Planning Commission Regular Meeting   3/14/2023

Rock and roll.

We're good.

We're good.

Good evening, good evening, good evening.

Welcome.

Today is March the 14th and this is a meeting of the Planning Commission.

So I just want to make sure those who are in the audience are in the right place and this is the right time.

So the opportunities for the public to access participate in the hybrid meeting are posted on the Albemarle County website on the Planning Commission homepage and on the Albemarle County calendar.

participation will include the opportunity to comment on those matters which comments from the public will be received.

Tonight on the agenda, we have one public hearing and one presentation and so, I would like to call this meeting to order and establish a quorum.

Yes.

Aye.

Miss Firehawk?

Here.

Mister Missel?

All right.

And a quorum has been established.

The next item on the docket is other matters not listed on the agenda from the public.

Are there any members of the public here that wish to speak on anything that is not currently listed on the agenda?

All right.

Seeing no one rush to the front, we will move to the next item on the agenda, which is approval of the consent agenda.

You'll see that there is the draft regular meeting minutes from February the 14th.

Are there any comments or corrections on that document?

Seeing none, is there a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented?

Any further discussion?

All right.

Yes.

Mr. Murray?

Aye.

Ms.

Firehock?

Aye.

All right.

We'll go to our one and only public hearing tonight, which is SP22200012.

I did that.

It's OK.

City Church expansion.

Mr. McDermol, I'm sorry.

Yes, thank you.

I'm a Rebecca Ragsdale planning manager.

I'll be giving the staff report for this item this evening.

We'll first kind of orient you to the location and the zoning and existing conditions of the site and then we'll get into what the proposal is.

The site is there on your screen highlighted as the yellow pie-shaped triangle.

It's a religious assembly use known as City Church across from Belvedere Boulevard and between KTEC and the existing city neighborhood of Greenbrier.

and near Dunlora and the John Warner Parkway.

And this is just sort of a zoomed in look at the site where you can see the existing building, existing parking areas, wooded buffer in the back with the railroad tracks, the city neighborhood, excuse me, to the west and then across from 999 Rio, which you saw recently.

I don't know that my pointer is working, but.

That's the yellow on the map here.

I've highlighted the existing site.

There's a bit of R4 in this area along Ryle Road.

The pink are the salmon and the lighter pink colors are commercial that are nearby, which is the other church across the road.

And then what we refer to as gasoline alley, the car washes and the...

and the gas stations along Raya Road.

The gray is the city of Charlottesville and then we have what you saw recently as I mentioned the neighborhood model district of 999 Rio across the road.

So there's a bit of primarily commercial but also non-residential uses with KTEC and religious assembly uses and commercial nearby.

Excuse me, again the pie shaped parcel highlighted in yellow is designated urban density residential in the master plan for this area.

The blue area is institutional and then the yellow area neighborhood density residential.

Religious assembly uses are included as a secondary use in residential areas and are

The switching gears, this is a

An exhibit, this is the concept plan that's proposed for the site.

This is a use that has existed on the parcel since the 1980s and there is an existing building and parking areas as I mentioned before and then the existing entrances off of Rio Road.

Now there was a special use permit prior to this one that included a

Bigger request with up to 500 seats and redevelopment of the property.

But since that time there's been some rethinking to the church's needs.

And this request before you this evening is for 320 seats.

utilizing the existing building and parking areas and expanding them and building a multi-purpose building that would be a gym and also some offices to serve the church's needs.

Along with that, there would be some grading and stormwater management facilities.

They were also approved with a prior special use permit.

and other what we refer to as major elements of this proposal would be the 30-foot buffer that's along the western property line closest to the residential areas.

It's not uncommon with these types of proposals that we would recommend some buffering and screening against nearby residential areas.

I think we mentioned in the staff report that it is zoned R4.

There's a height limit of 35 feet and the building would be located to the rear of the parcel.

So we didn't have any concerns as far as impacts to the entrance corridor or additional impacts from this development.

This is the concept plan.

Following this, there would be the site plan, which would include the final landscaping details.

The existing parking areas would be brought up to current code requirements for tree canopy and landscape islands and parking lot landscaping requirements.

We did mention in the report and we think it's important to note the recommendation of the Rio Corridor Plan.

We mentioned the continuous green tea across the road with Belvedere Boulevard when you reviewed 999 Rio a few weeks ago.

The concept plan for this site has reviewed these recommendations and is not proposing anything that would preclude implementation of this plan with the write-in and write-out of their entrances and then the connection frontage road over to KTEC.

Special use permits where you know we're focusing on what the impacts are, or the increased impacts from the proposal to surrounding properties or the character of the area.

There weren't any concerns about

Additional traffic impacts, we mentioned that there is consideration of the adjoining residential parcels.

We had the community meeting for this proposal, and there were a lot of questions about traffic which were answered at that meeting.

And also some of the city neighborhood residents had some concerns about stormwater runoff, which will actually be improved for this site.

with the site plan and water protection ordinance and erosion and sediment control measures that would be put in place with the new building.

Our engineering staff did look into those concerns and it looks like there may be drainage from additional properties and other areas.

that might have been causing some of those concerns for the city residents.

I mentioned with this proposal, it is an existing use that is expanding to meet current needs or building a new building to meet current needs that is not that much out of character which the long-standing use that has been in place since the 1980s and the comprehensive plan recognizes the need and secondary uses in residential areas such as this.

The staff did recommend approval.

We did find factors favorable.

We didn't have any concerns with this proposed use.

These conditions of approval are in line with typical special use permit conditions that address consistency with the concept plan that's been submitted.

That would include the location of the building and parking areas and the wooded buffer, along with establishing the maximum capacity

and providing for the area necessary to implement the Rio Corridor Plan.

And it's pretty typical that we have an expiration for the use to commence, as we say.

We've allowed five years in this case.

The prior special use permit that I mentioned for the 500 seat and redevelopment of the site is expected to expire in May and they are

moving forward with this proposal at this time.

Excuse me.

So I'll be happy to answer any questions that you have.

I didn't mention these conditions on the screen have been slightly tweaked in terms of wording.

at the suggestion of the county attorney's office, but they are substantively the same.

So when you make your motion, I've included that wording in terms of referencing these conditions as presented this evening and not the ones in the staff report.

There's only minor wording changes.

All right.

Thank you for the staff report.

Commission, any questions for the staff?

Thank you, Chair.

Just a bit of clarification.

That's correct.

That hasn't been pursued in terms of site plans.

Thank you,

Quick question, thanks.

The buffer on what I think is the south side, if I'm getting a north arrow right, it appears that the parking is going into the 10-foot buffer.

I assume that 10-foot buffer is a building setback line and not a parking setback line.

Got it.

I was using the wrong word setback.

Right.

Got it.

Okay.

So it's in the setback, but it's fine because there's no setback requirement.

Right.

There are, this is within the development area so we have managed and preserved slopes.

Oh those were managed?

Got it, thank you.

I'll just ask a quick question.

I was thinking maybe Mr. Missel was getting into it but

So I know there's a 20 foot wooded buffer that's to remain along the railroad tracks and then I see where it swoops out a little bit.

Yes, there would be some tree removal and we mentioned the wooded areas to remain.

I do have one question regarding timing of the projects.

Without knowing the specific timing that the applicant's thinking, I would guess that it's very likely because the project is not funded at this time.

would be identified for funding in the next fiscal year.

And then it would probably be about four years after that.

So it's about, it would be at least four years, I think, before we'd see any construction on that.

Got you.

Okay.

Any other questions?

No.

Then with that, we will open the public hearing and we will call for the applicant if they have a presentation.

and welcome.

And I'll go over the rules.

We look forward to your presentation and you'll have 10 minutes.

