sometimes, board, we want to highlight the work of, one of our CFR fire and rescue crews, and I'm gonna share some specific details that happened on December 22. Three days before Christmas, units were dispatched for a 51 year old male that was experiencing chest pain. The crew got on scene, performed a quick assessment, and was moving the patient, to the ambulance when the patient went into cardiac arrest.
After treatment, including defibrillation, the patient regained a pulse after losing his losing pulse but rearrested again at least two more times en route to the hospital, lost the pulse again as they arrived to the hospital, and personnel continued to work the code until they were able to turn the patient over to hospital staff. Ultimately, the patient survived. He was discharged back to his home and his wife and his four children. The family recently visited the crew to express their gratitude for their efforts in saving
this gentleman's life. And I want to name the crew members for the record, please. It included Captain Pitt. It included Fire Technician, Rous. It included Fire Technician Scholes, firefighter Chasse, firefighter Hackinson, firefighter Melton, and firefighter Putney. This is known in the ACF, ACFR world as a SAVE. And if you've ever visited our fire stations, at times, we will see plaques and celebrating events where people have come back and visited our staff and thanking them
for their work. And so it's a very moving story given that it was just a couple of days before Christmas. And so it's nice to be able to share that with the board and with our community. So now it's my privilege to turn it over to Trevor Henry. And this is top of mind, I will say. I'm sure everybody in this audience is tracking, the upcoming extreme cold and snow that may be, here in just a few days. So, Trevor, I'll turn it over to you, and I'll also let you introduce who you have with you. Thanks, Jeff. Chair Galloway, members of the Board, Trevor Henry, Deputy County Executive. I work with Public Safety,
Emergency Management, Economic Development. With me is Deputy Chief Emily Policcia, who is our Interim Emergency Manager. You may or may not have heard there might be a snowstorm this weekend. We're really here to just assure the Board that we are tracking this, the work that we do for events like this. We do early engagement. We have, through our emergency manager, a process by which we spin up our planning efforts. And so, I wanted to just assure the Board but also use this as a reminder to the community that they should be paying attention to this weekend. We're still three days out.
The models have even adjusted this afternoon. We've seen, I'll classify it as ridiculous amounts of snow forecasted for our region, and there is still that forecast. But there is also an emerging forecast that may result in still snow, a significant amount, but I'll say even possibly more concerning would be some sort of ice, sleet mix on Sunday, Sunday night, and then we're going to have a deep, deep freeze into the week. And I believe temperatures will stay below freezing for the entire week.
So that line will adjust over time. We're tracking it. We'll be communicating out what we know. From a county posture perspective, emergency management has spun up. We have a virtual system for which we can do emergency management. That work, we've opened up kind of what's called VOC. It's the system that we use. We've opened that up. That's how we can communicate across the organization. Emily has had engagement with our regional partners, the state, Virginia Department of Emergency Management, multiple meetings with that. That pace will continue. We've had staff leadership meetings today that will continue as we prepare for the weekend.
We are looking to kind of external and internal. External, police and fire are probably looking at a Saturday morning to at least initially through Monday night, that may be longer operational period where there's going to be additional resources held over. And we'll have to accommodate what that looks like, holding over additional resources. And we've also put an outreach into our volunteer system to ask for them to staff up as best they can for this weekend, again, with the threat of the snow and then
the weather that might come on top of that. So all that work is happening for external purposes. Abbey Stumpf and Cape, along with emergency management, have already had some engagement with communications to remind our community the steps they should take. Emergency any kind of emergency coming, you should have within your means the ability to be out of power or without help for at least three days. And so things like checking your generator, if you have one, making sure everything is gassed up,
just those things, food in the pantry, those messages will go out as our normal process. And then internally, we'll be communicating to our staff from a continuity of operations perspective to make sure that we have the Public Works and Parks and Rec staff and their contractors here to keep our facilities clear. And through the event, it's really keeping access to our fire stations, to our county office building 5th Street, which is where our public safety is housed, and into our fueling stations throughout the county.
So just that work is happening, and we'll continue to monitor and communicate to the Board and the community as we get more clarity around what the storm looks like. And then through the storm, we'll continue to meet for updates and make decisions around building closures and things like that as we see the conditions adjust over the weekend. Emily, is there anything else that you would add? You hit the It's a little comprehensive, but for the new board members, I wanted to do a little bit of depth.
On the planning work that we do when we know there's an event kind of in the forecast like that. Is there any questions? I'll go through. Was there any additional items in your report? No, sir. That's everything. So supervisors can react also to Mr. Richard's reporting questions here. Supervisor Lupisto Curley? Thank you for the report, but I have no question. Supervisor Missal? Thanks for the report and all the hard work of staff, and and thank you for the extra deep dive into the detail there. That was very helpful. Thank you. Supervisor Duncan? No questions. Supervisor Malek? No questions,
but thank you. As always, I love the idea. I saw the, empty police car the other day on '29, and it really did make a big difference as people just go, okay. As long as they keep their eyes on the road while they're doing it, that's terrific. And I really hope you can use all your power to not have the freezing rain. Thank you very much. Supervisor Pruitt? I have nothing further. Thank you for the report. Yes. Thank you for sharing the, especially the volleyball participation was great. Just hearing about that, and also for the prep that we're getting ready for the weekend. So thank you all. All right, Board. That will take us to item number 14,
public comment on matters previously considered or currently pending before the Board other than scheduled public hearings for public hearing. And, Vice Chair Missal will read the rules and move us through our speakers. Great. Thank you, Chair. Good evening, everyone. During the time set aside for public comment on matters previously considered or currently pending before the Board, other than scheduled public hearings, individuals may address the Board of Supervisors concerning matters previously considered by the Board or matters that are pending before the Board other than items listed on the agenda for public hearing.
Individuals are allowed one opportunity of up to three minutes to speak at each Board meeting. The sign up sheet is managed by the Clerk's office. Up to 10 persons may speak during each matters from the public session. Timekeeping is conducted through a timer and light system at the podium. The green light will go on when you begin speaking, which begins your allotted time. The yellow light indicates you have one minute to finish speaking. The red light indicates your time has expired, and you will be asked to end your comments. In order to give all speakers equal treatment and courtesy, the Board request that speakers adhere to the following guidelines. When addressing your the Board,
state your name and if you live in Albemarle County, your magisterial district. Address comments directly to the Board as a whole. Any written statements or other supporting material that may be given to the clerk. If representing a group or organization, you may ask others present to raise their hands in recognition. Speakers may not share any unused time with another speaker. Back and forth debate is not permitted. Do not speak from your seat or out of turn. All comments are live streamed, recorded and published on the Albemarle County website. And just as a gentle reminder, please remember to introduce yourself and speak directly into the microphone when you come up.
So with that, I will begin with it's okay Alicia Lanahan. Good evening. My name is Alicia Lanahan. I live in the Scottsville District. In the nine months that we have spoken about ICE at board meetings, we have talked about the erosion of constitutional rights and the rule of law. We have delivered evidence based statements about the people who are being targeted and dehumanized. We have appealed to your humanity. However, in spite of history, in spite of the facts, and regardless of the threat posed, you have remained silent. A recent article from the Miller Center analyzes ICE actions from the perspective of public
safety and resource allocation. Perhaps boiling the issue down to return on investment will give you a reason to act. According to Governor Spanberger, public safety must be built on evidence, not spectacle. It must prioritize tangible safety, solve violent crimes, earn community trust, and build cooperative policing, proven strategies that keep Virginia safe. So which costs more? Humanity and community trust or visible violent displays of federal power? An extensive 2020 study examined data from more than 3,000
counties over a fifteen year period and found that sanctuary policies have no detectable effect on crime rates. In contrast, recent longitudinal data from 2024 and '25 found that federal activation not only did not reduce violent crime, but also, in some cases, significantly increased violent victimization risk for immigration immigrant populations. Cooperation with federal forces does not come with funding. Local taxpayers pay for personnel over time and administrative supplies. By diverting officers to civil immigration tasks,
local law enforcement risks diverting time and energy away from solving crimes. And the most significant resource any police department has is community cooperation. When residents fear that contact with the uniform could lead to deportation, they retreat. This creates a dark zone where criminals can operate with impunity because victims are too afraid to call 911. ICE actions are about intimidation and fear, not law enforcement. Right now, our immigrant and refugee neighbors have no reason to believe that county government or law
enforcement will protect them from ICE when they come. Right now, we we have no reason to believe that you'll protect any of us from ICE when they come. Charlottesville City Council has finally taken heed and drafted a resolution that we have yet to see, and I hope that that will give you a place to start. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Next is Grey McLean. Good evening, board. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. My name is Gray McClain. I live in the district. I think you guys are probably already aware of this issue, but I'll give you a little bit of overview.
