Coraggio Consulting
City of Fairfax City Council Meeting, Tuesday, September 9, 2025

Date: Tuesday, September 9, 2025
Place: City Hall, City of Fairfax, Virginia
Length: 3h 17m (video)
Official meeting video (city, Granicus): https://fairfax.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=13&clip_id=4310
Agenda: https://fairfax.granicus.com/AgendaViewer.php?view_id=13&clip_id=4310
Minutes: https://fairfax.granicus.com/MinutesViewer.php?view_id=13&clip_id=4310&doc_id=e9f1f1c6-8e47-11f0-a766-005056a89546

Machine transcript (speech-to-text) produced by Coraggio Consulting. Not an official county record. Names and numbers may be misspelled; check the video at the timestamp before quoting.
Speech-to-text: whisper.cpp, model large-v3-turbo. Produced 2026-10-12. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:16] Good evening. I would like to call this regular meeting of September 9, 2025 to order. This is our first meeting back from summer break. If you are able and so choose, please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. One nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

[00:00:46] So we will start with our proclamations. If I can ask the Fairfax County Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution to join me down in the well.

[00:01:04] It's like really tall. Okay. I'm going to proclaim now. Whereas, the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution initiated the observance of Constitution Week in 1955, with a resolution that was later adopted by the U.S. Congress creating Public Law 915, which was signed into law by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in August 1956.

[00:01:39] And whereas, the goal of this annual observance during the week of September 17 to 23 is threefold to encourage the study of the historical events that led to the framing of the Constitution in September 1787, to remind the public that the Constitution is the basis of America's great heritage, and to emphasize U.S. citizens' responsibility to protect, defend, and preserve the U.S. Constitution.

[00:02:05] And whereas the U.S. Constitution is the oldest and longest-standing written and codified national constitution in the world, having been amended 27 times since 1789, beginning with the Bill of Rights, and interpreted, supplemented, and implemented by a long body, a large body of federal constitutional law. And whereas September 17, 2025 marks the 238th anniversary of the framing of the United States Constitution by the Constitutional Convention, this week of observance offers opportunities for education, celebration, and community awareness

[00:02:41] of the importance of our country's governing document to our way of life. And whereas the U.S. Constitution is singular in its history and importance to our country, we must endeavor to teach its significance to each new generation and to keep its core tenets at the center of our American principles.

[00:02:59] Now, therefore, I, Catherine S. Reed, Mayor of the City of Fairfax, do hereby proclaim the week of September 17 through 23 as Constitution Week and ask our community to reaffirm the ideals of the framers of the Constitution had in 1787 by vigilantly protecting the freedoms guaranteed to us through this foundational document forming the structure of our government in these United States and guaranteeing our individual rights and liberties. And with that, I will turn it over for your remarks. Thank you, Mayor Reed, Council members, and City Clerk

[00:03:36] Melissa Shambury, who was instrumental in making this proclamation happen tonight. I'm Katie Jackson, the DAR Constitution Week committee chair, and a 25-year resident of Fairfax City. Thought I'd add that in. As a representative of the Fairfax County chapter, National Society, Daughters of the American Revolution, I'm honored to accept this proclamation in support of Constitution Week. Your comprehensive proclamation goes a long way towards helping our chapter meet DAR's mission of promoting awareness and understanding of American history and the Constitution, and most importantly, reminding U.S. citizens of their responsibility to protect,

[00:04:16] defend, and preserve the U.S. Constitution and our individual rights and liberty. And I hope everyone voted today and exercised that right. Our chapter will once again be hosting an open house at the City of Fairfax Regional Library on September 17th from 7 to 8 p.m. It's to help the community learn more about the Constitution and the events surrounding its establishment.

[00:04:39] It's a family-friendly event. There will be educational displays and handouts, and there will also be library books about men and women who are instrumental in the framing of the Constitution and our government. They will be available for people to look at and to check out if they wish.

[00:04:57] So please tell your colleagues, your neighbors, and I hope to see all of you there too. Just stop in, say hello, take a look at the display. It's going to be in the little conference room as you go into the library from the front entrance. So on behalf of the DAR Fairfax County Chapter, once again, thank you for your time, your recognition, and your support of our organization and its mission.

[00:05:18] It's greatly appreciated. Well, thank you. We are going to get a photo now. Okay. Appreciate it. Thank you very much.

[00:05:48] I'm going to now ask Chloe Ritter, our Director of Multimodal Transportation, to join me here so that we can proclaim about Car-Free Day, Chloe.

[00:06:13] Whereas, the city of Fairfax is committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, including emissions from transportation, as part of the city's environmental sustainability goals. And whereas, the city strives to create a livable community with access to safe and convenient transportation options, and is currently developing the Move Fairfax plans to improve transportation safety.

[00:06:35] And whereas, reduced reliance on driving alone supports the city's safety and sustainability goals and provides other community benefits such as reduced congestion and reduced parking demand. And whereas World Car-Free Day is celebrated annually on September 22nd to promote sustainable transportation choices, and whereas the City of Fairfax is encouraging residents to get there differently on Car-Free Day and throughout September by trying alternative transportation such as the City's Q-Bus, Metro Rail, bicycling and walking, and carpools.

[00:07:09] Now, therefore, I, Catherine S. Reed, Mayor of the City of Fairfax, do hereby proclaim September 22nd as Car-Free Day in the City of Fairfax and encourage members of the community to enjoy local trails, public transit, and other transportation options available in the City of Fairfax.