Green means good.

When you get closer to the time of expiration, you'll see a yellow light, just a gentle reminder to make your most important points if you hadn't already made them.

And then at red, we'll ask that you respectfully stop and we'll turn it over to you.

Well, thank you so much.

My name is Chris Becker.

I'm the operations pastor at City Church, and I've been there 18 years.

When we hit COVID three years ago, we were meeting at Charlottesville High School and having one service over there.

And when COVID hit, we had to move back to our site back on Royal Road.

And so when we moved back in there, we slowly started filling back up.

And as we started filling back up, we noticed that our offices needed to be turned back into kids' spaces.

So we formed kids' spaces downstairs, and our offices, we now are all remote or meet in different kids' spaces.

And then we were like, well, the kids' spaces aren't large enough, so we need larger space.

So we are utilizing with an agreement with Harvest Church across the street using their gymnasium every Sunday as well.

So when we started thinking about it, we don't have offices.

We don't have a large facility for our first and fifth graders.

We thought, hey, if we had a gym like this over on our site, it would work really well.

And so that's kind of where this whole concept came from.

The previous SUP was a big idea, but we said, hey, this was one that we could more manage and fit the needs that we have now and should work pretty well.

So that's the main gist.

Hey everyone, I'm going to, hopefully, I know there wasn't a lot of questions, but I'm going to try to address those in a fairly brief PowerPoint.

So, could you share your name?

Yes, Craig Katarski with Timmons Group, representing the applicant.

Let's see here.

All right.

So again, this is for multi-use space addition for the church.

Essentially, we're asking for 10,600 square feet.

It would add about 40 additional parking spaces.

And I know 320.

Drag it up.

Oh, OK.

So we're not asking for any more seats within the sanctuary.

It's about 300, 310 today.

So no more than 320.

It's kind of based off of the parking number based on three.

three seats or one parking space for every three seats.

And additionally, just as Rebecca had already gone through, there was a special use permit where that is no longer being pursued.

As far as timing, I think what we're looking at here is probably construction starting about a year from the time that this is hopefully approved.

We are working with the contractor, so there are some things in motion already with regards to that.

and the thought being that we would be completed before any of the Rio corridor improvements were to occur.

And again, this is the location in which Rebecca kind of went over directly across from Belvedere and this is the existing conditions map.

You can see the shaded area that is the managed slopes and as Ms.

Firehock

One of the things I would note as I flip over to the layout that also shows some conceptual grading is that we would be bringing the site up to speed with regards to some of the canopy requirements.

I think one of the things that the

that the site is void of is really some trees over in the parking area.

So this is an opportunity to kind of produce some of that heat island effect just by getting some canopy over in that area.

As far as the stormwater question that was asked with regards to is it a retention pond?

Is it a biofilter?

It's probably one of those two.

I wouldn't want it to be something that detained water just because, again, one of the primary reasons for the addition is to accommodate kids space, youth space, and that sort of thing.

And so standing water is not always the greatest thing with them around.

But what we do want to look at is how we can enhance sort of the water quantity aspect with regards to what is draining,

over to the Greenbrier neighborhood.

We did look at that as that was one of the key questions that came up during the community meeting, and I think Rebecca mentioned a lot of that water is actually coming from and I think I'm turned around from my north, south, east, west directions but

It's coming from the other side of those train tracks, kind of up through Gasoline Alley.

The church certainly does contribute some, but with this project we would significantly be reducing the one-year event as well as reducing down the 10-year storm event that would be running off of the church's site.

So with that, that's kind of the end of the presentation.

We're certainly here if there are any questions that any of you all have.

All right, thank you.

Any questions from the commission?

So at one point, there was some conversation that

Kevin McDermott, Acting Planning Director.

Yes, that's correct.

In the Rio corridor plan, the connection between City Church's parking lot and KTEC was conceptualized.

We have not really moved forward with doing anything with that.

If the project

to improve that intersection, where to move forward.

There is the roundabout at John Warner Parkway that is already funded and that actually would probably be timed approximately about when they're talking about I think I think construction and that is around 2025.

So

That would be able to accommodate folks that wanted to head back towards 29.

So you could make a right out and go around the roundabout and come back.

Also, if this project were to move forward, a U-turn location would be available at the next street, which is called Greenbrier Terrace, I believe, is the next street on that same side.

So people coming from the city that wanted to access the church could go past it and make a U-turn and come in.

Yes, sir.

Thank you for your presentation and question about significant topography here, obviously.

And so it looks like you're bringing in quite a bit of fill, right?

I mean, there's very little cutting, right?

It's going to be mainly fill that you're bringing into the site.

So conceptually, the grading plan right now is conceptual.

I think obviously we want to limit any amount of fill for the main reason being cost.

Certainly there are some things that could be done with the building.

If there's a retaining wall that kind of comes off the back edge of the building to sort of extend that down.

Some of those items we're still working through.

Yeah, it seemed to me that

Even right after the building, you had significant grades that came right off of it.

No, absolutely.

And I think not only that, it's also, you know, the, the, where you have those steeper slopes, um, it's, it's land that's harder to use, right.

Even in an informal sort of fashion.

Yeah.

But the other side of it is it would, it would also help you to plant, right.

Those steep slopes is kind of hard to thank you.

Yeah.

I appreciate it.

Just a quick question along the lines of being conceptual I'm just curious the plan that we're looking at that was part of the staff report versus the one that you showed on the screen is different?

If they are different, they are probably pretty close.

It was just the way the parking was treated.

That edge is all perpendicular on your plan on your screen and this one's got that parallel parking.

Yeah.

So I think one of the things we were looking at is how to maximize kind of the parking on the site.

And so one of the areas that we looked is along that edge.

We do think that there's a little berm there that we'll need to work through.

But I think it's really more of a matter of just wanting to

Yeah so I think one of the things that we would do so the way that the the addition is sort of sited on the building or sited at that parking lot you'll have all that parking drain is sort of flowing towards that building so one of the things that we will kind of get more into during a design is placement of inlets but not only placement of inlets sort of thinking about what is overland relief

I have two questions.

The first one is, can you say a little bit more about, I knew you were talking about where you met during COVID and needs, but I didn't really understand the story about why you needed this gym expansion.

Yeah, well, we use the building frequently through the week, pretty much seven days a week, and we're always trying to find spots to put people in groups of people.

We also have small groups that meet in the community that are looking to meet in the church as well.

And so one of the things that we're looking at doing

is making sure that not only for kids on Sunday morning where we're utilizing the church across the street, we'd use it there, but then like our youth group meets in the sanctuary so we're throwing balls and it's pretty crazy.

It's both and we get requests to look at the community and as far as we can accommodate them, we allow it.

Okay, thank you.

All right, and then just a question about, so I appreciate that we're getting stormwater management for a site that didn't have any because it likely predates requirements for stormwater management.

But what, you've got this big sort of grassy field off to the other side that is not treed, it's just line art.

Are you currently, do you have plans for that part of the site for the future?

Yeah, so during COVID, we created an open field with a platform so we could have the services out there.

And so we utilize it for services for a long time.

And just this past year, we decided not enough people were coming for that service, but we wanted a meeting spot out there for our kids and for our youth as well.

And so we also wanted a green space throughout the week to have different groups of kids or adults meet out there.

So it's gonna continue just being a green space past the parking lot.

Not a question really, but just a comment suggestion.

You have these parking islands that are proposed in the concept plan.

Just remember, you can use those parking islands to treat stormwater.

And if you're going to put trees in there, allowing some of that stormwater flow in there reduces the amount of watering you have to do on those trees.

That's very helpful.

at Crozet Elementary near me, one of the things they've done with their biofilter there was they actually had little pavers so that children could walk into the biofilter and learn about the plants that were there.