I'm here tonight to talk to you about the Tonaska gas plant, which is proposed just over the line in Flavinia County. Let me start by saying, I understand this is not yours to vote on. I understand that you guys are not the approving body. With that said, you are our voice to Flavinia County. And so I just wanted to touch on a couple of things with respect to that. First of all, it's a doubling of a one proposed doubling of a one gigawatt plant. It's enormous expansion of fossil fuels right over our county line.
The health related impacts of fossil fuel use are both known, documented, real, and long ignored. And unfortunately, they've been normalized because that's what we have needed in the past to move forward our society. The good news is that we have alternatives now, and we don't have to rely on the continued expansion of fossil fuels. Those negative impacts, of course, to state the obvious, don't know county lines. The fact that it is just over the over the line is approved potentially approved by Havana County Board of Supervisors doesn't mean that that that air pollution is going
to stay anywhere. It's gonna go with the winds, which is to impart our county. Estimated twenty seven to fifty million dollars of health related impacts a year are estimated from this expansion. Some of that would be upon Albemarle County residents. So with that, I just wanted to ask one thing tonight. Please learn about this issue and express on our behalf your concern about the gas excuse me, the proposed gas expansion. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we ask that you show your support by raise of hand when a topic is
being done, and we'll just refrain. It will help us move through the speakers. Thanks. Our next speaker is Susan McCulley. I'm Susan McCully. I live in the Samuel Miller District, and I wanna know what it will take for you to consider the unmasked ICE resolution. We've been coming to you for nine months asking you to take a stand for our community and protecting our civil rights from the lawless tactics of ICE agents. What will it take for you to respond? I was gonna list the incidents of civil rights abuses just in Minneapolis, but, honestly,
there are too many to list in three minutes, so I'll speak in generalities. People have been assaulted, pepper sprayed, tear gassed. People have been dragged from their cars, thrown to the ground, pulled from their homes in subzero temperatures. A man was blinded. Renee Goode was murdered. Citizens, naturalized citizens, green card holders, immigrants, and undocumented people. Whatever the status, these are all people, human beings, adults, elderly folks, children, babies, even babies. And do you think it's just those targeted people who are impacted? My niece lives in Eden Prairie,
a high end suburb just outside of Minneapolis with her husband and three school age children. I reached out to her hoping that as a white family in a swank neighborhood, they would be untouched. But this is what she said, quote, my kids are genuinely afraid ICE is gonna take their friends away, and it's really sad because that has happened. We're doing lots of shopping for essentials and coordinating drop offs for families who are afraid to leave their homes. There was an ICE raid in front of a bus stop in Eden Prairie the other morning. The kids watched eight ICE agents detain a man.
The school district has directed bus drivers to drive the students back to school if they're afraid to get off the bus, and this is just Eden Prairie. There's so much going on all over, end quote. This rogue agency stacked with January 6 insurrectionists, Proud Boys, and white nationalists is not just terrorizing and traumatizing immigrants. They're raining fear and trauma on the entire community. And how do you think that community would feel if their leaders did nothing to stand up for them? What will it take for you to respond to the unmasked ICE resolution?
And now they're in Maine. Now they're here in Richmond, Petersburg, Jamestown. Do you think they won't come here, here where Heather Heyer was murdered? Of course, they will. Waiting until they're here is too late. Now is the time to plan and prepare an unequivocal response against this well funded American Gestapo. They this must be stopped, and it will if enough of us say no. Please say no with us and for us. Please take up the resolution. Thank you. Next, we have Olivia Hadley. Hi. Good evening. My name is Olivia Hadley.
I'm an Albemarle resident from the Rio District. I also would like to speak to the gas plant, that is cited to be built in Fluvanna. And, again, I also understand this is not directly within your jurisdiction, but I would just respectfully ask, that you all take a stance opposing this gas plant in Fluvanna. This air pollution, it knows no county lines. The particulate matter 2.5 pollution, that will be emitted by the plant, it causes a variety of health issues, including asthma, stroke, as well as recently has been linked to dementia. And a harvest a Harvard study on this plant found that this plant will lead
to two to three premature deaths per year because of the PM 2.5 pollution, which is a tragic and very preventable outcome. So I think it's also worth noting that this plant won't be benefiting the communities in Central Virginia energy wise. Rather, it's going to be used to power growing data centers in Northern Virginia. And I think when there are renewable alternatives available, it is irresponsible, that Central Virginia will have to pay the cost of lives lost for fossil fuels being used to power a data center bubble. So I just think that this plant is not in the interest of our community,
and I just would ask that you please take the health and environmental impacts of this plant into consideration. Thank you so much. Thank you. Next, we have Michael Crenshaw. Hello. My name is Michael Crenshaw. I'm an Albemarle resident from Crozet, and I am here on behalf of Livable Seaville to request your support in opposing the proposed gas power power plant in Fluvanna County. Livable Ceville advocates for safe and affordable living in Charlottesville and Albemarle County. The proposed gas plant in Fluvanna would make residents less safe by increasing the ozone
emissions as well as PM 2.5 particulate matter for which there is no safe exposure level. The negative health impacts of this plant on the residents of Fluvanna County, Albemarle County, and Charlottesville will be significant. The new plant would increase county resident cost of living by increasing medical costs as a result of these health impacts. Furthermore, Albemarle County residents may see increases in energy costs due to volatile natural gas pricing. It would also consume massive amounts of water, exposing the area to more severe impacts from droughts,
and it would further our dependency on fossil fuels rather than the renewable energy needed to fight against climate change. Our region's natural environment is a significant source of tourism and of revenue from that tourism. The effects of this plant on our environment, especially on the James And Robanna Rivers' waterway systems, will have a negative impact on tourism and on the revenue that comes from it. The proposed gas plant would primarily benefit the companies that sell the power, the data centers that use the power, and the tech companies that use the data centers.
It would not benefit the residents of Charlottesville and Albemarle County. Instead, they would pay the costs of the negative impacts of the plant on our communities. We ask that the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors take any legal and or political steps available to oppose the new gas plant. As leaders in our county, we ask that you speak out publicly against this project, which is bad for the county and the region. We look forward to partnering with you to do what's right for our community. And speaking on behalf of myself, I'd just like to add, we know what this electricity will mostly be used for.
It's AI slop and the social media sites that disseminate it. Two days ago, a family member sent me an Instagram reel. It was formatted like a news story, and it talked about a Somali immigrant who became a Seattle sit city councilman. In that role, he committed massive fraud and was eventually arrested as part of a dramatic raid involving a mansion, a secret room, and stacks of cash. The councilman named in the video does not exist. None of the story is true. It sounded like it was voiced by AI, and I suspect that the story and the visuals were also AI generated,
but it was enough to convince my family member. So even if we ignore the waste this plant would spew into the air and into the water, we have to consider the other output, cheap, divisive AI slop served up by addictive algorithms. I know the proposed site is outside the county's jurisdiction, but the folks seated here are leaders in this county, and I would really like if you all would join us in opposing this project. Thank you. Thank you. Next up is Hannah Strauss. Hi. My name is Hannah Strauss. I'm a long time Albemarle resident, but I live in Charlottesville right now. I've lived in Albemarle County my whole life,
and my grandmother worked at Scottsville's JML library branch my whole life. And I'm here to talk to you about the Tonasco plant as well. I know, again, everyone's already said this isn't your purview. But ahead of me talking about that, I want to reiterate what everyone has said about the unmasked ICE, bill and how much you could do to get ICE out of our communities. So keeping that in mind, you guys should think about that. In regards to the health and safety and the impacts that the Tabaska plant would have, It's dear dear to my heart because of the work I do and living here
for so long and seeing all of the things that people try to do to keep each other safe. Our rural neighbors are the most impacted by lacking access to health care and so many benefits. And I urge y'all to public to speak publicly and regionally against the Tonaska expansion and to press Louisiana's board to reject the new plant. This plant will specifically impact Scottsville and Southern Albemarle residents who live closest to the existing plant and therefore, be an impact to everyone's health and will put a larger impact, a larger strain on the health system.