[00:07:27] And with that, I will turn it over to Chloe Ritter. Well, thank you, Mayor Reed, and thank you to all of the City Council for your continued support for and encouragement of transportation choices in the city. car free day is a great chance to try different transportation options it's also a great chance this year especially to be thinking about the future of transportation because at the end of september and into october we're going to have opportunities for residents to give us feedback on the move fairfax plan which is for pedestrians safety and then also mobility choices in old town and we'll also have an opportunity to be talking about the future of q bus with our q transit plan

[00:08:03] in october as well so i hope you'll all be thinking about how you want your choices to change in the future and be improved in the future as well as thinking about the choices you have now and give it a try as you're going out and about on car

[00:08:14] free day or throughout September thank you we can move to the adoption of the

[00:08:58] agenda is there a motion to approve the agenda I move that the agenda be adopted as presented is there a second second the motion has been made and seconded a roll call vote excuse me I have a question before we go on just a clarifying question on item 11b and I noticed in the staff report it said that this is an item that was requested by some council members. Would it be possible just to know who the council members were who requested this agenda

[00:09:36] item? Ms. Shinneberry? I don't have that answer. Mr. Napti is coming up. And we also heard the request from the Planning Commission who actually took a vote and had a majority suggest it so that's why it's coming to you. I'm sorry an informal

[00:10:13] request from the council? Yes, during a work session on the development proposal for Gatewood Plaza. Again, do we know which council members requested this? I don't have it on the top of my head, but the planning commission did have a majority, and so it went to the planning commission.

[00:10:32] As a result of that, it's coming to the city council. Well, I would just say it would be helpful. I mean, the staff report indicates that this was requested by some council members. It would be helpful to know specifically who is requesting these agenda items when they come forward so we have a motion we have a second and we are doing a roll call vote council member amos aye council member hall aye council member hardy-chandler aye council member peterson aye council member

[00:11:09] bates aye council member mcquillan aye motion passed unanimously we will go to initial general public comment. I had one speaker sign up by 5 o'clock p.m. today, so I will call up the one speaker, Ellen Pence. My name is Ellen Pence, and I'm at 3211 Adams Court. I am speaking about the carts. We were given no choice in this matter. There were no surveys or polls or questionnaires

[00:11:44] or outreaches of any kind sent out by you until earlier this year when we got these door hangers announcing that the carts are coming now if you live in a separate house with a garage or a carport and a driveway that goes to a street or a road or even a highway the carts are no doubt a wonderful idea goody goody free carts right i totally get that but it's tunnel vision on adams court i live in a townhouse that does not have a garage or a carport or a driveway that goes to a street or

[00:12:23] road or highway. Adams Court is not a street or a road. It is a parking lot. It is a very tightly packed parking lot with vehicles not only in front of our houses, but also parked around the little circle at the end of it. The circle has grass and shrubbery and a few trees and three benches in it just for our enjoyment. There are 34 houses facing on this parking lot. That would be 78 carts.

[00:12:56] There is absolutely no room for any sort of carts to come into this parking lot. It is rumored that the city intends to buy trucks with mechanized arms that would only come down Cardinal Road. That would be 78 carts out on Cardinal Road at the school bus stop, which is right at Adams Court.

[00:13:17] And some of us would have to drag the carts for two blocks in all kinds of weather. Many of our residents are senior citizens who, like myself, are staying in their homes as long as they are able. We can't handle carts.

[00:13:34] We are able to carry our bags out of our bags of trash, which are provided by our HOA and not provided by the city. We carry them and our recycle bins through our front doors to the curb. We aren't able to drag carts up and down slate stairs outdoors.

[00:13:55] Our front halls are too small to accommodate carts of any size. Smaller carts won't work. No smaller carts in our neighborhood, they won't work. I don't want to keep carts of any size in my kitchen or living room or dining room.

[00:14:12] I can't drag them downstairs to the basement or the patio, both of which are a whole floor below. I can't store carts in my patio or in my laundry room so what is left my front yard you and your staff never considered that some of us live in connected houses we don't have we don't have sides we don't have backyards we only have patios that want to accommodate this thank you all right we can move to the consent agenda is there a motion to approve the consent agenda I move

[00:14:50] adaption of a consent agenda for agenda item number 6a consideration of the july 22nd 2025 special meeting minutes agenda item number 6b consideration of the july 22nd 2025 regular meeting minutes agenda item number 6c consideration of the august 12th 2025 special meeting minutes agenda item 6 number 6d consideration of the august 26 2025 special meeting minutes Agenda item number 6E, consideration of appointments of two Fairfax City Parks Foundation Incorporated initial directors.

[00:15:27] Agenda item number 6F, consideration of an appointment to the city's Retirement Plan Administrative Committee. Agenda item number 6G, consideration of an award of professional service contracts for architectural design, engineering, and construction management services to Architecture Incorporated, Providence Elementary School, and mostly incorporated Daniels Run Elementary School with combined expenses for both projects in fiscal year 2026 not exceeding $3 million.

[00:15:57] Agenda item number 6H, consideration of an award of construction contract in the estimated amount of $1,727,333.60 to Virginia Paving Company for Fairfax Boulevard Reconstruction and Paving.

[00:16:14] Agenda Item 6I, Consideration of an Updated Resolution to Endorse Applications for Revenue-Sharing Funding. Agenda Item 6J, Consideration of Resolutions 1, Accepting the Purdue Farmer Bankruptcy Plan and Approving of the City's Participation in the Proposed Settlement of Opioid-Related Claims Against Sackler Family

[00:16:40] and, two, approving of the city's participation in the proposed settlements of opioid-related claims against Albogen, Amnil, Aotex, Hikma, Indivior, Mylor, Sun, and Zytus and their related corporate entities, and, in each case, directing the execution of any documentation necessary to effectuate the city's participation in the settlements.

