Board of Supervisors Adjourned Meeting - Legislative Forum   11/4/2022

I will call this meeting to order.

Before proceeding, I do need to announce that Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley has requested to participate remotely in accordance with applicable Board Rules of Procedure Rule 8B-1B enacted pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act.

She is unable to attend the meeting in person recording in progress.

Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley, will you please state your location?

Yes, I am in Keswick, Virginia.

All right, thank you.

I will make a motion to allow Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley to participate remotely.

Is there a second?

Second.

Ms.

Ms.

Ms.

Mallek?

Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley of the Rivanna District is participating remotely, Supervisor Jim Andrews of the Samuel Miller District, Supervisor Ned Gallaway of the Rio District, Supervisor Diantha McKeel of the Jack Jouett District, and Supervisor Ann Mallek of the White Hall District.

I'm Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District.

We also have present our County Executive, Mr. Jeff Richardson, our County Attorney, Mr. Steve Rosenberg, and our Clerk, Ms.

Claudette Orkerson.

I also want to thank our Albemarle County police officers who are just outside the room, Officer Ben Chisholm and Officer Steve McCall.

Again, we thank you for your service every day to protect us.

I'd like to welcome our congressional, our legislative delegation with us present in person.

We have Senator Cree Deeds, Delegate Rob Bell participating remotely is Delegate Chris Runyon and also present in person is Delegate Sally Hudson.

And with that, thank you all for being here.

It's such an important meeting for us every year.

We look forward to it.

We appreciate the time that you and your staffs have taken to be ready for this meeting.

With that, I'll turn it over to David Blunt of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission to our legislative liaison to TSR.

Good morning.

Thank you, Chair Price.

It's great to be here with you all this morning.

I wanted to spend just a few minutes

to go over primarily the draft legislative program for the TJPDC region and the priorities in that program.

They're going to be up for approval in the different jurisdictions actually here in November.

I believe they're on the agenda for your meeting on November the 16th.

Three top priorities this year.

The first one being public education funding that continues to kind of resonate across all the localities in the region as a top issue.

That being state support for K-12 education, specifically requesting the state to fully fund its share of realistic cost of the standards of quality.

It's a position that's been in the regional program for a number of years.

What's new this year too, that position statement is requesting more flexibility in the use of state funding when state compensation increases for school employees are awarded.

There's also a new statement encouraging state support for adequate pipeline programs for teachers, especially in critical shortage areas.

and some emphasis on supporting funding and policies that assist localities in addressing challenges in hiring school bus drivers.

And it will resonate with some of the work that's going on with the county school.

The second priority position relates to budgets and funding.

This is what I call the perennial.

We support increased state aid, we don't want unfunded mandates, and we support the preservation of local revenue authority position.

So it kind of takes in all of those items in one position statement.

What's new in this position this year is some specific language to urge the preservation of the local options sales tax.

And as you know, that was somewhat in the crosshairs during this past General Assembly session during the discussion about eliminating the tax on sales tax and groceries.

And then the third priority statement relates to broadband expansion.

I'm not proposing anything new in this statement this year.

This is a general statement in support of state and federal efforts for expanding broadband access to unserved areas.

As you know, we are very grateful at TJPDC that this has happened in terms of a lot of money that's being put forth, ARPA funding running through the state.

And TJPDC is working with Firefly Broadband,

to expand broadband access across 13 counties in the great central Virginia area.

So we're saying keep it up in that area.

Just wanted to point out a couple of other positions outside of the priorities that are part of the ongoing legislative position statements that are being addressed.

One is to add some specific language to support the and acknowledge and support the school construction assistance programs that were enacted this past General Assembly session and certainly maintaining the statement that was introduced into the program last year.

in support of local governments having the authority to enact the one-cent sales tax for school construction.

Secondly, I wanted to draw your attention to Freedom of Information Act, and you know we had some legislation this past year that provided some additional flexibility.

The TJPDC commission met last night and endorsed a letter that we will be sending

out to a number of legislators as well as to you all at the local level that asks for even additional flexibility and authority, particularly as it relates to holding electronic meetings.

I believe Supervisor Galloway will speak to that a little bit later on.

And then finally, there's some new language in a position statement on housing, really just trying to place some additional emphasis on local authority and incentives as it relates to providing housing benefits.

So those are kind of the high points of the draft legislative program for the region.

Thank you.

The broadband, at least what your folks tell me, the take rate that fireflies get in Albemarle County is probably one of the highest take rates in the country for a broadband.

If that rate is, if I understood it correctly,

It's really impressive.

BARC was the first co-op in the state to take on broadband, but Firefly has far exceeded what they've done, and they're basically the role model for the other co-ops.

In fact, they're managing the work for other co-ops around the Commonwealth, so they're setting the trend.

We were lucky to have them.

I think that we'll have the same roadblocks we have before, we're just going to have to find a way to work around them.

And just because you've got a roadblock doesn't mean you don't try to work around them.

So we'll try that.

I'm certainly interested in the rest

with public education funding, because the governor's going to propose a tax cut that just about equals the amount of funding that it would take to work for us, for this economy to share or to provide 100% of the funding for standards of poverty.

So we're going to go with the basic challenge in budgeting.

And at the end, it's going to be very difficult.

There's got to be some compromise to get something done.

So that's kind of a challenge from the outset.

Thank you, Senator.

I was listening.

I think that all of us who represent parts of the county I represent have had regular constituent concerns about their provision of services through CenturyLink.

and most of us have tried a combination of carrots, sticks, sticky carrots, cherry sticks.

Just to provide the service that people believe that they are already paying for.

So of the agenda that you've described, one of the more exciting things would at least be to provide an option.

One of the issues has been

There are not other options for people in those areas.

They're stuck with this or nothing.

So that's always been the trade-off of I don't, this is really unacceptable and yet my other option seems to be nothing.

This will be helped by some options.

Thank you

The lion's share of the growth in our unanticipated revenue at the state level is coming from taxes derived from investments.

So rising corporate profits and rising corporate markups over the last two years, we've seen a big growth, about 75% of the growth is coming from the taxes that come off personal investments.