We already have heard in the news from Seaville tomorrow and other news sources that three out of four people right now in the emergency room are in for respiratory illnesses, for COVID, for the flu, for RSV. And so right now, going from the twenty twenty pandemic, going from continued health impacts, we're going to put more strain on our health care workers. That's irresponsible. And we have the right to do something. Also, this plant has limited employ employment opportunity. They say that they're going to hire people like 29 employees or something, but they've also said they're going to use, construction workers from outside of our counties,
outside our communities. And so we can speak up against that. There's also unaddressed noise complaints and fiscal pressure on residents. And so, again, I urge you to talk to your neighbors in Savannah County to publicly speak against this plant and to publicly demand that ice is out of our community. Thank you. Thank you. Next is, I believe it's Sandrina De Cruz. Good evening, board. My name is Sandrina De Cruz, and I am a resident in the Rio District. And I'm here to talk about, the Tonasca gas plant,
and I also wanna make the request for you all to take action in getting ice out of our communities. My family and I are gravely concerned about the proposed expansion and addition of another fracked gas power plant in Flavinia County. As has been said before, air movement does not respect man made county boundaries. If approved, the two Tonasco plants combined will make will make it the single largest gas fired power generation complex in Virginia. I'm deeply worried about what this what this power plant will mean to the air
quality, our health, and the health of communities in Albemarle, Savannah, and surrounding counties. A study that has been cited, by another community member, and conducted by, the Harvard Public Health, school found that Tenaska's proposed gas plant expansion would significantly increase fine particulate matter PM 2.5 pollution. This will lead to an estimated 500,000,000 to $1,000,000,000 in statewide health loss. This includes higher risks of heart attacks, strokes, asthma, and the premature death of for 4,000,000
Virginians, with particular impact on our most vulnerable community members. Building another fracked gas plant will have direct implications not just for the health of Albemarle residents but also for the climate action decisions of this board and future governance of our county. Although we have our specific climate goals in Albemarle, we have neighbors and statewide emission targets. The more our neighbors go backwards towards fossil fuel use, the more our decisions in Albemarle will have to mitigate the impact of those decisions. If we are to meet the Virginia Clean Economy Act goal of zero carbon emissions
by 2050, building the largest fracked gas plant in the state will require counties like Albemarle to work increasingly hard to make up for this backwards momentum. Counties don't often seek partnerships to address cross boundary problems, yet the complex challenges we're facing require vision and leadership decisions that focus on addressing systemic issues. Fluvanna has similar high level environmental goals as Albemarle. This is an opportunity for Albemarle to break the mold by creating ways to work together with Fluvanna County. We need to identify and build on where we have shared goals.
We call upon your leadership and Fluvannus to be a partner in achieving our joint regional environmental goals in service of better health outcomes for our communities and ecosystems. Thank you. Thank you. Next is Faith Schweitzert. Sorry. Is it? Schweickert. Wasn't gonna be closed. Thank you. Hello. Good evening. My name is Faith Schweickert, and I'm here representing the Piedmont Environmental Council. Like others, I offer the following comments on the Tonaska gas power plant proposed just across the county line in Fluvanna. Over twenty years ago, PEC opposed the approval of the first now existing Tonaska gas power plant in Fluvanna.
Today, we strongly oppose this second proposed plant owing to its known significant health and environmental impacts to the surrounding community. As that surrounding community includes residents in eastern and southern portions of Albemarle County, please consider individually communicating your concerns with the Fluvanna County Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors. As many of you well know, this proposal is not happening in a vacuum. Across the state, there are seven new gas plant proposals undermining the Virginia Clean Economy Act goals. The first,
the Chesterfield Gas Plant, was approved by the State Corporation Commission just two months ago. Tonaska states that the new Fluvanna plant could power up to 1,500,000 homes, but it's more likely that the energy produced by this plant will be used to serve data center to serve power hungry data centers in Northern and now Central Virginia. Though Albemarle is not currently seeing hyperscale data center development, it is likely to see the associated infrastructure impacts, including air quality impacts from the second gas plant, the rebuilding of a 230 kilovolt transmission line from Augusta County through Central Albemarle to
Gordonsville, and a 200 foot tall, seven sixty five volts kilovolt transmission line, the first of its size in Central Virginia, that will run from Lynchburg through Southern Albemarle along the Drains River past Scottsville to a substation near Tonaska. PEC has called for a statewide pause on hyperscale data center development, at least until the state has a full accounting of how much energy and infrastructure the utilities have already committed to and how much is in the pipeline. And until there is a comprehensive and transparent statewide plan for protecting our grid,
water, air and communities from the destructive impacts of unconstrained data center growth. This recommendation for a pause includes associated fossil fuel power generation and infrastructure, like this 1.5 gigawatt Tenaska power plant in Fluvanna. Please consider acting individually to protect the health of 4,000,000 people in the region, including the citizens of Albemarle. Thank you. Thank you. Next, we have Gwyneth West. Thank you very much. I'm Gwyneth West. I've been in Charlottesville for thirty five years. I came here to teach at the university,
and somehow I managed to begin to think about things other than teaching theater. And it drives me to come to you and appeal to your humanity, your families, and the future of all those who live in our community and the area to do what is the best thing you can dream of, to protect us all from the pollution and the climate challenges that face us with the addition of these kinds of
institutions that are going to change the entire geometry of who we are. Please protect us. Thank you. Thank you. And our tenth speaker, our final speaker is Sai Vod Flynn. Thank you. Hello, Chair Galloway, Vice Chair Missel, members of the board. It's a privilege, really, to be able to participate in democracy in this way, and to take my first opportunity of the year to address you all. I know that, you as decision makers feel a very different type of weight to what we do
as advocates and community members, and I do thank you for stepping up to this challenge. As you've heard tonight, members of the community in Albemarle are extremely worried by the health impacts of an expanded gas plant over the Fluvanna line near Scottsville. In my work as a climate justice policy manager for the Community Climate Collaborative, we've joined with the Fluvanna Horizons Alliance, which is composed of several different local and regional, organizations. I've been to planning commission meetings, and I've been to town halls out there. I've been to community meetings. I've seen firsthand what kind of a neighbor Tonaska,
this Nebraska based corporation, multibillion dollar private equity corporation is to the residents of Havana. They are gaslighting. They are putting up walls. They're saying, well, we're not polluting you as much as we're legally allowed to do. Therefore, we don't wanna listen to it. We don't wanna investigate anymore. The health impacts the health impact study commissioned by the SELC, and conducted by Harvard University found that there will be an estimated two to three additional premature deaths per year as a result of the increased levels of particulate matter
2.5 in the area in the area around the plant. That's two to three additional deaths that were could have been prevented, did not need to happen in service of some additional tax revenue for Fluvanna. As we have discussed, this is not pollution that stops at the county line. We know that some of those residents will be Albemarle residents. The people in your community, the people in your constituencies are asking you to take a stand. We understand, we recognize, acknowledge, and accept This is not yours to vote yes or no on.
But as you saw in the email that I sent you earlier today, c three has prepared a draft joint resolution that we propose be adopted by the city of Charlottesville in and the and Almirall's County, opposing the proposed Tonescu natural gas plant expansion in Fluvanna County. We believe that you signaling this will actually empower Fluvanna's board to say no and to know that you have their backs in saying no and that we have a different regional approach. The planning commission has already voted that this does not comply with their comprehensive plan,
neither does it comply with ours. We must take a regional stand on this. I also have with me a hard copy of the, Harvard Health Study that I will submit to you all. Thank you so much for your consideration. We will look forward to talking more about this, and, and thank you for being here. Thank you. That concludes our list, Chair. All right. Thank you for everyone who came out to speak this evening. If you were expecting to speak but the slots were already filled, we invite you to email the board. You can do so at basinboard,o,sasinsupervisors,bos@albemarle.org,
and the board will receive your comments. So thank you again for raising your issues and coming out to speak. Board, we will move to our first public hearing this evening, number 15 on the agenda. This is ACSA twenty twenty five one, jurisdictional area amendment request, Holly Hills Sewer Extension West Of Route 29. Mr. Newberry, I see, has joined us again. Good evening. Good evening, Mr. Chair, members of the board. My name is JT Newberry. I'm a senior planner in the Department of Community Development. And I will be taking us through,
today's review of ACSA 2025 number one. And I will wait for our visuals to come up. We'll wait, too. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. If you don't. It seems like in some ways, it'll help. Like, how we're doing it up about the airport right now. Yeah. It seems like it's not a standing not gonna make that. It should be stuff more for me. That should be the edits. I don't know. That would be presenter view. I'm curious. I missed the fighter box. Okay. I see. I missed that. Okay. Well, I think that's Brenda's on me. Does it come on on the screen?