And so they made it as an educational space.

All right, I have a couple.

See if I can put them in a logical order for you.

So currently the church has an agreement with KTEC.

So a lot of the parking actually occurs over at KTEC and there's a path that leads to the church.

So from that perspective, that lot, you know, the KTEC lot probably is on a Sunday, maybe 50% full at the very most.

So there's plenty of overflow parking there.

And I would imagine that that would be an agreement that would remain in place throughout construction.

I know we've talked a lot about stormwater management.

Well, I think, I mean, I think as a designer, I mean, I think that's one of the things that we're always trying to think about, whether it's stormwater or whether it's, you know, the amount of pavement that we're, that we're using, or even, you know, when we talk about tree canopy, I think it's important that, you know, as we kind of progress through this, that that is sort of at the forefront and that we're using, you know, native materials and things that are easily accessible here.

So I think that's all part of the conversation that we'll have also with our design-build contractor to ensure that they're sort of thinking in that way and that fashion throughout the process.

are all well aware of.

And one thing that prompted that question was, you know, it's like a sea of asphalt when you turn in.

That's kind of the first thing you see.

So just want to ask that question.

And lastly, this is more of just a comment.

It's a concept plan.

It was like the dumpster pad is kind of put right at the front entrance.

So maybe thinking through that a little bit and where that goes.

If I'm reading the plan correctly, it's like a sidewalk that goes right into your addition.

And then there's a dumpster pad that's kind of tucked right there.

And I've never really seen a handsome dumpster area.

Right.

You're correct.

I think obviously we want to have that screened.

I think that maybe more of a placeholder and I think certainly there's some space also in the rear of the building.

I think one of the things we're trying to think about is access for it and obviously, you know, making sure that we can get a dumpster or a truck back there and turned around and that sort of thing.

But that's something that I think is a great comment and certainly something that we'll take a look at.

One last question.

What's the current maximum assembly for your sanctuary?

One of the staff recommendations says it should be limited to a maximum 320 seat sanctuary.

Okay, I don't know why we would reduce it, but I just want to double check.

Yeah.

Okay, thanks.

My understanding is that the current condition limits it to a 320 seat sanctuary and so that's not a reduction.

Thank you, Council.

Well, actually, the prior special use permits didn't limit the sanctuary and when they came in with the most recent amendment, it was 500.

So, 320 is more in line with kind of like what they have now and we typically

include a condition to establish the sanctuary.

So, it's really like mister Herrick said, it's not really a change in terms of intensity.

Well, the arbitrary, the concept plan, and the traffic information, and the parking is based on 320.

No, no, no, no, no.

All right, any other questions for the applicant?

All right.

No, sir.

All right.

Well, with that, we will close the public hearing.

Seems like a pretty straightforward continuation of a use that's already occurring.

So we already all agree that a church is an appropriate use for the site.

And I think it's

I kind of got a chuckle when I was imagining the kids all being rambunctious and running amok and needing more space.

I feel you on that.

So it seems like it seems like and also appreciated the comment about making the space available to community groups as well.

So they're providing a civic service.

So anyway, it seems like a great proposal to me.

Any other thoughts or reactions?

I have no concerns also, Chair, but what I, I guess when I first saw this coming through, when I saw it was an expansion in space, I actually had a vision that perhaps they were going to come before us and ask us to put a multifamily unit there.

And so of course I was real happy.

But then when I realized that it was a gymnasium, I was still happy, but I wasn't as happy.

because I was really anticipating having a really sort of big smile about us having a multifamily units on that piece of property, right next to all that transportation and schools and walkability and all of the things that we claim we want in a dense area, but we just don't seem to be able to get.

Your point is well taken, sir.

Well taken.

No, I agree.

This seems fairly straightforward.

It is a challenging site, so just encourage us as we work through the site plan.

This is more of just a confirmation from staff, reading about the two ways into the site.

We're hearing no other comments or discussion.

I'm happy to make a motion.

Is there a second?

Second.

Did we need to be specific?

You said that there were some differences in what was the conditions presented on the screen tonight from what was in the staff report.

That was part of the motion that it would be the conditions as presented.

As presented, because I thought you said in the staff report.

Right.

So it wouldn't be the staff report that would be referenced.

It was the conditions.

As presented.

Yes, and I apologize.

This motion is not entirely as it should be for the commission because you're making a recommendation.

So, you would make a sorry about that.

At the meeting.

Thank you.

Any further discussion?

All right.

Yes.

Ms.

Firehock?

Aye.

All right, well, thank you and best of luck as you take your proposal forward.

Next on our docket is an affordable housing developer incentives presentation by Dr. Stacey Pethia.

We will now be ready to hear the presentations.

Good evening, Stacey Pethia, housing policy manager.

It's nice to see all of you.

It's been a while since I've been here.

And the presentation tonight is not really focused on developer incentives.

Sorry, I can't see the screen.

So again tonight, I'm just providing an update on housing activities that have been happening since the adoption of Housing Albemarle in July 2021.

And we're going to go over just a real brief summary of what that activity has looked like and then get a bit more specific about certain things, including giving an update on the affordable housing stock in the county, a brief update on activities, funding activities with Southwood, funding awards that were made for affordable housing over the last couple

fiscal years.

And then we'll talk a little bit about the affordable housing grant program that's being proposed.

I don't have details on that yet.

Those are being finalized.

So this is really just sort of a brief overall view of what that will look like.

And then a bit of discussion about a proposed affordable dwelling unit ordinance, and then a few other activities that are on our workload for the next year.

So here's a real brief timeline of what's been happening.

Again, Housing Albemarle was adopted in July of 2021 and since then the board did approve in January of 2022 funding to hire a housing project manager to assist with all of this.

I am happy, really happy to say that after 11 months search we have hired a staff person in December of last year

and they're really focusing a lot of their efforts on Southwood and the CDBG grant that's going on there, so that's been really helpful.

In February 2022, we did have a work session with the board on a proposed affordable housing overlay.

That didn't really go very far, so that's been pushed out of the way.

And then we had a meeting with them again in May of that year to really talk about an affordable dwelling unit ordinance.

At that time, they did pass a resolution of intent to amend the zoning code for that.

and we have a meeting scheduled with them later this I believe in April and after that we will come to all of you with the work session to discuss that as well.

We did provide funding in April and July of last year and had another work session with the board that's coming up and that brings us pretty much to today.

So looking at the affordable housing stock, these numbers are current as of May of last year.

Staff is working on collecting the new numbers, which will be published next month as well, or in May, sorry.

So currently there are 2,157 affordable housing units in the county.

Those include both rental and for sale units.

About 1,400 of those are subsidized rental units.

So those include low income housing tax credit and other federally funded units.

Some of those are property units that have been completed, 58 for sale units that have been purchased by income qualified buyers and then 518 property units that are for rent and being rented currently.

It also includes units that have been rehabilitated by AHIP through the homeowner rehabilitation program and 99 bonus density units and that is the Brookdale property.

In the pipeline, as of last May, there were about 1,500 units that are in the pipeline.

Almost 900 of those are for subsidized rental units, again, primarily low-income housing tax credit, as well as 653 proffered units, and those include both rental and for sale.

Looking at Southwood, I know you've heard a lot about I had a couple updates last year.

This is really just looking at the funding side of things.

And if all of you remember or most of you should remember there was a performance agreement that was signed in 2019 that provided $3.2 million in funding.

1.8 million of that was cash through the housing fund and that was dispersed over six disbursements as Habitat met six milestones.

All six of those milestones have been met so all of the cash contribution has been distributed.

The remaining funds, $1.4 million is going to be provided through real property tax rebates.

And those should start within this year, I believe.