This is your dividends and your IRAs and all of those.

and then also the corporate profit tax.

So that's a smaller hunk of our state budget.

That's exactly the money that comes back to Virginia because we're a good place to do business.

that if we're thinking about trying to attract businesses here that value an educated workforce and sound housing and transportation, we have to when those tax revenues come in, we have to invest them back in Virginia in the characteristics that make this an attractive place to live and work and to run a business.

And so I think it's really misguided for I think the messaging that the governor is using around

the unanticipated revenue when he says you know this we didn't expect this money to come in and it means Virginians are being overtaxed and it means we need to give this money back to the taxpayer this money is coming in because corporate pockets are soaring the payouts to investors are rising in tandem and that's money we should be investing back in a lot of things that we've been neglecting like our teachers and our school construction so I think that um it's it's on us I think to do

The Broadband Bid

I think, though, we're all very excited about the expansion we've seen.

I know we've also seen pockets of the county that have had their internet service provider pack up and leave unexpectedly.

I'm sure you've all heard from constituents about that, too.

One of the things that I learned in that process was that the State Corporation Commission has no authority over broadband as a utility, despite the dramatic expansion of what is now a lifeblood utility for any family, which is internet access.

And so I am working with a colleague to see what we can do about getting the State Corporation Commission appropriate oversight over broadband so that we then have the full suite of consumer protection tools that we would for any other utility.

At this point broadband is essential as water and electric, and we don't really have a strong framework right now in Virginia.

for dealing with consumer protection of broadband customers.

So I think that's something that we have to start thinking about at an institutional level.

All right, thank you.

Delegate Runyon, if we could.

Thank you.

So I appreciate that.

And, you know, I share the concern.

Actually, I share the appreciation that we're putting significant resources into broadband.

The concerns that I hear from the portion of Albemarle that I represent is they feel like there's been a delay or a slowness in implementation and extremely concerned about that.

I guess we're not surprised that our constituents feel frustration.

Everything seems to be slower than we'd like for it to be in this environment.

But I do see us moving along.

The beam pullout was certainly a setback.

I think altogether about 1,300 constituents.

in the 25th district were impacted in a negative fashion and seems to be some movement forward that may help some of those.

But Delegate Hudson's comment about that we've moved into an era that broadband has a much higher level of attention

and whether it should be regulated as a utility or what appropriate level to be regulated.

I think those things make sense and we anticipate having those type discussions so that our constituents have the opportunity to be treated fairly and that we can move our economy forward on that.

Quality issues, I share Delegate Bell's concern that the existing providers, they're never going to win any Chick-fil-A awards, let's say.

All right, thank you.

Yes, good morning.

Well, if you have any comments about what Mr. Blunt just presented,

Yes, thank you very much.

Yes, I'm very much interested in broadband and just bring everyone up to date.

I did speak with just this week the presidents of SEVEC Firefly and also Dominion, and it looks like Albemarle will not be getting, will not be fully, shall we say, fibrored up until they're saying the end of 25.

So they're hoping it'll be before then, but that's what's happening.

That is a big issue with me.

But now, otherwise, I support everything that David has said.

Thank you, Supervisor Galloway.

I'll speak to the virtual meeting and the electronic participation when we go through our packet.

I'm very disappointed to hear the news about the issues for education.

All right.

Thank you.

Supervisor Andrews?

In support of the thing that you pointed out, I will comment briefly that to the extent that unanticipated revenues were from taxes on dividends that

Thank you.

and so cute, funny things.

And to speak to what Sally was pointing out, one of the things that makes Virginia attractive to businesses is quality education systems that their employees can access.

So it really behooves Virginia to make sure that we maintain a high quality public education system.

The state corporation continues.

And maybe I just want to ask this question while I have you.

I was recently reading that they were not operating very strongly right now, that they were missing some membership.

Has that been resolved?

So that's my concern, because if they're not operating and they have an empty seat, then when we're trying to get them to help us,

I'm just trying to get quickly if you could just help me.

I think the conversations continue to take place about filling that slot.

It was inexcusable that we couldn't come up with something.

There's plenty of people out there.

We live in a world where we have to compromise about these things.

Democrats can't get their way.

Republicans can't get their way.

We have to compromise.

We just weren't able to do it this past year.

We tried probably from January to September.

I will say over the years, I've referred constituents to report issues and

No, the state corporation commission is still functioning and still doing its job.

The work of the commission is done by staff.

Well, I understand that.

There are three judges that kind of make the decisions.

Right now, if there's a tie vote, there's nobody to break that vote.

Well, I remain very concerned and hope that gets resolved pretty quickly.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, and thank you, David, for putting those out.

Certainly for the continual need to fix the, I guess it's legislative authority that the SEC could be given to better regulate

the kinds of communication company issues that we are having and have been having for 15 years here.

And only when Central Bank was getting ready to run all its assets did the locality have any ability to say anything.

And I think we were very successful.

Went down there with a stack of complaints this high and multiple people testified all across the region.

And I think hopefully the

Restrictions of the conditions that were put on the sale will give us a little bit of recourse, but I was horrified to learn that they really have no authority to do much for us in that, except for the declared utilities.

So I hope that you all will think about ways that you can expand their authority to these, what do they call them, non-utility communication companies, because

We're all being taken to the cleaners and our constituents are being taken to the cleaners.

And what is now the end of twenty five was going to be the end of twenty two.

And we just get continually the whole of the Commonwealth being hunted down the road and people out of the country are taking all the profits.

I'm sad about that.

From the workforce point of view, echoing just a different point of view for the SOQs and the strength of education, the state workforce board, the one we hear the most

is from employers who say I can't find employees who have the basic skills.

I will give them the final skills.

You know, so nobody's going to go work for some proprietary company and be trained by somebody else.

They're going to be trained on site, but they must have the skills to be nimble and quick and being right and work together in groups and all those kinds of things.

And I think there's great appreciation for the support for the certificate programs and not requiring

I'm one of the constituents who recently lost Chantelle Beame and have had to go back to Centering, Link, Lumen, BrightSpeed.

I think they're going to be called Solent or something going forward.