No. I mean, I'm not misunderstood. West Underneath Trail. Okay. I got it. I gotcha. Oh, they moved you around, We're gonna try something different. Hold on one sec. Is it up here? Tim Gates reboot. Look at it. Great. Thank you. Take two. Plan b's are the best. Alright. So good evening, Chair Galloway, members of the board. My name is JT Newberry, senior planner with Department of Community Development. I'm joined, by some some fellow staff members to help answer any questions that, I'm not able to answer tonight. But we'll be discussing a jurisdictional area request,
to allow water and sewer service to 10 parcels in the the Hollymeade neighborhood of the Places 29 master plan. So here are the, is the visual I was hoping to bring up. This is these are a map of the 10 parcels that are requesting water and sewer service. So we're approximately, four tenths of a mile south of the Coles, in Hollymeade Town Center. And we are, directly across Route 29 from the Holly Hills project that is currently,
under construction. The red line on the map indicates the boundary of the development area, which is important because county policy, recommends that water and sewer service only be provided within the limits of the development area. So, we'll talk more about that in just a second. Most of the surrounding area, has had a water and sewer service designated already on the jurisdictional area map. Within the 10 parcels that are before the board this evening, there are two that have water to,
only to existing structures, parcel, 46 Dash 7 and Parcel 46 Dash 28 D. And so the, the request is to amend the jurisdictional area map for all 10 parcels that are outlined in blue for the sections that are within the development area, which are seven of the 10. And I'll just quickly point out, there is a little bit of a gap between the 10 parcels. This this, area is not included in the request.
So there are two parcels up here adjacent to Ryle Mills Road, and then the remaining eight are, here adjacent to Burke Mar and Seminole Trail. So as I mentioned, the comp plan recommends the extent the provision of public and water and sewer to, parcels within the development area, and staff recommends approval of the requested amendment. And here is a motion slide. And believe we have the applicant with us, too, in case there are any questions, for the applicant. Alright. We'll go through to see if there's any questions right now for mister Dewberry.
Supervisor Lakisto Kirtley? No questions. Thank you for the presentation. Alright. Supervisor Missal? No questions, I think. Thank you. Thank you. Supervisor Duncan? No questions. Supervisor Malek? Well, there goes the line. Okay. So the I see right in the middle oh, your slide went away. Right in the middle of the the red line slide. So Templeton is the street, the loop where the houses are on and sort of park there. Are there individual applications for each of these parcels? Are they in common ownership? I mean, normally, we it's up to the owner to pay for this and to get it done.
So I'm just confused about why we're making this giant leap instead of taking care of the one to serve Holly Hills because the sewer line isn't gonna go through the middle of all this stuff to the West of Bergmar. It's gonna stay close to 29, as I understand, or is already in Bergmar, actually. No. That's the freshwater line. Sorry. Go ahead. I, the the name of the application Holly Hills is a bit of a misnomer in the sense that, this request is is really not meant to serve any parcels associated with Holly Hills.
It is, was made in conjunction with the construction that's currently happening there as a way to, simultaneously, provide infrastructure, without having to come back at a later date to to install it. So while the infrastructure is being installed for Holly Hills, the applicant has provided a diagram that, I can pull up that shows the extension of, the the facilities for that development. There would be a a a boring and jacking under Route 29 to establish a
sewer manhole on the western side of, Route 29, approximately in this location on on, Parcel 28 D. These parcels are all under common ownership, although they have, different LLCs that control them. The the applicant could speak more to that, but they all 10 parcels are under common ownership. So the part that ACSA would do would be the under the road, and everything else would be up for somebody to do in the future. But the jurisdiction area would be taken care of is what you're saying. Yeah. This just provides the the author the,
the authority to to provide water and sewer service once, the infrastructure is there. I see. Thank you. Alright. Supervisor Pruitt? I have no questions. Thank you. Alright. I do not have a question at this point. Is the applicant making a presentation tonight or just available for questions? Just available for me. Alright. So we will open the public hearing. Do we have anyone signed up for this request this evening? We do not. Alright. Seeing none, then I will go ahead and then close the public hearing. And I'm going to look to my left to right to see if there's any
other questions for the applicant here. Alright. And I understand this is just a timing thing to take care of, and that was my my presumption. I guess I'm confirming that presumption. Because of the happening over here, we can do it at one time to get this point over. It would help reduce and save some costs down the road. Correct. Which those landowners would be paying for in the future. Well, it's not building out all the things that those parcels are just like the other one we have is something that's a landowner responsibility. So I'm just trying to sort out facts.
But they would be eliminating that for the for those developing parcels in terms of connection fees and things like that. I think the applicant would probably be in the best position to answer that particular question. Good evening. Hey. Hunter Wood, United Land Corporation. So what we met with staff, said this was something that could be done. It was in the comp plan. You know, it's in the jurisdictional area. What we are trying to do is not get into the same situation that we are at Hollymeet Town Center where I'm paying full taxes on land that I cannot do anything but put cows on,
because we have been waiting for upwards of six or seven years for the service authority to upgrade the sewer line. So we are just trying to be forward thinking and looking towards the future. This is my cost. This is not a cost to the county, and we just would prefer to put something in now instead of going back after Holly Hills is finished and tearing up a bunch of things that don't need to be torn up. And, and it's something that is a gamble, I guess you would say, on my part, looking towards the future of Albemarle County.
If any questions I can answer, I'll try to answer them. I mean, that was kind of my presumption, the forward kind of step. I guess the gamble is if they don't develop, you've done this for nothing is what you're That's correct. Yeah. I I they're you're not rezoning anything across on the West Side Of 29. I'm not asking for any rezoning on the West Side Of 29. I'm just trying to prepare for something that I believe that will happen in the future. Yep. Understood. Alright. Any that was my question after I've already asked for pass. Any other questions or anything?
Yes. Quick question. I think I've already answered this, but there's no cost to Holly Hills development. No. Holly Holly so there's no Right. Zero cost to Holly Hills Development. This is all cost coming out of our pocket. Okay. Thank you. No cost to the county. No cost to anybody but right here. Alright. No other questions? Thank you, sir. Thank you. Alright. This is, in the I'm sorry. Mister chair, before the board entertains the motion, it's unfortunately slightly more complicated than what Mr. Newberry has indicated. There should be a pink, revised resolution that the Board was provided.
So my if the Board is inclined to approve this, the suggested motion would be to move to adopt the resolution to approve ACSA twenty twenty five-one as revised 01/20/2026. All right. Whose district were they calling this in? Was it the Holly Hills side? That's that would be mine. Go ahead. Okay. You said as revised January 21? Twentieth. Twentieth. Okay. That was it. Right. No. I see that, but today's That's when they That's fine. But but just to clarify, this was revised yesterday and provided to you all yesterday.
Okay. Got it. Got it. Thank you. I move to approve, rev resolution to I move to approve, ACSA two zero two five zero zero zero zero one for parcel IDS. Do I have to name no. As revised 01/20/2026. Second. Alright. The motion has been made and seconded. Any further discussion? Alright. If the clerk would please call the roll. Miss Duncan? Yes. Mister Galloway? Yes. Miss Lupista Kirtley? Aye. Miss Malek? Yes. Mister Missal?
Aye. Mister Pruitt? Aye. Alright. Very good. Motion is approved. Thank you, JT. Thank you, mister Wood. Alright. The next item this evening, number 16, public hearing on the County acquisition of a portion of Parcel 56A2-02A 100 at 1153 High Street by eminent domain. Good evening. Let me get this slideshow going here. There we go. As you stated, this is a public hearing for the proposed acquisition of portions of 1153 High Street by eminent domain.