[00:17:07] I move to approve the Consent Agenda Items No. 6A through J and the motion accompanying the Consent Agenda Item as printed. Is there a second? Second. A motion has been made by Council Member Hardy-Channeler and seconded by Council Member Bates.

[00:17:26] Are there any items Council would like pulled for additional discussion? Yes. Council Member Peterson. Items E and F are appointments. there are simple one sentence motions it's customary to read them so that they can be recognized and I'd prefer that we do that and on item I I think it would be helpful just to reread it's a very brief sample motion but the list of the three transportation projects that are being approved here so that everybody can have an updated understanding of what those projects are thank you item

[00:18:03] 6e 6f and 6i will be removed for discussion roll call vote on the consent agenda minus the agenda items e f and i council member mcquillan aye council member bates aye council member peterson aye council member hardy chandler aye council member hall aye council member amos aye motion passed unanimously go to 6e yes item 6e consideration appointments to fairfax city parks foundation

[00:18:37] Inc. Initial Directors. Good evening. We have two individuals up for consideration and approval this evening. The first is James Hickman, and the second is Nicholas Brasini. In your pack, you'll find both of their letters of interest. James is here this evening in the audience, and Nicholas was hoping to attend but was unable. Any additional questions on these two

[00:19:15] appointments? Council Member Peterson? What's the term of the appointments? Three years. And just to put this in perspective again, this is a set of initial appointments that are being made. If you could just remind us of that procedure, it would be helpful.

[00:19:30] Yes. So the Parks Foundation, the bylaws state the council will approve the first five directors, and then the organization becomes independent and will appoint an additional up to five more.

[00:19:46] So the board must be a minimum of five directors and a maximum of ten. Thank you. And these would be directors three and four. So we are waiting on the 5th, and PRAB has two more individuals to interview Thursday night.

[00:20:03] Any additional questions on this? No. Did you want to make a motion? Yeah. I move to endorse the appointment of James Hickman and Nicholas Persini as directors for the Fairfax City Parks Foundation for a three-year term as outlined in the attached bylaws.

[00:20:27] Is there a second? Second. A motion has been made and seconded. A roll call vote. Council Member Amos? Aye. Council Member Hall? Aye. Council Member Hardy-Chandler? Aye. Council Member Peterson? Aye. Council Member Bates? Aye. Council Member McQuillan? Aye. Motion passed unanimously. We will go to 6F.

[00:20:45] The consideration of appointments for the City Retirements Plan Administrative Committee. I'm going to recognize J.C. Martinez, Chief Financial Officer. Thank you. Mayor, Council, as the chair of the Retirement Committee, This is an appointment of a retirement representative for the City of Fairfax Retirement Administrative Committee.

[00:21:04] The previous retiree representative alternate resigned from the committee at the beginning of 2025. Following their departure, a call for interest was issued to the retirement community, specifically the employees, and one retired member has expressed a willingness to serve.

[00:21:20] Suzanne I'm gonna get this wrong well Woloski what will is that thank you and it is respectfully requests that City Council point miss Suzanne as the retiree representative alternate to the City of Fairfax retirement administrative committee for the term beginning March 1 2025 and ending February 28 20 28 happy to field any questions are there any additional questions on this appointment is there a motion council member peterson i move to confirm the appointment of susan

[00:21:59] wikolowski as the retiree representative alternate position for remainder of a three-year term extending through february 28 2028 is there a second second a motion has been made and seconded a roll call vote council member mcquillan aye council member bates aye council member peterson aye councilmember Hardy Chandler aye councilmember Hall aye councilmember Amos aye motion passed unanimously we'll go to 6i which is a consideration of an updated resolution to endorse applications for revenue sharing funding

[00:22:38] I'll recognize David Summers the Public Works director thank you this is an update from the May resolution to provide revenue sharing for three projects. The update needed to be done to list the projects and update the amount. The first project is sidewalk construction on 1st and 2nd Street between Holman and Oak. This has an estimated cost of approximately $5.2 million total. Half would be Virginia revenue sharing and half would

[00:23:14] be C&I funds. The second project is safety and drainage and pedestrian improvements at the intersection of Dwight and Sager Avenue and Roberts Road. This project has an approximate construction cost of $3.6 million total cost, half by Virginia revenue sharing and half matched by CNI funds. The third project is the Northfax East-West Roadway, which connects University

[00:23:49] Drive extended to Cambridge Road. This project is approximately a $21 million project, and half of it is paid by NVTA 70% money, and half of it is paid by revenue sharing, VDOT revenue sharing funds. And happy to take any questions.

[00:24:12] Are there additional questions? just maybe two questions. The first is, it's been a while since we talked about these projects. As I recall, has there been anything in terms of new developments with respect to community feedback on any of these things? The last time these projects were discussed, I believe, was at the May resolution, and there was support for them from everybody we've heard from.

[00:24:43] And then just to double check, I know at the council level, we had quite a bit of discussion around all of these, and I'm assuming that there are no additional questions right now about any of these, because I know there were a lot at the time. Is that fair? Everybody's clear in terms of all their questions on this?

[00:24:59] Great. Thank you. Is there a motion? Councilmember Peterson? I move to adopt an updated resolution to approve the city's submission of three projects, First and Second Street Sidewalks, Dwight Avenue Improvements, and Northaxx East-West Roadway to the Virginia Department of Transportation for revenue-sharing funding.