And I constantly find my internet is buffering and it loses the signal.

And frankly, I have to use my cell phone hotspot more often than I'm using the BrightSpeed internet because it does not work.

And you cannot sit there and get things done when you're constantly waiting for there to be a reaction.

Upload 1.4, download or download 1.4, upload 0.4, if I'm lucky.

That's where we are in Charlottesville as well, just like yours.

Now, I want to commend Gary Wood of CBEC and Firefly.

I was at a presentation about two years ago, and I was so impressed when he talked about how he offered to the Internet providers, you can use my polls.

And they said, yeah, as long as we are going to make a lot of money off of it, we're not going to do those people who live out into the hinterlands.

We only want money back.

And he said no customer will be left behind.

And that's what they're doing.

But we have a major problem in Albemarle County in that many of our residents live down the, you know, the hollows and the valleys, and the pass-by is well beyond 650 feet.

In many of these instances, and I happen to be one of those as well, so, you know, full disclosure, it's well over 2,500 feet from the main road to where the residence is located.

That is very common in Albemarle County.

So we not only need the attitude that Mr. Woods has shown to make sure that no customer is left behind, but we need to ensure that there is affordability for the connectivity where those passbys happen to take place.

And I concur with the disappointment that 2022 is now, if we're lucky, going to be 2025.

Thank you.

How far will Firefly go down the driveway without charging?

Well, the information that I'm getting is that they are looking to be very supportive beyond the 650 feet that has previously been.

I'm not going to

Thank you, Chair Price.

Chair Price, if I may add, I was trying to look back on the application for the BODI 2022 grants, finding it readily, but I believe Firefly has

That's an incredible increase.

Thank you.

I'd like to extend good morning to members of the board and members of the local delegation of the General Assembly.

I'm Steve Rosenberg.

I've been the county attorney here for the last three months, so I'm new to the position.

For the county, I'd like to thank the members of the delegation for participating in today's meeting.

We have a lot of significant territory to cover, so I'll move forward with a review of the legislative priorities of those Board of Supervisors for the upcoming 2023 session.

And initially, I'd like to recap the board's process for the development of its priorities.

So on June 15th, the board took a look back at its 2022 efforts and the legislation that was enacted in response to those efforts and the legislation that failed and began a discussion of possible priorities for 2023.

In September, the board continued discussion of its priorities package.

And then in October, on October 19th, the board did adopt its priorities for the 2023 session, as well as some legislative positions and policy statements.

And I myself was educated in the process as to the distinction between these two.

So we'll cover seven legislative priorities that are the board's primary initiatives for the upcoming session and then there's a separate set of positions and policy statements that has also been adopted by the board as in years past that

of no less importance, but far broader in scope to just set forth the board's views on all sorts of subjects that may be the subject of legislation spearheaded by others during the session.

And then, of course, today we have this meeting with the members of the delegation.

So let me, I just want to note for the members of the delegation that you have, and delegate Runyon, I don't know if this was emailed to you.

I think, okay, so I'm getting some some nods up and down.

So you have this four page 2023 legislative priorities document, and this is going to be the focus of my remarks for the next 10 minutes or so.

The first three of the priorities will be familiar to you all because they're returning from the 2022 session and so I won't spend a lot of time on those but I'll just review them at a very high level and then there are four new priorities that

are the subject of the board's efforts for the first time this year.

So the three carryover priorities from the 2022 session, the first one is to enable civil penalties in lieu of criminal punishment for violations of local ordinances.

As you all will recall, Delegate Hudson carried a bill, House Bill 627 last session,

that failed in committee.

The board continues to desire this authority to transition from criminal punishment to civil penalties for certain violations of county ordinances and just to give you some concrete examples the county code includes

prohibitions on smoking in certain public places, unlawful destruction of trees, curfews for minors, and destroying or failing to return library books.

So those are examples of the sorts of ordinances that are presently punishable as crimes and they could be transitioned to a civil penalty scheme.

The next priority, also, again, returning from 2022, is to expand the authority of the county to use photo speed monitoring devices.

There were two bills last session, House Bill 630 carried by Delegate Hudson and 747 carried by Delegate Bail, both of which failed in committee.

I won't delve too deeply here.

other than to direct your attention to the rationale for the board's inclusion of this priority and its package.

And we've added to that really to note the additional safety

that would be afforded by law enforcement officers who are often called upon to run radar on some dangerous and winding segments of roads in the county without

any sort of a shoulder with the drop-offs and so this tool subject to all of the other requirements that are anticipated as a part of a photo monitoring program would provide additional protection to our law enforcement officers in enforcing current speed regulations in the county.

The third

Returning priority from the last session is to require agricultural buildings used by the public to be subject to minimum safety standards.

This piece of legislation was adopted by the General Assembly last year, Senate Bill 400, that I believe Senator Hanger

led the way on.

And I do also want to express appreciation to delegates Hudson and Runyon and Senator Deed for their support of this legislation.

take stock of where we are now.

The legislation requires that the Board of Housing and Community Development promulgate safety regulations for what are called agritourism event buildings.

That's the newly defined term in the state code.

and an agritourism event building is one located on property where farming operations or agritourism takes place, which is primarily used for holding events and entertainment gatherings open to the public of 300 people or less.

The legislation also establishes an agritourism event structure technical advisory committee.

That's a mouthful.

to assist the Board of Housing and Community Development in its administration of the new requirements.

And that body, that committee has actually organized and met.

But none of the required regulations has yet been drafted because the legislation includes a reenactment clause.

And so to become effective, as you know, it must be adopted again during the upcoming session.

And so for this reason, the board requests your continued support of this particular priority.

Moving on then to the four new priorities of the board and some of this may sound familiar from David's remarks concerning the PDC legislative program.

The first priority is to grant the county taxing authority for school division capital projects.

This would involve an amendment to title 58.1 to make Albemarle eligible to levy an additional 1% retail sales tax for the purpose of funding school division capital projects.

There are really two approaches here one is to open this authority up to all localities in the Commonwealth.