Oh, and I should say, I'm Michael Stumbaugh. I am a senior project manager for facilities and environmental services, and we have with us Jennifer Teavendale, deputy county attorney, who's the phone a friend, if we have attorney questions. It's been just incredibly helpful in a lot of these right away situations. So the overview is go over the project, the parcel, the right away negotiations to date, the recommended process, and the suggested motion. So the project,
this is UPC 113385 Library Avenue extended, which is a VDOT revenue sharing project. The project will extend Library Avenue eastward to connect to High Street, connect the square with Hilltop, and I'll show you a picture of this coming up the diagram, and extend High Street northward. This is a public private partnership as well as a revenue sharing with the developer of the Barnes Lubber property. And this property this project embraces strategic goal three, enhancing multimodal connectivity. So here's the diagram.
In the upper left is the square, on the right middle is Hilltop. So this roadway will connect those portions in Crozet, and then in the middle left is Library Avenue, which will be extended to High Street, and then High Street will be extended north to the new roadway. So the gold star, the yellow star, is the parcel in question here. And here is a right away sheet, which shows again the yellow star with and it's Parcel 006 in the sheet for
the right of way plans. And this is a further blow up of that area. And you can see in the salmon, that's a permanent take. The green is a utility easement, and the yellow is a temporary construction easement. So this is a picture of the 1153 High Street, which is the building that's green on the right, and you're looking northward on High Street. About where that pole is on the left is where the the, roundabout will start, and that's where where the trash can is,
where it'll start to take some of those, portions of the land. So here's the right of way negotiations that happened. There was an offer to land over over land owner in September 2024. The negotiations yielded an increase for cost secure items in April 2025, and highlighted in blue and for emphasis in June excuse me. June 2025, the documents were signed by the landowner. The landowner is pro project. The landowner wants the project to happen.
So there have been various contacts with the mortgage company because we need a partial mortgage release, and they have remained largely silent, which is the reason for this public hearing. So we did have hope because on 11/14/2025, the lender, the lienholder did, say that they were re leaning forward on this, but then nothing has happened since we haven't gotten any communications. We keep asking and we keep getting no,
answer from them, and there is no way that we can force the the the, lienholder, the the partial mortgage release. We can't force them in any way, but what we can do is approve by this public hearing to adopt a resolution authorizing condemnation. But if an agreement is reached, and I hope it will, then the condemnation process could be ended. So the recommended process, the board adopts a resolution which is appendix or attachment c, excuse me. The County Of Albemarle files a certificate to take and deposits the original estimated value
of take, which was $11,004.06 6 with the Albemarle County Circuit Court. The County of Albemarle can proceed with the project, and the Albemarle County Circuit Court determines the value of parcel, including cost secure and proper recipients of payments if it goes that far. And then the last bullet point is negotiation may continue prior to court determination, and, again, I would be hopeful that we would reach an agreement. So here's a suggested motion, and I will now stop talking. I will start. All right. Supervisor Lupiso Kirtley.
Right. I have no questions. Thank you. Supervisor Missal. Hey, mister Stonewall. Mister? Just a question on the previous slide. Yes. I'm just curious, and I know nothing about the legalities behind this. But why would the number not be the $21,000 that was originally negotiated with the the lender. Phone of bread. Perfect. Thank you. Good evening, Chairman Galloway and, members of the board. Under the condemnation procedures, when we file a certificate of take, we only deposit with the court the original Got it. Offer amount.
Since we do have an agreement with the property owner, if we cannot receive the clear title from the lender, the county's intention is once if we have to file that certificate of take, we'll deposit the original offer amount. And then later on, we will, if there's still the agreement, file the petition for disbursement and then deposit the remainder of the amount to take it up to what has been the agreed compensation. And the court will hold those funds, and then the court will determine when to actually disperse those funds. Perfect. Thank you. You're welcome. No other questions.
Alright. Supervisor Duncan? No questions. Supervisor Malek? I'm well set. Thank you very much. Supervisor Pruett? Who's the lienholder? Is Is it a big box firm? Is it a small company? Like, this is just comically bad behavior. It is a corporation or company called Mr. Cooper. Oh, yeah. I have them. They suck. Yeah. Okay. It's not a person. It's a it's a company. Yeah. They acquire other lien. They're like a second Correct. Tier holder. Okay. Yeah. It's just frustrating. Right? Because this is a circumstance where we are expending this board's time,
legal know how, frankly, putting the owner in a position where we have no reason to to pay the extra amount. We could totally just do the original amount of take. Everyone loses out because of mister Cooper. Okay. Great. Thanks. I have no questions. We will open the public hearing. Do we have anyone signed? We do not. No one signed up, so we will close the public hearing. Are there any additional questions or comments needed? All right. Then we will be the motion. It has also been. And, Mr. Chairs,
with the with the prior matter, the the motion to approve would be a motion to adopt the revised resolution to authorize the acquisition by condemnation of a portion of parcel number and then the parcel number as as revised January 21. Good. I will do that. Down to the four. That's why we go. I move the board adopt the resolution to authorize the acquisition by condemnation of portions of a certain parcel of land, parcel ID numbers 56A2020A-one for the purpose oh,
stopping there. Okay. As revised, January 21? Yes. As revised, 01/21/2026. Alright. Is there a second? Second. Alright. The motion has been made and seconded. Without objection, if the clerk will please call the roll. Miss Duncan? Yes. Mister Galloway? Yes. Miss Lupista Kirtley? Aye. Miss Malik? Yes. Mister Missal? Aye. Mister Pruitt? Aye. Very good. Thank you, board. Thank you, ma'am. Thank you. Well, you're staying up there, I know, for the next one. Sir. I am. Number 17, public hearing for proposed abandonment and conveyance of a portion of Oak Street Crozet.
There we go. So, yes, I am Mike Stumbaugh. I am senior project manager for Facilities Environmental Services. And once again, and we've seen the value, we have, Jennifer Teavendale of the county attorney's office. Thank you so much. So this is a public hearing for proposed abandonment and conveyance of Portion Vogue Street in Crozet, which happens to be this project is adjacent to the project we were just talking about. So the overview, we talk about the project, we talk about abandonment and conveyance, finding required abandonment is necessary,
the recommended process in the suggested motion, which may be amended, I think. So alright. So this is project. It's a UPC one one three one eight eight, which is again a revenue sharing project with VDOT, Crozet Square, and Oak Street Improvements. This project will and has, because it's ongoing and almost over, in part, take Oak Street to VDOT standards, improve parking in the Square and Oak Street, provide ADA compliant sidewalk along the Square businesses, and convey stormwater from the square. This project embraces strategic plan goal three,
enhancing multimodal connectivity. So a lot of words here, and I will get to pictures which will help, show this die the the diagram will help explain this better. But the county is seeking to acquire portions of Virginia Passenger Rail Authority, VPRA property, in exchange for conveyance of county property, a portion of Oak Street to the VPRA, and again the diagram will help explain this. Before conveying that portion of Oak Street to VPRA, the county must first abandon it. The process begins with both a notice of intent to abandon portions of the blooded
streets or public right away of Oak Street in Crozetia set forth in Virginia code three three dot two dash nine sixteen, and a public hearing on the abandonment and for the conveyance of county property to VPRA, and this is that public hearing. So the diagram, blue is what now the county owns as a part of Oak Street. The red is what VPRA owns. This is when the project started, or it was it was ongoing,
but it was in the summer at some point. It's further along now. So this will, I think, help show where, where this will help both of us. So if you're coming up Oak Street North or up in the picture, the folks from VPRA can drive directly into their site. So you can see up by the railroad tracks, they have equipment up there. Well, they can drive directly up there right now. If they already use their property, they would have to go left and then into the red property. So what we are looking to do is basically abandon blue and convey
to VPRA the blue, and they then transact with us for the red. And what we get out of it, why this is a win win, they get a straight shot up Oak Street. And what we get is more parking spaces in the square, which is very valuable. So does does that make sense? Okay. So Virginia code 33Dot2Dash919 requires the government governing body to find dot one, no prod no public necessity exists for the continuance of the section of road as
a public road, or the welfare of the public would be best served by abandoning the section of road as a public road. So the recommended steps, find no public necessity exists for continuance of the portion of Oak Street as a public road. Bullet point number two, adopt the resolution to abandon a portion of Oak Street, which is attachment c and prepared by miss Teavendale. And bullet point number three, adopt the resolution authorizing conveyance to VPRA, which is attachment d, and then staff finalizes the exchange with,
BPRA, which, again, miss Tevandayo would would greatly assist with. Andy, is there any any changes to that? No. And all the in this case, all the resolutions are as provided in the package. They do need to be voted on separately, so it will be two separate motions, that the board adopt the attachment C and that the board adopt attachment D if, in fact, that's what the board chooses to do this evening. Alright. Very good. Supervisor Lupista, currently, any questions? I have no questions. Thank you. Supervisor Missal? No questions. Thank you. Supervisor Duncan? No questions. Supervisor Malek?