[00:25:20] Is there a second? Second. The motion has been made and seconded. A roll call vote. Council Member Amos. Aye. Council Member Hall. Aye. Council Member Hardy-Chandler. Aye. Council Member Peterson. Aye. Council Member Bates. Aye. Council Member McQuillan. Aye. Motion passed unanimously.

[00:25:36] We will now go on to public hearing. We just have one public hearing tonight, which is a public hearing and council action on request from Chick-fil-A for a special use permit for modifications to the existing drive-thru and building for the property identified as tax map parcel number 48-3-06-028A and otherwise known as 9509 Fairfax Boulevard, Imprins, SU-24-00078, and SE-24-00079.

[00:26:12] I'm going to recognize Savannah Newbern, the senior planner of Berkeley Group, to provide the staff presentation. Yeah, it's on.

[00:26:33] Good evening, my name is Savannah Newbern, and I will be presenting on the request for a special use permit amendment,

[00:27:13] three special exceptions, and the certificate of appropriateness from the applicant for an existing restaurant located on Fairfax Boulevard. Here we detail the land use requests, including the special use permit, which will expand an existing restaurant to include a building addition for increased kitchen capacity, a dual drive-thru lane, and the widening of the drive-thru lane at the pickup window to the existing restaurant. Three special exceptions that we'll detail further on the next two slides and the Certificate of Appropriateness. So here is an image of the existing site. It may be difficult

[00:27:52] to see, but you enter on Fairfax Boulevard and you circulate through the site at the location of the green arrow, going south and back behind the restaurant, and then enter on the north side again. So here they're proposing to restripe the parking lot, widen, and double the drive-through lanes. You can see here, didn't know there was a feature to do this, very nice, and additional

[00:28:24] expansion along the north side here where there will be a canopy, and this details the special exception request from the setbacks. So I try and spell out exactly where and to what degree they are requesting relief. Again, this is an existing restaurant. They are somewhat constrained by the position on the site, and we find that their requests for relief from these setbacks are amenable and consistent with the intent of the zoning ordinance. Here we discussed the

[00:29:00] transitional yard and the bulk plane requirements so they're requesting relief for the transitional yard three requirements along the east south and west property lines adjacent to a multifamily community and a special exception for the bulk plane requirement along the east and south property lines and just to help if anyone isn't too familiar with the term bulk plane here is the definition bulk plane refers to a theoretical plane beginning at a specific line which shall be the lot line unless otherwise specified and

[00:29:37] rising over a specific slope so the intent of this is to ensure that there is some step back from the property line and you achieve human scale however this is an existing restaurant and the intensity of the use here is intended to improve with the operational changes that are proposed according to the applicant they may speak to this more during their their turn and so here is an aerial image of the site it may be easier for you to understand the flow of

[00:30:17] the parking lot from this image it is in the general commercial zoning district and in the future land use map it is an activity center and with these factors in mind staff does recommend approval of the special use permit the three special exceptions and the certificate of appropriateness I'm happy to answer any questions you might have but I think the applicant speaks next next oh thank you so much I just want to add some historical context to this chick-fil-a

[00:30:53] was approved by a previous City Council around 2007 constructed opened around 2009. It's been a very popular regional destination, but that has resulted in various traffic challenges along the way with early on backups out onto Route 50, creating some significant concerns with safety. Over time, particularly since the COVID era, the property owner the operator have revised their operations we aren't seeing quite that dramatic of an issue they do have employees out there that are

[00:31:32] facilitating the orders and delivering orders but the site is an old standard it's not quite as as up to par as some of the newer ones in the region so what they what they proposed to us and what we've been evaluating this whole time is indeed a safety change it with the small kitchen addition and the equipment that they would house in that would expedite and cut down on the wait times to move people through the drive-through quicker especially with larger orders the drive-through lane adds enough space for approximately six

[00:32:10] vehicles which is roughly a hundred and 200 feet of space just for context from the service drive which is in the public right-of-way to their drive-through is about 240 feet that adds a significant amount of space that would allow cars that actually back out of the parking spaces and leave the site easier than it is today the addition of the door and the space for employees to then walk out and hand the orders to vehicles would also help expedite getting folks out of

[00:32:45] that queue there's a backup that happens right at that window space and one one aspect that staff focused on and discussing this with the applicant was while it's good that you have employees to facilitate helping take the order and things they don't have safe conditions standing out in a parking lot today so the plan does design between three and five foot walkways for the staff to be able to walk down to safely access the vehicles but I wanted to make sure you had that that context for the applicant speaks thank you I will open the public

[00:33:24] hearing Ms. Shinaberry has this public hearing been properly advertised yes it has we can call up the applicant to speak good evening Evan Pritchard from Wiregill here on behalf of the applicant I'm struggling with what to add because staff stole all my thunder and and and laid it out very clearly miss Newbern did an excellent job of summarizing the request and then mr. Seffen came in as the closer and sort of you know said a lot of what I was going to say about the you know the impetus for coming here I mean I'll just quickly summarize by

[00:34:03] saying as has been touched on that it is a very small site by by modern Chick-fil-a standards and all of these changes we've spent the last year going through methodically with staff as as mr. Sutton indicated they're all aimed at not only making the whole experience safer for employees and for customers but much more efficient to just get through there.

[00:34:28] For any of you who have been to this Chick-fil-A or others in the area or elsewhere, you know they've got the technology on lock. All these changes are going to facilitate much greater ability for employees with the tablets to go out, get the orders from people who haven't ordered ahead, get the food to the people who are waiting in the right car, and just make it much more of a seamless experience.