The other would be specific legislation to add Albemarle County to the

the nine other counties that already have that authority, Charlotte, Gloucester, Halifax, Henry, Mecklenburg, Northampton, Patrick, and Pennsylvania, and the one city, Dangel.

So there are two different approaches there.

I think as Senator Deeds has already noted, there's a requirement for a referendum.

So even if this legislation is enacted, authorizing the county to exercise this authority to impose an additional retail sales tax,

would require approval by the voters in a referendum, and that approval would only be valid for a period of 20 years.

The second new priority is to change the eligibility requirements for the Virginia Business Ready Sites program.

This is, as you know, a program of the Virginia Economic Development.

Program, a partnership that provides both site characterization and site development grants to localities for industrial sites located in those localities.

I think the county does participate in the site characterization grant program.

but is presently only able to, is limited in its ability to participate in the site development grant program because of the absence of contiguous developable

parcels of 100 acres or more located in the county.

So the board's proposal would be to reduce the minimum site acreage from 100 contiguous developable acres to 50.

And again, there are alternatives here that could be implemented on either a statewide basis or by adding Go Virginia Region 9 in which the county is located to the list of other regions, which include Go Virginia Regions 1 and 2.

where the lower threshold is already applicable.

So there's precedent for a 50 acre threshold.

And my understanding is that one of the reasons for the lower acre threshold in those two regions is due to the topography

of the regions, and I would suggest to you that those same topographical challenges which exist in regions one and two also exist here in Albemarle County.

So as I said,

The county is doing what it can, taking advantage of site characterization grants.

It also is currently collaborating with the University of Virginia Foundation in an effort to obtain a site development grant from VEDP in the university's North Fork Discovery Park.

And that is the one site that is eligible in the county under the current guidelines.

Can I ask, what do you prefer?

Maybe I was a sentence or two behind you.

What, are there sites in mind that would fit the new that don't fit the old?

In other words, if this is done

We all live here.

I don't have detail in terms of location within the county, but we have conferred with the county's Economic Development Office and this would be a meaningful change.

because maybe at some point email us.

I'd ask Madam Chair, follow up.

Yes, please.

Could staff at some point just give us, if they have a list of, if this makes it from the one north of town to five, maybe they could share with us where those five are and what they would, what parcels they would be.

And then I guess the more general question would be

those of us who've been around a while and recall various proposals being made and various reactions of what the county thought would be great and ones that we kind of started the process and when it got to county they said this is not what we're looking for.

So I'll tell you, Bill, thank you for the question.

I'm going to remind you that I'm relatively new to my position.

So I'm going to go out on a limb here.

And I believe that the county's strategic economic development plan is project enable.

And that was just, well, Mr. Richardson, can you help me?

Yes, Project Enable is the economic development strategic plan.

It was adopted in October of 2017.

That plan is now five years old.

Roger Johnson, who is the county's economic development director, who's been here four years, has been working diligently.

We have a small and nimble team that works and focused on Albemarle County, where the primary focus is supporting business

businesses and industries that are already here to sustain and to grow those companies.

And let me back up.

And so in the fall of 2022, the Board of Supervisors had that project enabled strategic plan adopted with the full support in a joint session with our planning commission and also with our EDA.

So it was three boards that met at the same time

That's about 20 folks in the room and it was unanimously supported by all three of those boards and it has been a scalpel approach across Albemarle County over those five years with the work that we've done to

support our community and support our strategic plan.

Recently, what Ms.

Rosenberg is talking about is that the board just approved its 24 to 29 strategic plan.

And in that adoption of our strategic plan, the board supported our recommendation.

I do know, sir, that we've worked in the last year with several existing businesses and companies in our county, and we've worked hard to look for

But when we looked at Willow Tree, they were in the city.

And we're out of space and we're going to leave this area.

So we were able to offer up a site in the county for will and treat the existing business that we did not want to lose.

So, and I guess if I had a few minutes, we could come up with some other examples, but

I guess, as I sometimes say, you are assuming I know more than I do.

You're answering a better question than I asked.

I was more basic.

If I was asking what would be the, we hear it would be a grade A plus, let's go get it.

And are there some that frankly are not what you see, what you're looking for?

In terms of a business looking I guess I'm thinking of to move here just because obviously the ones that are here are a discrete group but I mean I vaguely know what Willetry does as a business.

Would that be a good example of something we would really want to see if someone else was looking to move somewhere that would be an Albemarle?

Sometimes we could look to the Albemarle Business Campus that's in current development out on 5th Street extended as the type that would be some new would likely be some new industry that would come in.

It would be more around medical, pharmaceutical creation, development of the vaccines, things like that that could happen in the area that falls perfectly in line with

Well, Project Enable is about supporting businesses that are here and helping them grow.

So Rob, I would add to that, that we're really trying to partner with UVA, a lot of entrepreneurs that are coming out of UVA, and we'd like to keep them here and not lose them.

A great example of what we have in the way of

People don't even know that manufacturing is happening over there, but it's multiple manufacturing groups.

Northrop Grumman is another example.

you know, where they're doing this work already.

Those are the types of, um, industries.

I'd say largely what we're looking at in STEM industries.

Yes.

Um, we're not looking to do iron and steel.

Right.

Um, we're not, um,

particularly looking to bring in large warehouse type operations.

We are a highly educated, largely technical locale, and it's those sort of technology, biotechnology, engineering in the new age that, again, as mentioned, you don't necessarily need 100 acres for that.

So if we could get

This is maybe a question for Mr. Flunt.

Is this a conversation that you've had with our companions on the other side of the Blue Ridge in like Planning District 6 and 7?

Because it would seem to me if I'm just a neutral party as a legislator and we're trying to make the case that the Blue Ridge doesn't stop at Amherst, but there are

There are localities that stretch down the mountains.

It would seem to me more equitable to try to team up with the localities on either side of the Blue Ridge and say, hey, you left us out.

This is especially timely.

I read an article just the other day about what Virginia doesn't have and other states have are large sites ready for

They gave a couple of examples of Virginia losing automobile manufacturers to South Carolina and Mississippi or whatever.

I get where Rob's coming from.

What do you want?