Could you pop back to the diagram a minute? Show the pink and blue because it's a little different than what's in our packet, I think. Which one? So all the area in gravel right now where they have been driving in and out, so around the pickup truck area, is Yes. Real is really on JB Barnes, I guess. Yes. Okay. So they're gonna be getting off of that section eventually and going to use the access where you've paid the apron. Yes. As we discussed in the first presentation, that road's gonna keep going, and it's all gonna be developed.
So you're they're not gonna be able to just go up there. Right. East West, that is. Yes, ma'am. And Oak Street I guess the only thing that we've been talking about for about twenty years is some kind of crossing over the rail where either Oak Street or High Street come out. And maybe High Street is probably where it's been shifted to now, which is why we're not losing anything important right here. Yes, ma'am. Because there was, long ago, a thought of a elevated pedestrian crossing that, actually, BBR was gonna build until they were told they had to do it ADA compliant, and in which case that went made the cost go from 50,000
to 500 or 5,000,000 or whatever. I don't know. Okay. That answers my question. Thank you very much. Supervisor Privett? I have no questions. Thank you. All right. I do not have any questions. We'll open the public hearing. Do we have anyone signed up for this item? We do not. All right. We will close the public hearing. Any additional questions or comments? Then we have two motions to make. C and D, right? Okay. C and D. C and D. Well, I will move that the board adopt the resolution to abandon a portion of Oak Street as in
attachment 17. Second. Attachment C. Attachment C. All right. The motion has been made and seconded. Without objection, if the clerk would call the roll. Miss Duncan? Yes. Mister Galloway? Yes. Miss Lupista Kirtley? Aye. Miss Malik? Yes. Mister Missal? Aye. Mister Pruitt? Aye. Great. And then attachment d. I move that the board adopt the resolution to convey a portion of Oak Street Crozet to the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority as described in attachment d. Second. Alright. Eager. Second. Motion has been made and seconded.
Without objection, if the clerk will call the roll. Miss Duncan? Yes. Mister Galloway? Yes. Miss Lupista Kirtley? Aye. Miss Malek? Yes. Mister Missal? Aye. Mister Pruitt? Aye. Very good. Both both motions carry. Thank you, sir. Thank you all for your time. Thank you. All right. That will take us to item number 18SP2020Five-four, Northridge Preschool. And Sid Schoaff is with us this evening. Good evening, everyone. Sorry about that. Always wonder if the planners will ever request walk up music one day. Dry ice.
Can we get a motion for that? Hi. Good evening. My name is Sid Shof. I'm a senior planner with the planning division for Albemarle County's Community Development Department. And tonight, I'll be giving staff's presentation for a special use permit SPDash2025Dash4, Northridge Preschool. This is a special use permit request to amend an existing special use permit to increase the total enrollment and hours of operation for a preschool. The subject property is approximately 9.92 acres and located at 5100 Dickerson Road, which is approximately one and a half miles south of the Albemarle and Greene County
line. And it's just north of the Places 29 development area. It is zoned rural areas, and the comprehensive plan designates it as rural areas. The surrounding properties are all zoned rural areas include and include other religious assembly uses and single family residences beyond the adjacent parcels. The subject property is home to the Northridge Community Church of Nazarene, which was first approved by a special use permit for the church in 2000, and the preschool was first established in 2003. There's an active special use permit that was approved in 2006 that allows a maximum enrollment of 80 students, And the applicant is requesting to increase that student enrollment from 80 students to 100
students and increase the hours of operation from 07:30AM to 01:00PM to now 06:00AM to 06:00PM. The special use permit application was reviewed under the factors for consideration as outlined in the zoning ordinance. Staff believes that the proposed special use permit will not be detrimental to adjacent parcels, will not change the character of the nearby area, will continue to be in harmony with the rural area zoning district, and is consistent with the comprehensive plan. There are three recommended conditions for this application. The first two are related to the applicant's proposal and the third is carryover from
the previously approved special use permit. The intent is to preserve the existing woodland on the property. In sum, there are three positive aspects. The first is the proposal is consistent with the review criteria for special use permits contained in the zoning ordinance. The second is that the proposal provides the preschool slash daycare option for community members who live and work in the area. And lastly, there are no detrimental impacts to joining properties are anticipated. Staff recommends that the board adopt the attached resolution attachment d to approve SP dash twenty twenty five dash four with the conditions stated in the staff report,
and I'm happy to answer any questions from the board. Thank you. Alright. Thank you. Supervisor Lopisto, currently? No questions. Thank you for the presentation. Supervisor Missal? No questions. Thank you. Supervisor Duncan? No questions. Supervisor Malek? None for me. Thank you. Supervisor Pruett? I have no questions. Thank you. Alright. And I do not have questions at this point. We will open the public hearing. Is there anyone signed up this evening? Is the applicant planning to make a presentation this evening? We will do a brief iteration of the rules. Please come forward. Okay. So you can just read the applicant rules.
Okay. I think I will state that the applicant, you are afforded ten minutes, to speak. You do not need to take the full ten minutes, but you are free to do so if you wish. So please state your name for the record, and you may proceed. Good evening. I'm Debbie Swanson. I am, the preschool director there at Northridge Preschool. Good evening, chair and members of the board. Thank you for the opportunity to speak today on behalf of our school. I'm here to request your support in expanding both our hours and increasing the number of available spots in our preschool program.
A quality education early education program is crucial because it fosters brain development during the critical first five years. It builds long term academic skills, social emotional skills, reduces achievement gaps and creates stronger communities by improving school readiness. It involves high quality interactions and safe environments with skilled teachers and supportive family engagement, leading to better life outcomes and significant societal returns on our environment or the investment.
Many families in our community now require two parents to meet the cost of living and raising children. Our current preschool hours do not fully align with that standard full time work schedule, which force our families to make difficult choices between employment and reliable early childhood education. Expanding our preschool hours would allow parents to increase household income and reduce financial strain while knowing their children are in a safe, nurturing and loving environment.
With increasing housing demand on the 29 North Corridor, there is also a need to increase the number of preschool spots to address the growing demand. More families are seeking early education opportunities that prepare our children socially, emotionally, and academically for kindergarten. Quality preschool experiences are proven to strengthen early literacy, routines, and social school readiness, which benefits not only the children, but also the entire school system in our community in the long term.
By expanding our program, we are investing in working families, supporting economic stability, and ensuring our youngest learners are prepared for success when they enter kindergarten. Please join us in supporting children and families in our growing wonderful community. Thank you for your time and consideration, and I respectfully ask for your support. Thank you. Let's see if we have any questions for you. Supervisor Lupisto, currently? No questions. Thank you. Supervisor Missal? No. Thank you. Supervisor Duncan? No questions. Supervisor Malek?
No questions. Supervisor Pruett? I have no questions. Thank you. I have a question. So and it's more curiosity than than, but I know that the the starting hours, is that to accommodate folks that need drop off before 07:30? It is. Yes, sir. So not just, like, staff arrivals, but actual the the children being dropped off that early? Potentially. Currently, it's at 07:30 in the morning, and that meets our most of our needs. But we have had parents ask us to please increase that. And just for commute time and being able to drop? Yes, sir. Do kid would kids end up staying that whole time?
They are not allowed. Okay. So I was gonna say, they're not there from 6AM to 6PM themselves. Correct. State standard is ten hours. Okay. Then we pray have some staggered folks who do one or the other. Yes, sir. Great. Thank you so much. You're very welcome. Alright. I don't know if you need rebuttal time based on that question. If there are no other questions for the applicant? All right. Thank you. We will close the public hearing, and the matter is back before the board. If there are no further questions or comments, then we were looking for a motion. I just have one comment to make, because I saw this as a planning commissioner as well.