[00:34:51] So we're really excited. We have experienced what Mr. Sutphin was talking about, about historical backups into the parking lot, causing conflicts between the drive-through patrons and the people who are trying to enter or exit a parking spot and spilling out all the way to the service road and sometimes to Fairfax Drive.

[00:35:11] So I'm happy to answer any questions. We have the project engineer and architect here as well, if there's anything I can't answer. I think I will ask the clerk to call speakers forward to hear what the public has to say, and then we will open it up to the dais.

[00:35:28] Is there anyone to speak? I had nobody sign up prior, but if there's anybody in the room that's welcome, yep, come forward. Good evening. My name is Elisa DeLuda-Tath. I am a city resident, and I am a manager at this location.

[00:35:46] Yes, everything that has been provided for review has been meticulously gone through, has been revised multiple times. The safety of our staff and the efficiency of the operation that we have is of primary concern.

[00:36:03] The opportunity to have the long canopy where our drive-through window is and the door allows my staff to be able to go out, regardless of the conditions, to be able to, even if there may be a delay with a guest who is currently at the window, we can deliver the next several orders after that.

[00:36:25] It facilitates the ability for us to be able to get the flow moving as quickly as possible. So the proposed changes does increase the kitchen size. Thank God. And it does allow for, again, an opportunity for us to facilitate the quicker movement of those cars that have historically backed up to get them through and our guests to enjoy the experience as well as our city residences and those backups much more efficiently.

[00:36:56] Thank you. Is there anybody else in the room that would like to speak on this agenda item? All right. So we will open it up for questions from the dais for either staff or the applicant. member Amos and then council member Hardy Chandler well mr. Pritchard stole my thunder I was gonna ask specifically about I know that there's been multiple cases of these expansions kind of happening not just here but I notice in the county and other areas is this just part of a national effort or is this on a case-by-case basis it is part of a national effort chick-fil-a is always

[00:37:35] looking better you know for ways to to improve their their operations and yes As you've seen and we've talked about, they have to take kind of a bespoke approach because I'm sure, as you've seen, all these sites aren't created equal and they all have different entrances and exits and real estate area to work with.

[00:37:56] But, yes, it is part of a consistent program that Chick-fil-A has. Yeah, so are we taking those incremental steps to open on Sundays? We're going to get there? I can't make any representations on that whatsoever. I would just love a frozen lemonade on a Sunday, but whatever. I get it. Thank you. Thanks.

[00:38:12] Councilmember Harder-Challon? Well, I think many of us have seen the backup into the street, and so certainly, I mean, there's just evidence of the need to address that, and I really appreciate the attention to the staff's safety.

[00:38:27] That's a really big issue. Certainly, it's difficult in 2009 to anticipate what the need might be in 2025. I'm just wondering if these changes, do you see these as having longer-term solutions? And again, it's hard to predict the future, but just wondering if this is a fix for 2025 or is this a fix that you see kind of managing those issues for the long term?

[00:38:51] No, it's a great question. And the Chick-fil-A, I can tell you, although they weren't directly part of this effort, but the folks that work at Chick-fil-A work very closely with local management. But they do have operations people who really try and do look at the data, crunch the numbers.

[00:39:12] They keep amazing detail on number of orders, time to process those orders, and they factor all that in to come up with the design solutions that are going to be implemented here. And they do try to project, you know, they look at trends. I think COVID was referenced.

[00:39:29] I'm sure we've all experienced like a lot more use of drive-thrus in the subsequent years. And that is a trend that they see continuing. that you know these these solutions we're proposing therefore we think are going to be you know the best we can have for the next few years that we can predict but certainly doesn't close the door to us coming back to you in 5 10 15 years and and seeking even even a better setup based on customer behavior and the technology in the kitchen technology on in our phones or whatever

[00:40:06] we have in ten years so thank you councilmember hall I think these are going to be very welcome upgrades to the park or to the drive-through area is there any loss of parking spots I'm just trying to visualize where this will be going nine spots is that an issue is that a concern for staff does that still fall within our requirements they still meet the required parking for the site that's not one of the special exceptions that they're they're requesting relief Yeah, I figured since it was not mentioned, but I just wanted to confirm

[00:40:43] Okay, thank you other questions comments from the Dias Council member Peterson on the the backside where you've got the setbacks Have has there been any? Communication with the residents in those areas to see one way or another whether they have any reaction to this The there was the the public notice that went out I don't believe we've had any direct contact with folks, but that was something That was a long discussion with staff about exactly where any kind of equipment is going to be located, and we kind of had a good answer to that.

[00:41:22] It's unlike some of the other fast food providers, and, again, as many of you have probably experienced, if not all of you, when you come to Chick-fil-A, there's not really an order box where you're communicating your order with the machine, with the speaker on it.

[00:41:42] You're speaking with employees. I think outside of normal hours, there may be some of that. But we did provide specs for staff demonstrating that the equipment is going to be, if anything, quieter than what's been out there previously.

[00:42:01] Anything to add in terms of the interface? These applications were properly noticed, which means that Jason property owners would have received notification of what was proposed. I received no emails, no phone calls regarding the project.

[00:42:20] I have received those in the past on other projects, which indicates to me that there was no concern from those notified. Any other comments or questions from the dais? Well, I will just say that this Chick-fil-A is a case study in the book Reset that was written by Dan Heath and published in January of this year.

[00:42:41] And it talks about the engineering that Chick-fil-A has gone through. The subtitle of the book is How to Change What Isn't Working. And Dan Heath, I'm a fan, talks about Chick-fil-A and how the whole process, and it's used as a case study to talk about how you change things that aren't working.