And so that is really focused on phase one funding.

There is a hierarchy of usage for those funds.

First and foremost, this fund should be used to construct habitat homes.

After that, those funds can be used to pay down construction related debt.

And finally, any funds that

that can't be used for those other two purposes really can be put away and set aside for phase two construction.

We were awarded a $1 million community development block grant.

Those funds are being used to construct five single family homes.

I believe there's one single family detached and the other units are

Duplexes, thank you.

And $40,000 of that $1 million is being used to construct a small tribute park in Village 2 that is honoring the Monacan Indian Nation heritage on that site.

And then in 2023.

FY23 funding through the housing fund, we did award $306,000 to Habitat to help with rental assistance as people residents in phase two need to move to accommodate construction.

So that is really short term rental assistance to help with relocation.

Looking at the larger funding that we did in FY22 and 23, we did award $12.4 million through a variety of sources.

Again, there was the CDBG funding, but also through the agency budget review team.

which covered a variety of housing related topics.

There was about $118 in home investment partnership funding.

That's the federal government that is to help construct one house in Habitat, sorry, Southwood.

$2.7 million in American Rescue Plan Act funding and that was really focused primarily on the premier circle permanent supportive housing project that is should be starting

Hopefully starting construction later this year, there has been a delay due to the construction costs rising.

They are going back next month to apply for additional low-income housing tax credits to fill that funding gap.

And then revenue through the housing fund was about $4.8, $4.9 million.

And all around, all of this funding really supported the construction of 724 affordable rental units.

and 352 owner-occupied units.

That also includes rehabilitation, safe shelter and services for 200 victims of domestic violence, services and shelter for 406 individuals and families experiencing homelessness, and housing counseling services for 558 households.

So I think we did a pretty good job over the past two years and really diversified how we are serving the county.

So for the Affordable Housing Grant Program, again, I don't have details on this yet, but I can say it's really focused on implementing Housing Albemarle Strategy 2C, which is to provide incentives to increase the production of rental housing.

It is authorized under Section 15.2-9508 of Virginia Code, which allows the county to provide grants or loans

for the development or rehabilitation of multifamily rental housing.

It can also be used for individual homeowners who need to do some housing rehabilitation, but we're not set up to do that yet.

Property owners under the enabling legislation, in order to receive the loans, they would need to provide a minimum of 20% of the residential units as affordable housing.

with a minimum affordability period of 10 years, but the county is allowed to set that at a longer term.

So to go in line with housing Albemarle, that would be a 30 year affordability period.

And staff is proposing that the grant program be structured as a real property tax rebate.

And that's all I have right now.

So we'll give you more details later.

The Affordable Dwelling Unit Ordinance, I'm sure many of you know what this is or have heard about it.

It is enabled under Virginia Code 15.2, Section 15.2 2304.

This is the one that only a select few localities in Virginia have and is really wide open what we can do with it.

And so under that, a county ordinance is able to require a percentage of the total residential units be set aside as affordable.

We can set affordability levels for those units, as well as the length of affordability, establish a per unit cash in lieu fee, and incentivize construction of units beyond the density increase.

Again, staff is scheduled to have a work session about a proposed ordinance with the board on April 19th.

Once that work session happens, staff will incorporate the board's comments and feedback from that and then we will schedule a work session with all of you to do the same thing.

And finally, there are a few other projects on board so at the top again you see the affordable housing grant program and the ADE ordinance and updating the annual regional housing report which is where those first pie charts came from for last year's report.

We are also working on creating an affordable housing waiting list that will be directly connected to the property units and any units through an ADU ordinance.

And that's the best way we know to be able to connect income qualified buyers or renters directly to those units.

One of the issues we have with proper units currently, particularly with the for sale units is that it's really hard to connect those with income qualified buyers.

So this is a way to do that.

The plan is to start small initially, kind of work out the details and any kinks in the system.

And so we will start with the police foundation and county staff.

And once we get everything down to a good,

process, we will open it up countywide.

We are also developing

a tool to track implementation of housing Albemarle and how we are working towards meeting those objectives and goals.

And we are also waiting to hear final word on whether or not we will be awarded an infrastructure grant from DEQ.

We have not made the tentative list.

They released the grant award, the tentative awards last week.

There were 20, I believe they had 258 applications.

24 projects have received tentative offers of grants.

We did make the contingency list, so there are 14 of us on there.

So we will have a firm answer by the middle of April.

If we do end up on that list, we are offered an award then that will put a good deal of work on our plate.

The agreement with Southwood was that the county would manage the project ourselves instead of them.

So we have a whole bunch of people waiting breathlessly to find out if we got the money.

And that is all I have for you tonight.

All right.

Thank you.

Thank you for a great report.

I'll start to my right.

Sure.

I know the Sunwater Conservation District has helped a lot with some of the septic problems that people have had.

And that's a big way that the people have been able to stay living in their homes, particularly in the rural area in Albemarle County.

Unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, I don't manage that program.

That really goes through the finance and budget departments.

Yeah, so we have been using some of the ARPA funds in order to do that.

But again, I'm not managing that program, so I know very little.

Yep, go ahead.

I have a couple questions.

I'll just ask them one at a time.

So great report, I appreciate the brevity.

I would like to ask, though, when you do the sort of the the overall progress annual report and, you know, obviously you're reporting on the number of units have been provided and different types of units and all that stuff.

Do you also, as part of that report, look at how many units have maybe moved out of affordability?

In other words, are we winning?

We built this many, but then 2,000 more became unaffordable because the market's crazy.

Not yet.

That is something we're moving towards.

I just don't have a good tracking system in place yet, so that's part of the tracking tool that we're trying to create.

We are able to, there is a national group that does track assisted housing, so whether those are moderate rehab, Section 8 funding, low income housing tax credits, pretty much anything that has like a HUD or federal subsidy behind it.

they track those expiration periods.

Yeah.

The median price of a house keeps climbing and climbing.

My gut tells me no.

Okay.

But we don't have a good source.

We don't have a good way to track that yet.

Something to think about or figure out how to develop if possible.

I'm not here to propose a solution.

I don't know either.

All right.

And then the other question I had has more to do with the time frame.

So the first time frame question is, have we considered

requiring, I don't know if we can require this, requiring a longer period for affordable housing, rentals, as well as for cell units to have to be on the market.

Because we have had that problem with, the developer does the development and they say, well, I had 20 affordable units, but nobody, 10 people applied and the other 10 went back to market rate.

Is that something that the county could legislate as a

You want to make sure that

The developers so that they're not hanging onto them so long that they're losing money.

But you're right, we need to find a way to make keep them affordable longer.

And one way we could do that is through an affordable dwelling unit program ordinance, and it would still have that

period, probably 90 days.

But you could change the program to tweak it to say that right at the end of the 90 day period, if you don't have an income qualified buyer, you can sell it to anyone.

So it seems like the just not to interrupt, but I feel like the the 90 days you just said sounds a lot longer than what we've heard from

Correct.

This is why an affordable dwelling unit ordinance is good.

Because that's where we can put some of those requirements in that we can't necessarily do with the proper system as it is.

So an ADU ordinance would allow us to set those periods that say, right, you have to market that for 90 days.

We could work in something that says after the first 60 days, if you don't have an income qualified buyer, you have to open it up to nonprofits to purchase the unit.

and then at the end of 90 days you can sell it to anyone, income qualified or not, but that price is restricted, the resale price is restricted for 40 years.

Gotcha.

That's great.

And then the second part of that question in terms of time period is,

how long the like for example the for rent units are affordable.

So 10 years is a common period we did have an applicant who put 20 years forward is that I know that we want it to be attracted to the development community so they will propose these units.