Are you really ready for one of those type business?

And what I heard you say is basically you're interested in somebody who's going to commercialize some sort of research here at the university and that you've got some of that already.

This might allow you to generate more.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Can I ask Mr. Blunt a question?

You talk outside the circles that the rest of us do, so presumably this would have already happened if there weren't some reason why it might not.

We were asking to add to

500 acre, I don't even know what a huge site would be.

My sense, and there had been just a very small pot of money available for site development, and I think it was only like five or $10 million until the big influx that the General Assembly approved in this past year.

You know, if you go and you look at the language in the budget, there was emphasis, I guess, given on consideration by the EDP of what they're calling megasites, and that's the over 1000s.

Huge.

And there was just,

I think another one of these rankings that came out a couple of days ago were Virginia in terms of its business sites readiness ranked at the top, but one of the efficiencies was in sites above 250.

So, you know, my sense is that maybe that's more the focus right now at the EDP, but certainly they have made the allowance to put in a statute, you know, for those as

Thank you.

So two remaining priorities that are part of the board's initiatives.

There's already been mention made of a desire to

amend the Freedom of Information Act to make more permissive the current provisions related to electronic meetings.

and as proposed that the changes would grant to all Virginia localities the authority to hold all meetings of public bodies virtually.

And there would be no limits to the number of meetings that could be held virtually.

And I think, you know, the rationale here is that this, you know, we've seen how

The virtual meetings born of the pandemic have led to increased participation on the part of the public and they've made it easier for bodies including advisory boards and commissions to

provide input to city councils and boards of supervisors.

And there are guardrails that exist under the amended legislation that ought to provide the safeguards and protections that we would want to ensure that these meetings are conducted openly, transparently, and in a way that

maximizes public participation and input.

So the current restrictions preclude virtual meetings by city and town councils and boards of supervisors, school boards, planning commissions, architectural review boards, and zoning appeals boards.

So those particular bodies, except in limited circumstances, emergencies,

For example, those bodies may not conduct electronic meetings or meet virtually.

Individual members may under certain circumstances, but the entire body may not.

And so the

the proposal would expand to permit those bodies to meet electronically.

And then the current restrictions are such that bodies that are authorized to conduct virtual meetings are limited in the number that they may conduct per year annually, not more than two meetings or 25%, whichever is greater.

And they also cannot hold

consecutive virtual meetings.

So if an advisory board, we have community advisory committees here all over the county, and they may meet virtually, but if they meet virtually on one occasion, they can't meet virtually on the next occasion.

And so we've seen that the virtual meetings, the electronic meetings make it easier for people to participate not only

members of the public, but also the members of the particular order commission.

I would love to hear you all reflect on this one because it's an area where I confess that I'm still very undecided and I know that all of you take civic engagement very seriously and I'm sure that you've thought a lot about this one.

My one General Assembly session on Zoom was terrible.

I mean, there was something very seriously lost from the inability to engage the people who could grab you in the hallway.

and maybe that's more important to the warp speed environment of the General Assembly.

You all do something way more sane than what we do.

But I'm still forming my opinions about this one.

And in particular, I'm less concerned about the ongoing governing of this body, where you all are very serious servants, but recognize that there are county boards I have not met all over the commonwealth.

And I worry some about what increased access to virtual meetings does to people who are less intentionally accessible to their constituents.

So I think the pandemic allowed us to prove that the FOIA and the notice of giving notice of meetings was able to be adhered to.

And I think if you had boards that you feel would do something nefarious, would probably do so even if they were meeting in person.

Late night meetings, not giving proper notice, doing it in a way that violates FOIA.

So the virtual meetings allows, in my view,

greater participation, not just for those who want to interact with those who legislate, but those who can legislate or want to legislate.

We have a long tradition of part-time legislators in Virginia, and virtual meetings embraces that tradition and allows it to be done by more.

I work full-time.

The virtual meeting showed, not just for the board meeting, but allowed me to do my job more effectively.

And I think there are those who would not participate, do not participate because they have full time jobs because of the physical demands of being in a certain place at a certain time.

So I think it's up to each locality that would have to decide the what and why.

How would we make our virtual, like I don't think our board would choose to be virtually in our board.

I think our citizen advisory committees and some of those we might figure that out.

But each locality should be trusted to figure that out for themselves and be held accountable by their voters for that.

So that's the authority.

In Virginia, local governments are always asking for the authority to figure things out on their own, and that's really for me what this is about.

So the what and the why

You know, we could probably debate about, but what I would say that I think is different now than at the start or even in the first year of the pandemic is the who.

You know, last night at the TJPDC, you know, there's a lot of times in our region where Charlottesville and Albemarle has a different voice than our other fellow members in the TJPDC on political issues.

But you have Greene County, Louisa County, Nelson County, Livanna County, Albemarle County, and the City of Charlottesville all saying the same thing on this.

And nobody's nitpicking details.

They're saying, look, this is easier and more effective for us as legislators, and it's more easy and more effective for those who we serve.

And this just makes good sense.

and when I, you know, as the current chair of the TJTDC, when I'm sitting in the room and I see all the counties and all the participants nodding in agreement on something, to me that goes, oh, here we go.

That's not a party thing.

So, um, I think, uh, like supervisor Barlow made in these account, who I, I suspect on political issues, he and I probably diverge, but he, he inspired me then for the next week, speak to my board.

And it's about the same piece.

It's both citizen participation, legislator participation, opening up the doors, those who want to participate in either.

And in my opinion, this is a way that goes, wow, Virginia takes part time legislators seriously.

This is a tool that helps us embrace that tradition.

Yeah, to piggyback on those comments, I would say that this goes hand in hand with broadband access and allowing people to participate in their government more effectively.

And I do think that the numbers that we have in front of me when it comes to community participation and public observation of what's going on in committees and its mobility to interact.

When we were on Zoom, people could do, a lot more people watching meetings and being aware of what's going on.

And then when forced to go in person, you don't have the capability of providing all of these committees the kind of internet resources that would be needed to make it so that

The public could participate in the meeting, yet now the meeting could be held in person.