[00:43:02] And I recommend the book to everybody, but he really does talk about the fact that increasing the capacity by double lanes means you have to increase the size of the kitchen staff. I mean, he goes through all the things, whether it's filling drinks, It is a very detailed representation of how engineering has gone into each one of these Chick-fil-A locations because they are all different.

[00:43:23] But head and shoulders, Chick-fil-A is ahead of every competitor in processing orders and filling them of any other chain in the country. And so I have great confidence, after having read this book, I have great confidence in the fact that a lot of engineering has gone into this, that all of this makes sense, and that we as a community are going to find that the community embraces the fact that they are orders of process faster, there aren't backups out onto Route 50, and that this really is, in all aspects, an improvement. So, if there's no other comments,

[00:44:00] I am going to close the public hearing, and there are a series of motions for this application. Is there a motion for the special use permit? I move that the City Council approve the request of Chick-fil-A, Incorporated, for a special use permit to modify existing drive-through and building pursuant to the City Code Section 6.7 on the premises known as 9509 Fairfax Boulevard, and more particularly described as Tax Map Parcel 48-3-06-028-A, with the following conditions.

[00:44:36] The proposed use shall be consistent with the application and statement of justification received with the application to the special use permit shall be non-transferable three the application shall obtain all necessary local state and or federal permits prior to any construction on site is there a second second a motion has been made by council member Hardy Chandler and seconded by council member Peterson is there any discussion on the motion seeing none a roll call vote council member Amos aye council member Hall aye council member Hardy Chandler council member

[00:45:14] peterson all right council member bates aye council member mckellen aye motion passed unanimously is there a motion for the special exception i move that the city council approve the request of chick-fil-a for special exceptions pursuant to city code section 110-6.16 from the following standards the transitional yard ty three requirements along the east south and west property line the front building yard along fairfax boulevard side building yard along the

[00:45:50] east property line and rear building yard along the south property line and the bulk plane requirement along the east and south property lines on the premises known as 9509 fairfax boulevard and more particularly described as tax map parcel 48-3-06-028-a with the following conditions one the proposed use shall be consistent with the application and statement of justification received with the application and two the applicant shall obtain all necessary local state and or federal

[00:46:23] permits prior to any construction on site is there a second second a motion's been made by council member hardy chandler and seconded by council member amos is there any discussion on this motion seeing none a roll call vote council member amos aye council member hall aye council member hardy chandler council member peterson i council member bates i council member mcwellen i motion passed unanimously is there a motion for the certificate of appropriateness i move that the city council approve the request of chick-fil-a incorporated for a certificate of appropriateness in accordance

[00:47:00] with section 110-6.5 of the city code on the premises known as 9509 fairfax boulevard and more particularly described as tax map parcel 48-3-06-028-a with the following conditions one the proposed modifications shall be in general conformance with the plans and renderings received by staff in june 2024 and recommended for approval by the board of architectural review as of july 17th 2024. two the applicant shall secure all required zoning approvals and permits

[00:47:38] prior to construction and three landscaping is subject to change per urban forester comments at site plan approval stage is there a second second i love chick-fil-a okay uh a motion's been made by council member hearty chandler and seconded by council member

[00:47:57] Hall. Is there any discussion on this motion? Seeing none, a roll call vote. Council Member Amos? Aye. Council Member Hall? Aye. Council Member Hardy Chandler? Aye. Council Member Peterson? Aye. Council Member Bates? Aye. Council Member McQuillan? Aye. Motion passed unanimously. We will now go on to the second general public comment. Is there anybody in the room that would like to speak on general public comment that was not public hearing item tonight?

[00:48:24] don't think so okay then well I will now recess the regular meeting to go into a work session we will stay in council chambers our first item our first item is a pre-application briefing on Fairfax Square Professional Center in parents nine eight four zero through nine nine four six Main Street I'm gonna recognize Albert Frederick city planner to provide the staff presentation good evening everyone this is the pre-application briefing for concept

[00:49:02] for Fairfax Square professional center at 94 or 9840 through 9946 Main Street staff met with the potential applicant to discuss the preliminary preliminary plans and have provided some initial feedback on a concept plan staff will provide a brief presentation the potential applicant is in the audience and is available to answer any questions on the potential concept plan the site is located on the north side of Main Street west and south of Fairfax of square apartments and east of main street center this site is in the

[00:49:42] commercial corridor place type with commercial retail zoning district the total acreage of the site is approximately 10.4 acres the conceptual plan is a phased mixed-use development that would retain the existing five-story office building located at 9900 Main Street and the existing bank at 9910 Main Street while replacing the remaining 10 commercial buildings with four commercial buildings approximately 61,000 square feet along Main Street in addition the the applicants proposing four residential buildings with

[00:50:20] approximately 297 total multi plant multi-family units that would be located in the rear of the site one one building would house 44 affordable dwelling units which is approximately 15% of the units proposed the density is approximately 30 dwelling units per acre also the the three existing vehicle access points will remain as the applicant plans to add a new shared use path landscaping and bus shelter on Main Street the concept plan does not

[00:50:58] include the Fairfax Square apartments the gardener style apartments to the north and to the east of this site it's not including the proposal so to kind of walk you through the through the concept plan this is existing conditions there are 12 buildings on site buildings 9900 and 9910 the office building for van meter companies and the existing bank would remain the other buildings would

[00:51:30] be demoed and as the project is phased beginning from the west side of the property to the east and the next couple slides will walk you through the demo plan and the phasing of this concept plan so on the on the west side of the property you'll see roughly five buildings that would be demoed in phase one and in phase two those buildings would be removed and you would have a commercial building up front being replaced so that's building D that's