I'm just curious if that's also part of the mix of because I just think of it as like a ticking time bomb.

There's a certain hope that the person renting the affordable apartment for 10 years will achieve more in life and move up the ladder in their career and then be able to afford that price when it changes.

But there's a lot of jobs that just doesn't happen.

And so it's like just like we're just deferring the problem for some folks who are not going to

Be able to afford that when that time period ends.

Yeah, so the housing policy recommends extending that from 10 years to 30 years.

Okay.

And you can do that through that through an ADU ordinance.

Okay.

Great, thank you.

First and foremost, thanks for everything you're doing for this missional goal and objective.

Hear, hear.

That's awesome.

Forgive me if I'm jumping around here.

I just have a few questions.

One, the tracking tool.

That's a great, it will be a great thing to have, I think.

And two, Commissioner

Firehock and previously to Commissioner Carrazana's points about knowing how well we're doing, kind of checking to see, I think it'd be important.

That's a good question.

I'll have to figure out how to put that in.

I mean, that's an important day to have.

One of the things we have started doing with our funding agreements through the housing fund is we do collect household demographic data to go along with that.

So we will be able to say,

you know, how many people are in the household, if they're female headed, single parent, if there's anyone with a disability, seniors, how many children, race and ethnicity, and income level.

So that type of data we can collect.

I'll have to think about other types that we can put in there as well.

I'd like to ask you a question.

Were you thinking of things like

If there's six people and they're living in a two-bedroom apartment, is that good?

Or is it six people living in a three-bedroom?

Are we squishing people?

I don't mean to steal your thunder here.

It's just such a great idea.

But you had mentioned the fact that losing poor quality affordable housing is still losing affordable housing.

And so I think it's important for us to understand if we're losing poor quality affordable housing and replacing it with much better affordable housing, that's a good thing, right?

But have those people had to leave their home because of that.

and are they then driven out to some other who knows where, right?

Or are they retained and can they stay in their homes and what does that look like?

So I think this tracking tool things, not to make a bigger project for you, but I mean, I think it would be great to have the ability to somehow have input into that if it's helpful to you.

Okay.

Related to that a little bit is the idea of the wait list that you brought up.

And I was curious, you mentioned several times it's income qualified.

Are there other measures that you look at, again, related to diversity, equity, inclusion, and those more sort of subjective things?

Or is that not possible?

We would have to focus on income qualified because after that you run the risk of running into fair housing issues.

That's what I figured, yeah.

Okay, good to know.

Shameless question.

Honestly, what I told you on that slide is what I know as of today.

What we're really trying to figure out is

Do we need to cap the amount of property tax rebated each year?

For example, Washington DC has recently implemented a tax abatement program for affordable housing.

In FY24, they will cap the amount of property taxes that they will abate across the entire, all the areas that they're applying this program at $400,000.

So it's kind of first come first serve.

Yeah, this is specifically focused on a property tax rebate.

Right, right.

Got it.

You mentioned under the, didn't you code 15.2-2304?

that county may establish per unit cash in lieu fee amount.

Correct.

It would.

It's being recommended.

Well, currently the cash in lieu payments for housing proffers go into the housing fund.

It would be the same thing.

And how is the housing fund

How are the housing funds distributed?

In the past, it has been when my predecessor was here, when there was never a lot of large sums of money.

So when he had money in the housing fund, he would send an email to the nonprofits requesting them to send proposals in and then he would

decide which ones are funded or he would take the money and divide it evenly among them.

He would make those decisions, take the recommendations to the board of supervisors.

We are looking at implementing a competitive application process.

So there would be a request for proposals issued annually with the very specific set of requirements to respond.

Got it.

Okay.

So you mentioned DC.

Alexandria has a housing advisory committee, as I'm sure you're aware, and they administer those funds.

Yeah, I mean initially, so one of the recommendations in the housing policy is to create a housing advisory committee, which could potentially be utilized for that purpose.

That's coming in the future.

That's not together yet.

So initially it would be representatives from different county departments.

I've reached out to economic development and they would have someone available.

Probably the Office of Equity and Inclusion.

I don't have everybody together yet.

Interesting.

Yeah, gotcha.

I'm going to say roughly about $650,000.

Got it.

So on slide six, maybe I'm just misunderstanding.

There's a housing fund reserve, which was 4.8 million.

Does that continue to grow?

Correct.

So about once or twice a year when there's a pool of cash and loan payments, proffer cash payments, those get transferred to the housing fund.

And generally, through the budget process, more funds are placed into there.

I see.

So it's re-upped every year.

Correct.

I got you.

OK.

and this is still part of the same question.

I don't know.

It varies.

It's when payments come in and then I don't know.

Okay, that's all.

Right, Commissioner Carrazano.

Thanks, Stacy.

We appreciate the presentation and the analytics and think we've talked about this

a number of times in terms of how do we get better analytics?

How do we understand the housing stock that we might be losing?

Because I think that is a missing piece here.

I mean, it's great to see here we have, you know, 2,157 portable housing today and 1,500 coming online.

I mean, that looks like a huge increase, right, percentage-wise.

However, there's a missing piece, right, that it would be great to understand.

So one question is, how do you see this analytic building?

That's good.

Not a question I was expecting tonight.

I think there's a couple of things that can happen.

Again, going back to the housing policy and sorry to keep doing that, but there is a recommendation to do

an affordable housing survey.

That could be annually.

That's kind of a big lift, having done these before.

So potentially every other year, every five years.

But that would go out to the rental properties in the county.

We would collect all types of information.

And that would give us a good sense of the new developments, which ones, how old they are, what they're renting for.

who's living in them, where they're located.

So that's a really good source to start with.

And we could ask additional questions that goes along.

Excuse me.

Years ago, Prince William County, I helped put one together for them.

They had asked questions about

So energy efficiency features within units.

Montgomery County often combine theirs with some fair housing information questions through their Office of Human Rights.

So there's all types of different information we can collect across the years through that tool.

Again, that's a huge undertaking so it's probably not something we could do every year, but it's something to look at for to get done in the future within the next couple years and do it so many years after that.

I think that's the best way to get a really good handle of the housing stock in the county.

on the rental side.

For homeownership, it's really looking more at census data, unfortunately, but getting better at tracking, keeping good track of the property in it.

So we have not had a really good tool.

I've been working with the planners to figure out how we can track those better over time and to create a take what they collect and put it into my own database some way so we can keep track of that.

I think those are some of the best ways we can do that and then again as issues come up if we want to know more about energy efficiency activities.

Local nonprofits like AHIP has a good handle on that through the affordable housing side.

So really looking at partners to collect information from them and just collect as many sources as we can.

Yeah, well, I appreciate that.

I mean, part of the reason I'm asking is because as we move into the comp plan, and of course, we're setting goals and priorities, and affordable housing is going to be one of those goals, right?

It's not going to change.

However, how we approach affordable housing should change.

I believe I agree with you when you stated we're probably losing footing here or losing the war.

And I think we all feel that way here because we're losing traction, right?

As cost of construction keeps going up, even our AMI, what are we looking at now?

380,000 if you're at 80% or whatever it is, something like that, right?

So is that affordable?

Right, so that's a different question.

We're not going to go into that right now.

So I do think that these tools will help us.

And so I truly encourage you to develop as many as you can, as much of this information so we can get a good picture.

And we don't repeat the same mistakes or write the definition of insanity where you do the same thing over and over again and expect the same result.

So hopefully we can then set these goals and agendas

and truly understand what has been working, what hasn't been working, where are there some models that have been, and so AHAB I think is a great program and I'm looking at your pie charts.

So if I'm reading this right, I mean the preserved units are those mainly that they have more than 34 and I see nothing coming online on that.

So is there,

So how is that incentivized?