And so being able to call the meeting, to the virtual meeting, where the public is allowed to come in to watch, to be part of, if they need to make public comment, is really helpful.

So I strongly support this.

I concur exactly what these two folks just said.

We have an open position right now on a board.

It is not an advisory board, but it is a board that we work with very closely.

I called two people trying to get them, two minority applicants, the people that I was hoping to get them to apply, and they said,

I would love to put my application in for that board, but I cannot because they meet on Wednesday morning in the middle of the day and I can't leave my job.

That is a barrier for me to apply.

If we had that Zoom option or electronic option, then we, I think, could increase our

participation in many of our boards and commissions, advisory, whatever, and diversified, right?

Because whether it's younger people that are not just retired, right, or women, men, just diversity, marginalized communities, I think it would open up those boards and commissions and committees to more diversity.

Just an example.

and I guess I can, I think I'll stop at that, because I know we're in shorter time.

Just two more examples.

Seniors or people of any age who can't drive at night have been absolutely precluded from participating in our evening, the public hearing things, when people you would expect would want to be able to do things more.

And I think at our advisory committees who would benefit from this kind of expansion, the same,

for the help to get those ideas in the room.

And I understand your perspective in the General Assembly of having it be weird or when you were all in your little glass boxes and so we're watching this.

I mean, that looked very painful.

But for someone who has been trucking down to Richmond against the sun at rush hour for 25 years to try to catch you guys in the hall, it is spectacular to be able to be multitasking at home while I wait the three hours for the committee to get to the item that I would like to speak to.

And even if I don't get to sign up, or don't get there, even if I've signed up and they don't get to me because there are too many other people, at least I've had an opportunity to send.

So just supervisor Galloway's point that the body that's going to do the nefarious thing will do it anyway.

We'd really like to be able to listen to you for that.

Yes.

Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley.

Yes.

I also think it's very important to be able to let other bodies, not necessarily the Board of Supervisors, I like to meet in person, but our committees and such to be able to meet virtually because of the driving distance that some of the people have to do.

Also, I'm on the Historic Preservation Committee.

We haven't met for four or five months.

We can't get a quorum.

And we almost had a quorum and one person at the last minute couldn't come.

It was all in person.

And if it would have been virtual, probably would have been able to get a quorum.

The other thing, our police foundation committee, which I'm on, we meet every other month.

So I think it's very important to be able to meet virtually.

And all of my community advisory committees are asking to meet virtually.

because we haven't had a problem during the pandemic of being able to get a quorum and being able to listen to everybody.

And I agree with Supervisor Galloway.

Actually, pardon me, all the supervisors, but I agree with Supervisor Galloway.

Just let each entity, each locality decide for themselves which is best.

I agree with everything that's been said with two exceptions.

I believe elected bodies should be required to meet in person and offer a hybrid option for their constituencies.

So the school board and the board of supervisors should be required to meet, but provide a hybrid option so that residents who are not able to attend in person

are able to participate virtually and I believe the locality has an obligation to provide open sites such as libraries for those residents who are not able to get internet at home are able to participate because the problem with allowing all of the meetings to go virtual without providing an opportunity for those who the download speed of 1.4 and uploaded 0.4 if it's working

means that you have eliminated their opportunity to participate.

But by requiring all of those committees and councils and boards to meet in person, you are eliminating many of the people who have jobs or family obligations and are not able to be there.

But I have a basic problem, even if they may do it nefariously, I have a basic problem with allowing elected bodies to meet totally virtually.

I think the hybrid method that we use here works perfectly well.

People can come, they can participate from home, but I believe that we as elected officials have an obligation to be in person in front of our constituency when we meet.

The other committees and everything should be able to meet virtually.

We need to provide an opportunity for those who don't have good internet.

And we should not require localities to provide the hybrid option for all of those committees because of the resource obligations that would be necessary to provide that personnel, financial facilities.

Chair Price, if I might.

How great would it be for each locality to have their representatives have that conversation?

But if you don't have the authority to do it, we can't have that debate among ourselves for what we think is best for our constituents.

We sometimes say we try to legislate bills, not ideas.

This is the reason.

So it's a question I've been taking all these notes for.

This would allow entirely virtual meetings to gather that proposal.

That's correct.

That's a little different than what Chair Price is talking about.

And some of what she is saying addresses some of the same reservations I was writing down about.

It's one thing to say we want the public to participate.

It's one thing to say there should be a way to watch and also chime in as opposed to

saying that the meeting itself is virtual.

There's no place for those to go who actually want to see it in person or the internet just doesn't work.

And when you all have some late meetings, the idea of the library have to stay open to provide a screen so that someone in Scottsville can watch, I don't think is, I mean, it's a big deal.

I understand what Supervisor Galloway is saying.

He said, well, for those of us that want to work it out if we can, but

I guess I don't want to, I don't know where Delegate Hudson is anymore, so I don't want to associate necessarily her with me.

I won't do that to you, but I have some of the reservations that she shared and that you are saying about the ultimate meeting itself not having a place where you could go and watch.

It may be great for 95% of people.

It might be easier.

A lot of them may choose to do it by screen.

but I had the same observation she had about fully virtual meetings not being 95% as good as in Marissa meetings, not being 75% as good, but a very appreciable degradation of the work product that we did when it was all virtual.

It wasn't the time we were on the floor at screens that was also lousy.

It was the one where literally we're sitting in our basement scattered around Virginia and I found it was, I did, I was not, it wasn't the fact that the, I wasn't getting the votes I wanted, it was actually just the,

I offered as a possibility a library.

We cannot provide a mechanism that is perfect for every resident.

This is a topic, obviously, we've had a lot of conversations about enrichment, and we've got to break down all party lines.

You're going to have people on both parties that are on both sides of this issue.

The Senate, we didn't meet all.

We met at the library or at the science medium, scattered out.

Now, two things we benefited from in that session.

One is we went to committee rooms that weren't any lobbyists.

They were like everybody.

They were put in the same position as everybody else in a virtual world.

They could appear.

They could testify.

That's right.

Second thing was that whether you were from Bristol or Virginia Beach or Arlington, you didn't have to get up at the crack of dawn or spend the night before in Richmond.