[00:52:09] approximately 30,000 square feet followed by two residential buildings to the rear on the west side those two units will come online and then as the applicant would continue with the program on the east side those units those commercial spaces will be demoed and the first building that would be constructed on the east side of the property would be a commercial building up front with I believe that build is proposed with retail office and possibly

[00:52:44] some restaurant uses to the rear of the site you'll have two more residential buildings coming online building our one is proposed as an affordable dwelling unit building with approximately 44 units on site that would trigger a modification to to the city's affordable dwelling unit ordinance and then the final phase for the concept plan would provide two additional commercial

[00:53:21] buildings up front so the applicant would remove again like I said 10 10 buildings and will replace back with a mixed-use product that would have roughly the same amount of commercial space as the existing commercial spaces out there and would add roughly 293 residential units to the site so what's before you is the primary vehicular and secondary vehicular improvement plan the

[00:53:59] concept plan shows you know the interests will again would remain the same secondary access points are provided on the site as well as pedestrian improvements interior and exterior to the site staff has provided preliminary comments for the potential applicant those comments are in your packet and if you would like to discuss those comments would be more than welcome to discuss them with you again so just the comments so again again are in your packet and staff has provided comments through DRT with the applicant

[00:54:37] and the outcome is aware of these items and they would bring those those comments proposed changes issues to be addressed within the proposed language application moving forward so in terms of the applications that you would that you could potentially see coming before you the applicant would need a comprehensive plan amendment from commercial corridor place type to mixed use place type this parcel has this property has been identified and the comp plan as a parcel specific consideration so and within that

[00:55:15] consideration it speaks to to providing a mix of use and with residential and commercial on the site so the applicant would be required to to provide a comprehensive plan in order to to facilitate this type of development as well as the rezoning would need to occur from commercial retail to plan development mixed use the applicant would need to provide a master development plan and provide the modifications to the affordable dwelling unit to have a standalone building with affordable dwelling units in it and in

[00:55:50] terms of shared parking or parking the applicant is proposing to provide a reduction in the parking for the proposal so a shared parking study would be required along with each they were along with the TIS and the applicant would be required a major certificate of appropriateness for architecture and landscaping so just graphically this is what the comp plan amendment would look like you'd have a commercial commercial corridor place type going to a mixed-use

[00:56:28] place type and then a rezoning from CR to PDM and finally the Planning Commission met and had positive feedback for the applicant back in July and overall the concept it's a good concept it matches a vision of the mixed-use place type there had some some concerns about tenant retention that the applicant should be able to address if you have any questions on the tenant retention plan and in terms of photometric plans and street lighting

[00:57:04] for internal and external streets the applicant would need to address those items during the Laney space so overall the Planning Commission had five positive feedback for the potential applicant and in terms of next steps the potential applicant would provide a land-use application submission a development review means with staff work sessions and public hearings the applicant is here to address any questions that you may have and I'll be happy to stand by for any questions you may have as well thank you thank you very much are there questions from the dais regarding this pre application

[00:57:44] Councilmember Hall thank you so we're looking at 293 units and 44 in a separate building what's the rationale for the separation of the 44 affordable units I think the applicant can address that but I believe it's in terms of it's a financing item that they would need to address in terms of just the way that

[00:58:18] the financing goes in terms of affordable dwelling units but walking up towards them I love that we now have the applicants here that can answer questions that staff can't this is wonderful thank you good evening my name is Roy Barnett I'm the group president for van meter companies responsible for acquisition planning development in our investment property group so they answer your question on this it's a question we've had in multiple jurisdictions over time and basic idea is that we have the buildings, but we're able from a financing standpoint, an economic standpoint,

[00:58:55] to provide more units to the municipality by being able to put them in a single building because it's a financing situation with Virginia housing. We use low-income housing tax credits, other means of financing and loan programs from Virginia housing that allows us to offer more units than the minimum required by the zoning regulations it allows us to put them in a location it's the same design standards the buildings meet the same geometric requirements exterior architecture is any other building we try to

[00:59:32] place them within the core of the product community so they're not isolated they're in integrated within the community that's why we have building ace identified as the affordable dwelling unit building because it's right next to the clubhouse and the pool and the amenities and it's in the core when we look at the overall community of Fairfax Square with the existing apartments and the proposed new apartments. Okay, thank you. What is the anticipated breakdown of one, two, three bedrooms, studios, etc.? We haven't got to specific details on the

[01:00:07] individual unit breakdowns, but typically in an urban setting, we look at 50 to 60 percent one bedrooms. We'll see about 30, 35 percent two bedrooms and just the minimal amount of three bedrooms because of what we see in the demand, especially in the Fairfax Square existing community that we have. Okay, and is there an expectation then of the 44 affordable dwelling units to be one, two, or three bedroom? They have, we are required to provide a similar mix as what we providing the market rate units. Similar mix. Okay. And the parking that will be provided,

[01:00:47] is any of this in garages or is it all surface parking? It is. That's why we have the transportation parking study being done. We look at the commercial users utilizing the surface spaces in most cases and we're putting underground parking in all four buildings. Underground. Okay. Okay. We did shortly before this meeting receive an email from a concern resident who lives in perfect square so i just want to just do a quick review of some of their questions i think their understanding was