Is there a way that we can incentivize?

I know there are, there are some communities that do that.

They incentivize developers instead of saying, okay, we're going to build, um, 10 homes in our, in our development.

And they're going to be $380,000 homes, or we're going to put money into a pot that's going to help to keep people in their homes.

And

What other communities have seen is that they can actually get a lot more bang for their buck.

And we're not talking about $300,000 homes.

And it's a way of maintaining your housing stock.

Correct.

So that's really tracking the new units, and what we fund a hip to do.

We do have the potential to create a separate program that we provide we could provide funds directly to homeowners to help with home renovations.

upgrades, energy efficiency upgrades.

It is easier and more efficient for county staff to partner with AHIP and with LEAP and other nonprofits to do that because they're set up and already used to doing that type of work.

They also have the system set up to be able to track the funds that are provided to homeowners.

There's absolutely no reason that we would not be providing more money to AHIP or to LEAP in the future.

We have several pots of money out to them now.

We've just given them $421,000 last year to do housing rehab in the county.

They have also gotten an additional $500,000 between the Housing Fund and Climate Action Fund.

to do energy efficiency work.

So the money goes out and we do collect that information through the grant process.

We provide that data as grants and they have to send us a report.

Well I appreciate it and again just encourage you to

provide as clear a picture of the housing as possible, but I know there's a lot of analytics and this is a great start, but I think it would be really needed in the comp plan as we move forward with that and try to set those policies for the future.

Mr. Bivins.

So a lot of what you're asking, a lot of the dreams that have been put at the foot of your pedestal are things that require more than two people to do.

There are lots of options and lots of opportunities, but when you're basically running an 80 hour a week job here, sort of staff,

Some of that's just perhaps going to be pushed down on, pushed a little bit further down the pole.

So there's a couple of things that I need to just sort of go out there and say the kind of things that I say.

I'm really, really happy to hear all the things we're doing, but there's a few things that I would want us to focus on on a larger context for the community.

I would like at some point for us to have some serious conversations about how to reduce the need, not increase the inventory, but reduce the need for affordable housing.

Everyone knows that that's my whole piece here, widows and orphans will always be with us, but where is there a good job?

And so if I can figure out a way to get industry here or to get roles in here, that in fact will allow people to have sort of career ladders.

so that they can, in fact, achieve the kind of things that Karen was talking about while they might be in this house for this period of time.

But in some period of time, they're on a pathway to be able to move to a higher income and perhaps stay here when they do that and not move to Greene or to Stanton or to Waynesboro or to Fluvanna or to Louisa.

And maybe now there's a growth in Nelson, so I'll have to add that to my litany of things.

I would also like to have some conversation and perhaps really what I'm doing is building a record for our supervisors.

I'd really like to have a conversation about why isn't a land trust option looked at in the same way that an ag or forest tax break is looked at.

So if I give someone a tax break to keep their land and whatever kind of farming they want to call it,

I have often heard that explained that's the key people who are marginal farmers in farming.

I don't know that the county should be keeping marginal farmers in farming because is that really the best use of their lives and their land?

But we're doing it and we're doing it without any sort of consideration on whether or not that's the right use of funding, funding being tax revenues.

I would like us to have some conversation like when you're talking with a work session or perhaps you will invite us and perhaps we will be invited to join our supervisors in the work session.

But I would hope that there would be a conversation that if a person with a significant amount of land wants to give that into a land trust that a developer could, that that person gets a tax benefit immediately to do that.

And so that what we're then doing is we're setting before the market,

an opportunity for people to make decisions that support what we're trying to do as far as a community is concerned.

Because I will suggest, if we only rely on the market, what we know is the obvious market solutions, there's a couple things that happen there.

Clearly this process and what we do for a builder's piece of property or a developer's piece of property when he or she comes before us, this process puts a level of benefit to them.

that 10 units back is not the equivalent.

It is no way, sorry, counselor, it is no quid pro quo that occurs there.

And so how do we, as a county of smart people, I don't know if any of you saw that Albemarle County was included in the school system, but I think we were like fifth or sixth in the Commonwealth for having smart people.

So, when we look at, when we sort of push out the Lake Walburgon effect here in Albemarle County, how do we in fact use all of the various new ways of encouraging signals and sending signals that we want workforce housing here to be something that people aspire to?

I'm going to come back to that for a second.

So you said when we start looking at sort of the things that we're going to do within the county for county employees and for police, I would also like to have a suggest

that we look at the inventory of land that is owned by us and that's owned by the school system and start thinking about what would it look like, for instance, if we were to do something at the Yancey property.

What would it look like if we would do something with the 60 acres that's up there on Berkmar or extended or what I think that's what it's called.

I don't know what it's called.

You know, I know how to get the things.

I never know what they're called.

And so the thing is, though, if all you're going to be faced with over these next few years is how to convince a bunch of people who really are trying to, and I like developers, this is not an issue, but whose business plan is not necessarily to think about how they're going to bring affordable housing.

to this community.

That's not what they're in business to do.

And I appreciate that.

But we are in the business of trying to shift the equation some.

And how do we do that?

We have an inventory of land.

We have taxing, which is something that we can, well, we don't control it, but there's some people who sit in these seats who control it.

that can in fact help to balance that.

And so while I get that we're looking at how do we do this, my real thing is how do we reduce the need?

That's about jobs.

That's about economic activity.

And also then how do we control the lift in inventory that we have?

And that's things that I think we can do within the purview of this building a little differently.

It'll make people look a little differently, but also the whole idea that I would say land trust is no different than ag and forest or tax breaks.

and it just depends on where you want to put your tax break.

That's a hard act to follow, Commissioner Bivins.

I agree with so much that I've heard here and one of the things I want to go back to, Dr. Pepia, is this tracking tool.

When you think of housing, it's such a big issue, right?

To me, it almost requires a theory of change, right, which is like a simplistic way of looking at something big and audacious and, you know, developing metrics to see if we're moving a needle.

Is staff creating this tracking tool?

Is this something we're subbing out?

Well, that's part of it.

I don't really know exactly yet.

I really think there's going to be several different ones.

So each program that is created out of Housing Albemarle, there will be a system to track

the activities through that.

And that's going to be done mainly so that we can see how that particular approach works.

So if we have the developer incentive program, we track that over five years and see, did it have any impact?

And then where might it be falling down?

And talk to people?

And how can we tweak it?

Or do we need to look somewhere else?

So you have all of those different things to evaluate the effectiveness of the programs that are being implemented.

and that will create like this big pot of data that you can then use to study and see how it's impacting everything around us, how they all work together.

And so there's going to be several different ways to do this, really tracking the proffer units so we know when they're coming online, what's being billed, how much they're being sold for, are they going to the right people, where are they located,

Do we need to find ways to really encourage affordable housing in specific neighborhoods that are lacking in affordable housing units?

So there's the technology that exists that

but like I have an invention coming.

Yeah, that's a challenge.

Sure, sure.

I have a series of questions, but feel free to jump in if anything makes sense or resonates.

To me, it seems that's the critical path item.

I mean, I don't think you could answer how many affordable units we're losing due to the time expiration because we don't have that tracking tool.

So we're kind of just walking around blindly in that respect.

I'm looking at some of my questions here.

We talked about the 80% AMI, that's the number we always hear, and I think I heard the number 380,000, which seems pretty high to me if you're a teacher or police officer or something like that.

How do we get more like 60% or another value below 80%

How does that start to look?

How does that work?

And I know a lot of times also when people hear these numbers, they think it's, you know, Section 8 housing.

No, no.

Housing Choice Vouchers are Section 8.

That's for extremely low-income households, really.