We saw we would see a number of these requests for additional, students and also sometimes, you know, flexibility on the times. And it sort of dawned on a lot of us that it was quite an arduous process to go through to do this, and we've seen it before. And I think there's going to be additional demand on preschool. So just for the record, I guess I'll say if there were a way to sort of streamline this, it would be helpful, I think, for staff and also for our time. And, I would just encourage us to be considering that. The other thing I'll mention is that in several cases,
we would occasionally ask the applicant, really, just 100? Do you want to go to 150 just to have some buffer so you don't have to go back through this process again? And I think we may have even asked this applicant that. But for now, I have no questions. So you'll mention that for us to consider. Very good. Thank you very much. And I concur in all of those because there have been at least a half a dozen just in the Whitehall District alone in the last couple of years, and $2,500 for the as opposed to a special exception or something. So we'll put that on our to do list,
whoever's keeping the to do list for the planners, to work on that. Thank you. And twenty years in this operation has a wonderful history, and I do know that quite a few of the families are either active duty or civilian or Vanna station right across the street. So it's and some of them have to come early to drive to Belvoir to work and come home. So this is a really important thing for the community, and I'm very happy to move adoption, a special use permit, SP twenty twenty five four, as attached. Second. Alright. The motion has been made and seconded.
Without objection, if the clerk will please call the roll. Miss Duncan? Yes. Mister Galloway? Yes. Miss Lakieser Kirtley? Aye. Miss Mallett? Yes. Mister Missal? Aye. Mister Pruitt? Aye. Very good. Motion carries. Thank you, Mr. Shoaffey. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mark. Good luck with the new hours. Yes. All right. That will take us to item number 19. Not skipping one, am I? Nope. From the Board, committee reports and matters not listed on the agenda. We do have the three items that we parked from the last meeting at Supervisor Malek's request. So if we could go ahead and handle those items,
I think we could handle them collectively, and then we'll go through, for committee reports. So the reason for me raising these is to gauge if there are four people in support of having staff come back to us with the amount of effort to do the work, not to do the work in advance, but to say how much and to whom will it fall, to develop an ordinance to require shoveling of sidewalks, which we've had the approval for for five years. And with this weekend's storm, it, you know, it's another reason to not put people walking in the street.
The second one is something we've had on the docket for many, many years and was recently, reemphasized in the AC 44, which was to do an inventory of and mapping of the many cemeteries of all, races, but certainly out in the Whitehall District, many, many, African American cemeteries around the parishes, which were those collections of the communities a hundred years ago or more. The question for that one is, who should do it? Should the historic preservation committee start and work with other community groups who have been
trying to be the advocates for these areas for a while? So I would love to have the board receive some feedback on their suggestions. There's a state law which requires preservation and protection and access to these cemeteries. But since we don't know where they are, the county has no role as other counties have already adopted ordinances that Prince William actually just did one fairly recently. It was suggested to me that that would be a good model to start with, from the, DHR person I spoke with, miss Green. The last for consideration right now is an update of the safer chemical policy,
which was, I think, adopted in 2010, was focused on many, many things. That was the cleaners used in the bathrooms, which were very, very dangerous. And the school department had real concerns because, yes, it may be spectacular for the first person to use the bathroom, but for everybody else for six or eight hours, it makes no difference as far and that they're still getting a big exposure to a lot of the chemicals. So everybody's done very well, I think, with far lower danger chemicals being used. I mentioned at one recent meeting that
having a policy for our public buildings that says we should not have fragrance emitting plug ins and soaps and things like that because there are significant number of people who are really negatively impacted by fragrances and causes them to have an inability to come to the building to get comfortably to get their their, work done. So those are the three topics, the sidewalks, the cemeteries, and the chemical policy. And I would just like to try to figure out how we can get some information back in advance of the discussion of the work program in the spring so we know a little bit more about how
to prioritize, on these issues. And for the benefit of our newest supervisors, like, it's easy to just, Oh, yeah. Great. Let's do that. But everything turns into staff time down the road, so the work program is that direction. So this would be at least having them, when they bring that forward, to say what the priorities are going to be, because We can't do everything with the time to take for these three items if there's approval at this point. We wouldn't be approving it yet. So is there any objection to having staff put together an idea of what it would take for these items?
Or any further questions that they'd like to ask? I'll just go down. Well, I'll go through the order. Supervisor Lapista Curley. Right. I I just have, a couple of questions, regarding and I'm just going to go through the list if that's okay. Regarding the ordinance to require shoveling sidewalks. So that would be the residents who live there to re shovel the sidewalks. Correct? They would be responsible. Yeah. Whoever lives there would be responsible. Okay. Correct? Well, if it's a commercial apartment building, it would be the owner of the property. Correct. So the owner or whoever right. The owner.
My concern is, a, people that are older because we all I mean, like, to we're supposed to get, what, seventeen, twenty one inches, this week, you know, on Sunday. We should not people should not be shoveling snow that deep. And if you're older or younger or whatever, but I mean, to to be able to shovel that, I don't want to put that on somebody. I mean, I want it to be done safely. That's my concern because I don't want people out there. This is the law. I'm gonna get in trouble if I don't shovel it.
So I'm sending out my, you know, older husband or older wife or whatever and have them shovel. And then something happens. They have a heart attack or something. So that's my concern there. The other thing is who is that putting a a a a an onus on our our people, the county people to go around. Well, you didn't shovel your sidewalk. Therefore, I'm what are we doing? Fining them or giving them a bad letter or what? Don't know. Okay. AC44 So let me let me pause.
Yes. So this is, tonight, the simple request that we're considering is if staff can come up with an idea of what it would take to bring this back before the Board. So it's not addressing the issue or looking for the opinions or the feedback on the matters. It would simply be saying, all right, with the list of different things, how long would it take if we wanted to do an ordinance on this? What would the staff commitment of time be? Okay. But what if we are against depending on what the ordinance might say, we are against some aspects in there? Well, then you could Bring that up at that time.
Oppose at that point in time. I don't want to debate these issues today. Okay. We don't even know what's going to be in there yet. If if the supervisors are okay with them bringing this forward when they bring other items forward for staff for the work list. So this would be part of a whole list of things. Right. So we're not would be conveyed by email in advance. Pardon that one. I think getting the information in advance so we can either take it off the table or keep it on, but not wait till April to drop all this on us when we have a very long busy meeting. Okay. Because I think that having the advanced discussion is what's going to help us.
Okay. As opposed to And then number two, the, inventory and mapping of cemeteries is a question for Anne. I guess we're talking about not individual people that are buried, but an area of a cemetery. Correct? As opposed to a grave. Yes. Pardon? A grave is one person. A cemetery is a collection of people. I guess I was thinking of the collection of the cemetery. Okay. And then I yeah. Safer committee. I like the, chemical policy update. Great. So you're not objecting to the staff time, seeing what it would take to move this. What in the in the spirit of what I think supervisor Malek is doing here,
is often when the work list comes before us and we consider staff time, it seems like that's often when other supervisors will go, oh, but what about this? So we're getting a few, oh, what about this is included in that list so that we don't do that in the future. Does that make sense? No. Alright. Well, we'll catch you up at the next when it comes before It's like drinking from a fire hose on work programs. Supervisor Missal, any objection to staff? No. Just one just one item to highlight. Actually, we've been doing a lot of work on item C, the mapping of the cemeteries in that space, and I'm aware of some that's been done in Batesville Mhmm.
As well. So his staff considers the amount of time that would be involved in that. There's a lot of power in numbers with the work that's already been done. That's And the first step is just to gather that and combine it. So that way that partners are. Yeah. Yeah. That way you're thinking about that timeline. Otherwise, fully supportive. Supervisor Duncan? With a, I would like to add on to that what I know we don't control our roads, VDOT does, but hydraulic kids walk to school in the snow. It's not plowed. It's not shoveled.
So looking at what we could do in addition to homeowners, you know, I yeah, I feel like it's weird to ask homeowners to do something that we're not willing to do for our own sidewalks, and include in that to bus stops, so what it would take to keep the bus stops shuttled as well. Alright. Good question. So that But I mean, yes, for all the rest of them, and you probably know, doctor Lynn Ray Rainville's book, Hidden Histories, about cemeteries. So, yeah, this would be great. She's a great advocate for Whitehall District. Thank you. I know supervisor Malek is okay. Supervisor Pruett? I believe I support, getting a assessment of how all these would fit out on a work plan.