You could appear before your state legislature.

We've had to save that element and allow people to appear before committees on Zoom when they want to participate, if they want to have input.

and I think, I get, you know, the people who are working at noon aren't going to be able to do Zoom and neither are most of them.

Well, during the lunch hour, maybe.

Yeah.

Well, I think Ned's a great example of being able to suit from work.

I'm certainly sympathetic.

I just don't want us to think that in-person meetings are perfect either.

We have this idea that meeting in person solves all these other issues that we're saying are the reservations for virtual.

And let their, their residents and their voters hold them accountable.

They can hold their, they can hold their own, their political accountable.

They don't allow public to participate.

They're going to be voted out.

This is Delegate Runyon.

I would like to offer in that I concur with the comments of my colleagues for the most part.

And I think for me, their perspective needs to be from the citizens' eyes.

And so I'm supportive of allowing them multiple venues to communicate

and Engage and all virtual meeting.

You may have the opportunity to participate, but I think you need to define the participation.

You are very easily able to observe.

You are very difficult, able to engage.

And so I think that the live option needs to be really the default.

And I think our system needs to allow for citizens to have a virtual option.

I was just looking at the scheduling and trying to see if all of us have different things.

I actually thought we were done at 11.

I just wanted to say thank you and express particularly to Supervisor Galloway that for me I sort of entered this conversation about where you entered the ranked choice conversation this morning which was this is an issue that I know a lot of people have thought deeply about and I have not yet invested that time and so I thank you all for taking the time and hearing you all share your very

Bridgeton.

He launched perspective on it.

It was very valuable.

Thank you.

Yes, and before I move on to that last one, just if I can make one more observation, and this comes from, you know, 25 years in the public sector and most of that in local government, both with cities and counties, urban and rural,

Delegate Bell, you were talking about what goes on on the floor of the House of Delegates and how that contributes to the legislative process.

My personal experience from the seat that I've been in all of those years is that, and you're going to be far more familiar with the General Assembly than I am, but my sense is that what occurs at the General Assembly is different than what occurs

at a local board of supervisors meeting or a local city council meeting where you don't see much of the off to the side recesses with conversations amongst lawmakers.

It's more conducting business, almost entirely conducting business at the dais from the moment the gavel hits until it's time to go.

to go home.

I don't want to be, we've been on this one topic and obviously it's one of the items.

I do think that we spent

versus 20 minutes to talk about how bad internet service is in parts of the county.

I understand that during COVID, we provided ways for families that had kids in school to, through multiple processes, have a place they could go.

And I think that having this as a tool is one thing.

In other words, allowing people to testify.

I think we've all found a rich one of the very things that, I guess things like Ann or

It is really neat to be able to tell someone you might have to wait a couple hours but in that time you can and you can do it from your kitchen.

That enables them to testify.

I think allowing them to watch where they can is also proven to be more useful than perhaps we thought it would be five or ten years ago.

It's the last step which would be and the entire meeting will be offline and if you don't have that access you can't

So moving on to the last priority identified by the board is in the land use arena and it's a proposal to allow for the expiration of special exceptions for short-term rentals in certain circumstances.

So this is

a proposed amendment to chapter 22 of title 15.2 that would allow the county to regulate short-term rentals by authorizing the county to provide for the expiration of a special exception for a short-term rental.

in certain circumstances.

So this would require the adoption of a local ordinance by the Board of Supervisors.

And so the issue here is that presently special exceptions and special use permits

they're said to run with the land.

So once they are granted by the governing body, the board supervisors in this case, then that's it.

And each successive property owner is entitled to the same right that comes to exist as a result of the board's land use approval.

So this particular proposal arises out of a concern

with the continued acquisition of residential properties in the county by businesses specifically for their operation as short-term rentals.

And so as proposed, the amendment would authorize the county to provide for the expiration of a special exception or a special use permit for a short-term rental on the occurrence of one of the following events.

a change of ownership of the property, a change in the owner of the business or the transfer of majority control of a business entity, a change in possession, a change in the operation or management of a facility, or the passage of a specific period of time.

So it could have a firm expiration date.

Currently, several localities, including

the cities of Hampton, Norfolk and Richmond have this kind of authority in a situation where they're considering a special exception or a special use permit relating to retail alcoholic beverage control licensees.

So if there's a particular land use that involves the sale of alcoholic beverages in those

three localities, they may impose these sorts of conditions on a special exception or a special use permit so that it no longer runs with the land, but it expires in those cases after, well,

after one of these events occurs, so that there's a limitation and the right does not continue indefinitely.

And again, the issue here is to address and attempt to address the increasing acquisition of these properties for short-term rental purposes not by private individuals, but by business entities that are in this business.

probably a legal question, but you're the right guy.

I don't know how hard, how did they get these in the first place?

Most of them are handled administratively by right use, but in a circumstance where the owner of the property is not an individual, where the owner of the property is a corporation or a limited liability company, or if the private owner of the property is unable to satisfy a

there's a requirement that the owner be present and residing on the property during the short-term rental stay use and where for one reason or another that requirement can't be satisfied then a special exception is required.

So in certain limited circumstances presently a special exception is required.

One of those is where

It's where the property is owned by the business entity and it's not because it's owned by the business entity as it's presently established, it's because the business entity can't establish

And when that happens, when it's granted, is it a sunset, an open, is there some?

No, that's the issue, that's the issue.

And then the exposed aspect of this, it could, so now you think there's an issue, can you start sunsetting from this point forward and this would be the ones that have already gone through the gate?

This would apply prospectively only to new applicants.

And you can't do that now, but if it's passed, you could then.

We have some questions about the authority to impose the requirement now.

And so this legislation would eliminate those questions.

And that concludes the presentation.

So, Senator Deeds, do you have any questions on that?

I think for the most part, my question's got answered.

I'm worried about special legislation.

It would be much easier if there were already a list, if we could find a way to get this last thing accomplished, because I get what you're trying to do.

I'm just, I'm worried about how you actually get something like this passed.

And something that certainly points out one county is special legislation requires a single majority.