So you're looking at people who are close to poverty level or below that.

and so the 60 and 80% AMI are really your firefighters and your teachers, your nurses, the people that work in the grocery store.

That's really the group that we're looking at.

Your administrative staff in your offices.

So these are the people that live among us, they help serve us, they work with us and oftentimes they have to leave because they just can't afford to live here.

So one of the things we can do through an affordable dwelling unit ordinance is really set maximum sale and rental prices.

And we can work those down closer.

So we're looking at probably, I think the recommended maximum sale price for affordable housing, which is really going to be focused maximum 80% AMI and below.

That would probably be about $214,000, which would actually make that affordable to some 60% AMI families.

And if they have enough assistance through down payment assistance, we can reach families as low as 50% AMI.

So it's really setting pricing that is more achievable for working families.

$243,750 is our current maximum sale price.

And that's a stretch for anyone below 80% AMI.

So really bringing that down.

Also bringing down the maximum rental prices.

And that's really focused at 60% AMI households and below.

That is, I think in some ways, our biggest focus should really be rental housing at the moment.

We have a really big shortage.

And if we want families to be able to move or individuals and families to move into home ownership, if you're at that 50, 60% AMI level, it's gonna be really tough for you to save for a down payment assistance or sent down payment for a house.

So be able to have rent levels that are set at a way that they can save money over time,

So we do have a work session with the board on April 19th.

So there has been an ordinance drafted and some administrative guidelines that talk about how the whole thing should work.

There will be that work session with the board in April.

Then we will have a work session with all of you once I get the board feedback.

And then as soon as we can after that go to public hearing with you and then the board.

So I'm hoping six months at the most.

It's something we can discuss.

We haven't looked into that, but we have done joint work sessions in the past.

I hope we could have a joint work session because I think there's a lot of planning expertise in the Planning Commission and that the board benefit perhaps from having a joint conversation rather than them.

I know they control the purse strings, but we might have a few good ideas here.

I just wanted to just make a comment that

I hope that as we are talking about the importance of affordable housing that we're also making a direct tie to our ability to attract employers to our county.

Because I was speaking as a small business owner, I just created a new job position in my company, another full-time position.

I'm probably gonna create some more.

And you know, I contacted you recently and I just asked you about the AMI and I last year for the affordable housing track tool.

I was asking for myself,

Not for my house, but as I try to employ people and create positions, I'm trying to figure out if they can afford to live in this county.

And so most business growth in the United States comes from small businesses.

It doesn't come from metas and Googles, which by the way, as you know, are dramatically decelerating hiring and laying off thousands of people.

So I want the county to be really aware that if they want to attract job growth, we have to have an attractive affordable housing package.

for anyone to want to be able to bring people here.

And you may recall there was a certain brewery that wanted to locate in my district.

The site was not ready for that particular brewery physically, but my concern also at the time was there was something like 104 jobs or something.

And I hypothesized that 100 of them would be coming from outside the county and just commuting there because there weren't going to be the affordable housing for those types of jobs.

So I just really want us to make a strong emphasis on the link between employers, new businesses, facilitating startups, and the ability to have your workers have a place to live.

Great.

And let's have one more question.

You actually took one of mine, which is good.

So I have to go there.

No, that's fine.

And it was about like how many, do we have a feel for how many employers or businesses we've lost because it's not adequate housing, so economic development, but you've touched on that.

General question, like if I were to move to town, how would I know, what would I do to get the information about what units are out there?

That's another thing that I'm trying to work on is come up with a good way to list at least the proper units and any affordable units that are done through rezonings on our website.

But there is also Porchlight, which is hosted by the Regional Housing Partnership.

That does provide a listing service for affordable units.

Currently limited to rental units at the moment, they are looking at ways to expand that to affordable home ownership opportunities.

And that's really about it.

I mean, if you, you know, your online rental sites and property real estate sites are really the only option.

So until we come up with a good source to advertise on our website.

One of the reasons I haven't done that yet is because the ADU, the proposed ADU ordinance recommends that those units that come through that program

be marketed directly to the people on the waiting list first before we open those up to the general public.

And so it would, once they go through that period, and off the top of my head I can't remember how long I say it has to go to them first,

And my last and final question.

Is there anything in the ordinance that requires affordable units to be of similar or same quality

as surrounding units in these projects.

What I wouldn't want to see is great windows on this one.

And then these affordable units, we always ask, are they dispersed or is that a block of affordable units, less than optimal windows in this one?

I am.

Yes, I'm fairly certain that there's the requirement that they need to be compatible to everything.

So, I mean, it's really

in that respect reflects our current comp plan and ordinances that go along and say that those affordable units really need to be, I forget the words we use.

I believe it says safe, decent and affordable housing.

It is, but it's really, they need to fit in.

They need to look similar and be a similar quality.

So they can't go in and build, you know, $500,000 homes with big fancy amenities and give everybody else a shack.

They have to be comparable.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

Just add one more thing.

It strikes me as someone who's grown up here and struggled to afford housing at various times in my own life.

that the most affordable housing in the county is actually in the rural area.

And a lot of focus on affordable housing often tends to be in the growth area where housing is the most expensive and subsidizing affordable housing is the most expensive.

And it does strike me that it'd be great to have some real metrics on how many low-income people are living in our rural area and really get an idea of how much of that affordable housing we're losing in the rural area.

I think of it almost like rural gentrification.

I've known a lot of rural communities that have kind of been forced out.

And so, just something I would encourage, you know, as you look at building a tool and getting more data, understanding that.

Also,

and thinking about what Commissioner Bivins had said, just I think too, when I think about when Crozet was at its most affordable, we also had Morton Frozen Foods.

Thank you, Commissioner Murray.

Commissioner Bivins pointed out the obvious to us when he pointed out with one and a half or two FTEs.

How many things that we just talked about, right, that would be great to have to inform the comp plan to just look at and understand our affordable housing stock, things that

Dr. Patia mentioned she's, I mean, at least half a dozen things you mentioned that you were in the process of or trying to work on.

And it seems to me that we talk an awful lot about how important it is, affordable housing, right?

It doesn't seem like we're actually investing and promoting that with our staff.

So if it's really that important, should we have 2FD?

Well, the second position that was added was one that this commission requested repeatedly be restored.

We used to have it.

So there's a certain victory in that.

Some of these things I think could be done through outside studies that we could commission.

If I could, Chair.

So I just looked up what our median income here is.

And so in 2020, so it's got some age to it now, but it's not necessarily been that.

We haven't seen those kinds of large salary increases in the county from the employers that I know.

It was 40,000 or 40,200.

And so that was the median income.

And so if you even want to take 60% of that,

That means we're looking at someone having to come up with $2,000 a month.

And if you then roll through, you were asking Stacy about how do you find these things out?

Well, you know, just go to Zillow.

Just go to Truvia.

Just go and look at what the standard apartment rents for here.

Many of the new projects that we've seen come to us, even in spite of the people across the street believing that they were going to be all Section 8.

When we asked the developer how much the rent was going to be, the developer says it was going to be $3,000.

It was going to be $2,500.

That's not what was fine.

I understand that they've got to have a return.

They absolutely are due a return on their investment that fits their profile.

But having rents at that level when the median household income in Albemarle County is $40,200, which means that 60% that person should be trying to reach to $2,000 a month in rent is going to be difficult.

Before taxes are taken out.

I know we've said this before, but just for the record, we also talked in the past with you about the importance of transportation.

So to quote a past president of the Piedmont Housing Alliance, an anecdotal story that was given where someone lived in the rural area and they could afford to have this rural house, but they couldn't afford to get to their jobs, so they ended up giving them four new tires.

In other words, getting their car to run was actually the most important thing.