I would also just add, a, is, I think, far and above going to require the most staff time? It wouldn't surprise me, because there's going to be extensive public comment and solicitation to figure out how we're going to implement it. There's probably going to be several rounds to review by this body. It also, to me, comes off as the most important. If we're going to keep saying that we're going to be a multimodal transit community in our urban core, this has to be part of it. Our our neighbor that we're literally inside of right now, recently went through this process. It was messy and ugly, and they got somewhere with it.
So Several years ago that Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's been done. Yeah. Almost every place but here, frankly, frankly. So we need to catch up. Thank you. If if all right with mister Richardson, I just wanna do a check-in with miss Wall. Are you good to go on any questions? Alright. So we are good there. So we will go through four, committee reports and matters not listed on the agenda. Supervisor Lupisto Kirtley? Yes. I had an EDA meeting, yesterday, and I just wanted to let everybody know that, the EDA contributed $500,000
toward the finishing of Boulders Road that will then go into 29. And their location has actually been moved. It's kind of been straightened out, because that accommodates AstraZeneca and future builders there. But just to let you know, it's going to be a two lane road with bike lanes. And the cost is 42,000,000, 20,000,000 from the state, 12,000,000 from AstraZeneca, and 10,000,000 from the county. And of that 10,000,000, the EDA is putting in $500,000 AstraZeneca is now getting a total of 82 acres.
And also to let everyone know that the EDA, their main source of revenue is from fees, from bonds, and that's about a $100 a year. There's a balance right now of 1,390,000.00. That's that. Breaking news today as of around 01:15 this afternoon. Amy Laufer has signed on as a co patron of H. B. A. Twenty one. That is the one that will allow photo speed cameras along rural roads and historic districts. And she a delegate delegate car is the sponsor,
and Amy will be the co patron of that. Does it answer all of our questions? No. But it gets our foot in the door because there are other historic areas, districts, roadways in the in the county. So if this can pass, that gets our foot in the door. And I think there's some other photo speed camera bills out there, which we should also support. Yes. 821. Is that the number? Yes. HB 821. Right. Thank you. Keep our fingers crossed. So thank you,
delegate Lawfer. Alright. Supervisor Missal? Yeah. Thanks. Couple of things. One, supervisor Pruitt and I attended the Fifth And Avon Street CAC meeting so we can riff off of each other on this. And it was essentially the the opening meeting for the year. We talked about the schedule. We approved, while they approved their minutes. We talked about the meeting dates, etcetera. And then we took a little bit of time to talk about the important topics, that they were the topics they felt that were important. A lot of them would be ones that you would anticipate, whether it's housing, traffic, all of the the typical ones.
And then we had an opportunity to talk with them about some of the issues that we've been seeing on the board, and I thought that was a really interesting conversation as well. I don't know, supervisor Prude, if you wanna expand on any of those. I would say the two, like, top level takeaways I think would be of interest to this board. One of them is something I think we've heard come up a few different contexts, but it was observed, oh, we didn't cover as many topics this year as we thought we did. Yeah. Because there had been fewer convenings of the CAC, because there had been fewer triggering community meetings. Essentially, an an elaborate way to say it it is another touch point for the fact
that there's fewer development driven submittals coming through in the past year. And the second thing, that we did spend some time talking about is the the initial the expected near term strain on, on our water and sewer infrastructure from the likely expansion of of services, that AstraZeneca is going to drive. There was quite a good bit of discussion on that, and this, group had previously really enjoyed the presentation they got from RWSA. And there was a discussion of whether or not it would be prudent to have RWSA come and talk about,
their planning for future future system strains. To this or to No. To the CAC. Oh, okay. That was something the CAC was interested in. Great. One other thing I'll highlight, and I think I mentioned this maybe at our last meeting, and that is that I attended, since the last meeting, I've attended the ANSI School Community Center retreat and review gathering, which was really fascinating. It was started at 08:30 in the morning most of the day, ended around midday. And it was at PVCC, and there was a presentation on the Orange Dot Project. There was discussion about connecting dots along a linear pathway,
classes, companies, and community. Comprehensive and collective research is hard work, so the methodology behind the community the Almora County Community Survey, roundtable reports from communications and public engagement, broadband authority, etcetera, etcetera, Sentara. I mean, it was really, I think, a very helpful conversation. And the only the only issue was that there were so few people there. I think there might have been, I don't wanna understate it, maybe 10, we'll say, from the community. And to, just a shout out to those that were there. There were a lot of familiar faces,
and they're typically the ones that are most involved in that community. And so a shout out to Ed Brooks as well for for his work and leadership there. That's it. All right. Supervisor Duncan? No committee reports, but last week I went to a community nonprofit night at, Eastwood Winery, and there was a lot of nonprofits and it was really cool to kind of walk around and learn about them. But what I was really struck by is how many of them were, like, disability focused and addressing there's, like, a new adaptive swim program at the Y, camp holiday trails, building things, like putting ramps in for people's homes and stuff.
And so it was just a really good reminder to, like, keep disability access, you know, as part of the discussion when we are talking about various things. But it was it was really cool. Wonderful. Thank you. Supervisor Malek? The Natural Heritage Committee, I did listen in to their meeting the other day and, had some updates on the work that they're up they're going to. This is the group who actually did all the work in the writing of the biodiversity action plan, number one and two, fifteen years ago and ten years ago. And they're, to me, a prime example of how citizens groups really support the work that we do and
multiply the ability to do things. They sent two letters to the board this week, one concerning biosolids, otherwise known as sewage sludge, spread on fields and an ordinance to require testing and information to be provided to landowners and community so that landowners can make informed decisions about what they're gonna be subjecting their property to in perpetuity because it never goes away, And also their support for the upcoming riparian ordinance, which is coming before the board sometime in the next month or so. And they have, I think, sent a request to you for the liaison thing,
so we can talk about that. Oh, yep. Did I miss that? I might have missed that. It was an email too. I was copied on it, but it was not. Yeah. So we can deal with that next month. It's fine. Supervisor Prupp? The that the Naval CAC was my only committee, since last meeting, and I already touched on that. Very good. I know my CAC at some point had a I don't know if it was ACSA or RWSA did something on all the future projects that they were doing, and I don't know if all the CACs received that or not. I'm always Since that might have been the one that they received two years ago. Two years ago.
It was it was well received at the time. They just they want more. They want more. Yeah. That's good, sir. I did not have any committee reports. I do wanna ask the board, as part of the work on the MPO and the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission, the letter that we had sent to our local delegation about the transportation funding issue. So the whole PDC signed on to that, all the neighboring jurisdictions. And it was sent from the PDC. What I would what I'm asking the board is if you would all be okay with a short letter that drafts and calls that letter out to be sent to
the new governor. This is a budget item that rises above bills and all the stuff that we're watching the track. And since it was copied to all the delegates that represent a portion of Albemarle or any of the six regions, I'd just like to send that on our behalf to say, hey, we endorsed the sentiment in this letter and would like to call your attention to it. I'm happy to circulate that draft with you all electronically before it's sent, but wanted to get you all feeling that before I just did it. Yeah. That'd be great. Thank you. I celebrate more creative forward leaning on this issue from you.
Has she, has the governor appointed a Nick. A transportation secretary? So I may, I'm probably track that, maybe send to those folks too. I actually don't think so. Yeah. That's why the ones we're still waiting on. No. Nick Donahue is transportation secretary. One other thing, if I may. Yeah. Yes. Our SWAC committee meeting will be in February, and I plan on bringing to them the charter and letting them know that the board is interested in reducing the number of liaisons from two to one. We can they ask them if they would prefer to have the RWSA,
representative automatically be the SWAC committee member or that it could be any one of the board members, which I would hate for an RWSA member to have to be on there if they don't wanna be on there. So Yeah. It's just I don't think I didn't remember. We talked about the that condition before. So Yeah. Last last meeting. Not to have both required. But anyway, we'll figure that out to me. Yep. Thank you. And then I'll bring that, and then that'll come before the charter will come before remember, we talked about the charter that will come before the board at the second meeting
in February, board meeting. All right. So we'll learn more about that. Then, all right. Any other items? All right. With no objection then, we will adjourn to 02/04/2026, 1PM in Lane Auditorium. Thank you, everyone.