It's very difficult.

Thank you.

I appreciate all the information.

I appreciate your answers to all of our questions along the way.

I hope in particular there are two where I think there's opportunity for conversation among the delegation about both local taxing authority for school division capital projects and also photo speed monitoring devices.

We have some of the members of

the committees that are charged with acting on that legislation.

And I know I understand that the outer is drawing late but I sure hope that there, I don't know what it would be but I wish we could continue the conversation about those because we have a lot of relevant parties here and we should be able to begin those.

I have become fully persuaded that I'm not sure what the possible solution to traffic fatalities from speeding on back roads could be if it doesn't include monitoring devices, I don't know.

But option C is.

Thank you.

Additional comments, I really appreciate being able to have this opportunity and it's very convenient to attend virtually and see the values when appropriate.

And the other thing I want to thank you all is you're well organized, you're concise, your laundry list is narrow and I appreciate that.

So I think that allows us to focus on the things that are important to the Commonwealth and we're not going to agree on everything, there's no doubt about that.

Thank you.

We'll go around one last time.

Any additional comments?

Thank you.

Supervisor Andrews?

Again, I very much appreciate your time and listening to us on the EU side.

I'd like to think that these are not really partisan requests for requests to help us come.

Supervisor McKeel?

We really appreciate it.

And Sally, who gave us another hour of her time for the rank choice voting, was great, too.

We appreciated that.

And I would just say on top of that, if you have any interest in touring some of the sites that we think of, not empty sites, but some of the sites that are doing the work that we're talking about, right?

We're happy.

Reach out to us.

And if I may, I'd add in there some of the businesses we've been able to retain, we've had success doing.

Yes sir.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Just quick quick notes I've written down just on these various topics.

The short term rentals ordinance we adopted was based upon individual homeowners being able to make a little extra money on football weekends, absolutely separate.

And we did not anticipate, as many other communities across the country have not anticipated, that this is now the new target for the real estate investment trust fund.

throughout the even more rural counties in Virginia.

I was reading recently just huge purchases of any empty property they can get their hands on from people far away.

And this is of great concern to communities.

They're losing their identity at some of the smaller communities that even vote higher than we are.

So I appreciate any help we can do with that.

And I know in other places I have lived, various has went with the land and special permits always were to the person.

That was much safer for everybody concerned, and it did not have the zone and flip, which is the cool thing that people love to do in Virginia.

So that's just off the print.

The photo speed cameras, three of the last 10 years, we had the highest number of highway fatalities in the performing world.

And that's not by population, that's everybody.

And that's horrifying.

But

Many of you have driven on Halfon Ranch and other places where these fatalities have happened, and it's almost universally been extremely high speed, in addition to no seat belts, but the extremely high speed has been the main thing.

And with 14,000 miles of roads, there's no way that our wonderful police officers can possibly control that.

Speeding at the Vaco board meeting in August, the sort of speeding all across the Commonwealth was a major complaint, and what people

I'm so excited because we have front wind aircraft using the old telephone manufacturing building.

I think re reusing existing buildings, the research group,

that's making sugar up at State Farm.

I mean, this is our niche that we're working very hard to make sure that we have these career ladder jobs for our people and diversifying our tax base.

It's really wonderful.

And I so appreciate seeing all of you today.

Well, I know it's fun, but it's so hard to get you because the committee meetings take too long and then

You're running off to do other things.

If anybody says it's fine.

That's why we're down there.

Yes.

Thank you very much.

And thank you to all the delegates and Senator Creed Deeds for coming today.

We really appreciated everything.

Everything you continue to do for us.

I'm going to just I'm supportive of all the legislative priorities, very much so.

I'm going to jump on my favorite, which is the photo screen cameras, just to give you a few statistics that year-to-date crashes in Albemarle County, 3,000.

Twelve fatalities and only two of them were on the interstate.

The rest were within our own roads and everything.

Seven of the eleven, twelve crashes or eleven, there were actually eleven crashes, two fatalities in one.

Seven of the 11 crashes were on rural roads, which brings us to the photo speed cameras, which is being supported also by our police department.

It frees up staff, but more importantly, it makes it it's a safer solution to traffic problems along the rural roads because officers and violators are not put in danger.

There's no way for them to be able to stop someone and enforce

Speeding along our rural roads, it is happening quite frequently.

So this is something near and dear.

And I will be contacting you all and seeing you all.

But let's hope that this will continue.

And we do need the third party monitoring, because if we don't have the third party monitoring, then that entire burden, cost burden falls upon our police department.

and we are currently 29 officers down.

So we, and to be able to have to hire additional officers is just, it's very, very costly.

We wouldn't be able to do it.

So we need the third party, the photo speed cameras operated by a third party.

These work very well in reducing traffic speeds in Europe and other places.

So we're hoping you can all support us on that.

I commend with envy Delicate Runyon and Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley's internet connectivity.

Appreciate their ability to participate.

I'll highlight two.

The first one, the civil penalties, this is an optional.

It does not require that these minor

issues be handled through civil penalties, but it allows us as a locality to identify the differentiation between individuals who simply may not be able to afford correction of some of their zoning deficiencies as opposed to those who are frequent fliers and are just ignoring the rule.

And with regard to the short-term rentals, in Albemarle County, as was mentioned, we look at the short-term rentals as a collateral use of a primary residence.

What we're

You know, Albemarle County has a substantial issue.

with the affordability of our homes here.

So we simply want the opportunity to be able to maintain these home stays as a collateral use rather than turning a primary residence into principally an income producing property which makes our housing shortage worse.

And I do have a thought that I would offer for your consideration for the general assembly for some of these intransigent issues that you're dealing with that perhaps ranked choice voting might help you to reach a resolution.

Thank you very much for your time.

We know your day is sort of full and you really do appreciate it.

We will adjourn until November 16th at 2 o'clock.

PM and Lane Auditorium.

Opportunities for public access to participate in the meeting are posted on the Albemarle County website, on the Board of Supervisors homepage, and on the Albemarle County calendar.

Participation will include the opportunity to comment on those matters for which comment from the public will be received.