And I had been excited for a while that

A certain mobility provider of transportation in our county was going to be providing trips down to Scottsville, where there are more affordable houses in that part of the county.

And that didn't come to pass for a variety of reasons.

But really important that we look at that transportation piece, because a reliable vehicle could be the answer for someone, not just trying to build only in the developed area.

I know you know this, but I just want to put that out.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

Any final comments?

Thank you.

Yes.

Yes.

And Mr. McDermott, we would certainly be interested if the board is amenable to that joint work session.

So you can let us know.

Thank you.

I will look into it.

So thank you.

Next on our docket are committee reports.

Work to my right and go to the left.

Any committee reports?

No?

To my left?

No?

No?

I just happen to have a committee report.

Stacey, don't leave yet.

Don't leave yet.

Don't leave yet.

Stacey, Stacey, Stacey, don't leave yet.

I just happen to have a committee report that I'm going to recommend all of you figure out a way to do this.

So, Supervisor McKeel arranged for the Jack Jewett.

Oh, it's not called the Jack Jewett.

the hydraulic 29, place is 29, hydraulic CAC to go to Southwood yesterday.

And I will tell you a few things.

So you know they're working on phase one.

And Stacy, what you've done with that whole process made my heart glad.

Now, it is a very complicated thing that they're trying to do because they are trying to move people to places that they're going to need to take people off of land so that they can develop that land.

And there aren't a lot of places to go in Southwood to do the kind of thing that Karen wanted, so not the non-displacement.

But they are really working hard at that.

And if you get a chance, I think this goes to the conversation you're saying about, is it comparable?

What I can tell you, what I saw, and I don't know who these people are, Southern builders or Southern development, they're building the marketplace houses over there.

You can tell there's a difference because the habitat houses are a little bit smaller.

From the outside, they have the same color because they have an ARB.

They have their own ARB there, and they have a similar look to them.

Clearly, the ones who are being sold for $600,000 are a little bit bigger.

It is clear that they're bigger.

and a little fancier design so that they pay for a more expensive architect.

They did, they did, they did.

But it was, it felt, for me, it felt like the thing that I was most concerned with, and I'm gonna come to this in a second, is that the community was integrating to itself with style and with economics and with people playing this.

I think that feels like, now I'm still gonna tell you, I'm still concerned about phase two.

because phase two is where there's going to be the majority of the marketplace housing.

Market rate.

Market rate, thank you.

Market rate housing.

And the CEO, Mr. Dan Rogan, so I said that when this is all over, there could be 500 units out there.

But I also should share that those 500 units won't be there when I'm here because there's a long tail on that, like 20, 30, I think he said, something like that.

So while we're going to get it, as you can see, and this is a group of people who really are trying to put their shoulder at it.

I think they're pushing like 45 houses up a year right now.

So they're pushing 45 houses up a year right now with modest resources.

They did get some money from Jeff Bezos' former wife, which I think was helpful.

But this is a big lift.

And this is a lift from a group of people that this is what they do on a daily basis.

And this is a big lift on a, yeah, this site is problematic.

I mean, most of you, I don't have to rehash the infrastructure issues out there, but there is significant, and so figuring out how to move people, how to build houses, how to build communities that are in fact, that embrace a diversity is not, is something that we can do clearly, but it's not done overnight.

It is not done overnight.

I would advise each of you to go out there and give Dan a hard time.

Okay, fine.

Don't tell Dan that Julian said that he was doing a good job.

I don't want Dan to hear that coming out of my lips.

I would say that when Stacey stood before us in a number of years ago,

That I can just compliment the work that she's doing with the staff person that's over there and how she's pushed people.

It will become, I think, a very welcoming place, a place that any of us would probably see ourselves living in.

It's a fantastic update.

Yes, thank you.

March 1, Board of Supervisors meeting.

One item on the agenda in the afternoon was regarding Free Bridge Lane project.

I don't know if you all have been following that, but it looks like a really great effort that we're making to actually close Free Bridge Lane between Darden Cow and 250.

and turn that into a bike ped resource, a promenade as they spoke highly of throughout the meeting or promenade.

They had a discussion about the actual pronunciation and they approved a pilot project to do that.

So what we're looking at now is

the idea of trying to get some gates out there, close it up and see how it's received, see how it operates, make sure it doesn't have any unintended consequences and hopefully over time rethink that corridor.

We have, there's some design plans that you can look at that we worked with a landscape architect at to sort of really make that more of like a, a green street type area that

you know as fits in with the Riverside.

So great little project they're working on I thought you might be interested to hear about that is moving forward.

In the evening we had a public hearing and I think apparently they the board heard that you all had a meeting that went until 11 30 at night and they said we can beat that because Old Ivy Residences was here until a little after midnight with a lot of public comment and in the end it was

Unanimously approved to move forward.

Fantastic.

There were additional proffers included in the related to transportation.

Of course, there's a lot of questions about transportation that came out of this and then the follow up with the proposal that VDOT had referred to as the triangle about over there on the western end.

Well, the interesting thing about that is that

VDOT has put that project on hold and has offered to do a corridor study.

The concerns from the community were that we weren't looking big enough when we were looking at that triangle about idea.

There could be unintended consequences, things like that.

So the community wanted us to look at a broader area.

So VDOT is now funding a study that'll really look at the entire corridor, Ivy Road corridor from

Boris Head, all the way to the city line.

Great, sounds good.

Yes, so we are finalizing really the efforts that were in part one of phase two, which is really focusing in on those topic areas right now.

We have been spending a lot of time going out to various committees, technical committees that the county has updated

that the county is tasked with, you know, addressing certain topic areas.

Natural Heritage Committee, I attended them, then Tori and Ben have been in other committees.

We've been meeting with other agencies, including ACSA schools, having discussions with them to figure out how we can address their needs through the comp plan.

The survey is open until Friday that is online.

We are approaching 500 respondents to that, really big numbers.

And beyond that, we've also got our working group that is going out and talking to members of the community.

We've been having pop ups.

I know the PC has been getting notifications when those pop ups are coming to their districts.

Those are going on through this week as well.

And then we're moving into the next phase, which will be the planning toolkits and looking at things like growth management and multimodal corridor plans.

Sounds good.

Just a quick question.

I know that there's a pop-up for my district on a Wednesday afternoon and there was one in Scottsville down the street from my office and I had to go to my actual day job, can't attend those.

I'm just curious are we doing any of these, you know, these are like holding them in the middle of the day is obviously for retired people or people have nighttime jobs and can go.

We had an evening one in the Jewett district just last week and I have to say it was too cool because Greer School, I think that's the right name for it, had a bingo night.

You can imagine a cafeteria filled with young kids playing bingo.

It was incredible.

But in order to get past their card, you know, to buy their cards, they had to go by David and who's the gentleman that's like the staff person and then David and Ben to get these palm cards that they could sign on to or if they wanted to do it there because they were parents there.

Yeah.

We're working to spread those times all around.

I can, I can talk to the team and see if we can identify the, the, the point of the pop-ups was we wanted to go to places where people are already at, at those times.

And so we show up there because we know other people are going to be there anyway, and we're trying to meet them.

So grocery stores, markets.

We have done some on weekends as well, but I'll check to see if we can find something.

Like Faysville has music on Saturday nights.

If you came an hour before that, or, you know, I'm not saying that's the best spot, but.

because there's not a lot of parking.

But anyway, I just want to be as creative as we can with getting all different types of people with crossroads.

And they're all waiting.

Yeah, we'll be doing more pop-ups.

And I know the Scottsville one was tying into another event as well.

But yeah, I just looked at the times and I was kind of scratching my head.

All right.

Sure.

Any old business for the good of the order?

All right.

All right.

Moved?

So moved.

All right.

All right.

With that, the meeting is adjourned.