[01:01:27] that over half of the units were going to be junior one bedrooms aka inefficiency but you're saying that that's that is not the case because we haven't released any breakdown of floor plans are unit designs. Okay. And I think, you know, one of the concerns in general is just this is 300 apartments. It's, you know, 600 cars potentially, those kind of things. So I'm happy to hear that there is a plan, hopefully, for the underground parking situation. And then my last question is, I think it said there will be about 61,000 square feet of commercial, and that's

[01:02:03] consistent with what is there now? That is actually in excess of what's there today that we would be removing we have and we're speaking of taking down approximately 57,000 square feet of commercial buildings replacing it with something greater than 57,000 depending on the design and we're working around a couple trees right now so we're but it would always be and that was part of the the effort when we worked with the planning commission council on the comprehensive plan was that we would always exceed the amount of commercial space that we have there today

[01:02:36] Okay. And staff mentioned maybe a restaurant or some other things that might be going in there. Is there any sort of first right of refusal being given to current tenants that would like to stay on? that's why you see the phasing plan that was presented building d is 30 000 square feet that's over half of what we have in the total complex today so our goal is to do this in phase excuse me in phases so that we can provide relocation so that the first building is only really taking down three existing buildings those buildings we're doing leasing strategy right now so those

[01:03:13] buildings are more short-term leases they can move out so that our goal is to build that first building, D, and then be able to move as many people who want to move into the new building, move over immediately so that we don't have a displacement. Okay. I'm really happy to hear that.

[01:03:30] Will the rents be comparable to what they're paying now or do you anticipate that that would be affordable for those that are already paying X rate? It depends. The rents there are, there's a variety of rents that we have today in the commercial space, but we would be looking at where the market is at the time and we would honor any of the leases that we currently have.

[01:03:49] okay thank you councilmember Amos thank you and I I'm curious I'm gonna be more curious about the lie tech and the 44 units but we'll come back to that another time I appreciate the phasing plan implementation I also want to echo some of the concerns that were raised I think both by staff and the Planning Commission specifically surrounding stormwater I know in the staff report and in the presentation and they identified that store you do you have a plan for stormwater yet on site or has there not really been any progress on potential ideas for

[01:04:26] how you would address that we are working on a stormwater management strategy both for quantity and quality and that could be a mix of devices and utilize systems strategies so that's being worked on and we've had feedback from the engineering department here at the city and our engineers have been working with them and and passing ideas back and forth and requirements that's making sure we're meeting all the requirements.

[01:04:52] And the fortunate and unfortunate thing is that some of the questions I want to ask you won't come until later, for example, after TIS is done. But I would be curious on, which was also brought up by the resident in the email, about that Burke Station Road, Main Street Light. That is of a concern, and I'm wondering if any improvements are going to be necessary, at least from a transportation infrastructure standpoint that probably isn't for right now, maybe later, or do you feel like one of the things that's the issue at the main street entrance light right now at front of sandy spring bank is what we call a short throat if you notice that that entrance if

[01:05:30] you've been in there you go in about 20 feet and there's a medium break to go left to right and then it's a very short distance back to your end of the parking lot if you notice on the new plan we're extending that medium break all the way back to create a division of traffic so if you're going to sandy spring bank coming in that entrance in the middle you will go back to the back side of the building turn left and come around the building to park in front of the building so we're trying to reduce those inner intersections and influences or traffic confliction points right

[01:06:05] now and shift them so that we have looked at that traffic situation so we're well aware of that and we're trying to address it with this plan sounds good and my last i guess point to also echo what the planning commission brought up the connection to the shopping center to the west have there been discussions about that what are some potential opportunities that we could see there in partnership with that to get more people going over i think you're probably well aware of the great differential that we have there between the different properties and especially the grade behind the shell station and so there's it's almost impossible to have a vehicular connection

[01:06:42] but i am meeting with the owner of that center next week to talk about a pedestrian connection that we could make there is a makeshift pedestrian connection today that's like a dirt trail through the woods that people have been using and we would like to more formalize that and i'm meeting with them to see what kind of resolution we can come up with council member hardy chandler so my question is to zoom out a little bit i noticed or what stood out to me in the statement of justification is the sort of perspective that this is more in alignment with the vision of the city.

[01:07:22] So can you speak to that? Because I think in addition to the project in particular, there certainly should be consideration of how it fits into the sort of broader direction of your neighbors and that kind of thing. So how do you see this fitting into the vision for the city?

[01:07:37] Well, I think, you know, we all, there's two points there. We constantly see a need for more housing and more quality housing and i think we have shown from the years since mr van meter senior built the first building fairfax square in 1965 and has the buildings you see out there were built what is that 60 years ago and we still maintain the day as if they this was a class a property because we treat as a class a property we i built the clubhouse in 2002 2003 we come in and completely remodeled the clubhouse area set it in the core of the community put in an

[01:08:16] oversized pool more than any other community would be of this size so we're trying to meet those quality standards that the city has we're trying to also meet the mix of housing needs that you see that are trying to be or sometimes overlooked and we're also looking at the affordability and I think by coming in up front without being even requested to do this is an offering 15% of the property as affordable housing I think shows our commitment to that part of the business as a side I am I also head up our affordable housing group and this is not our first project this will be

[01:08:53] number five six I think for me at the point when we actually get to this I have four completed two under design hopefully going to tax credit funding next year or next spring and then this will be number seven i guess so number seven thank you for mentioning the other projects i i too wanted to follow up on the question about the separated affordable housing in the other projects do you are there any issues that have come up around that separation beyond the financing just there has been none they're integrated communities integration not separation and i can show you

[01:09:33] some of the affordable housing buildings that we've built and most people would think that they were condominium buildings, not even rental apartment buildings. So it's been well accepted, and we actually have, I just finished a project where we built 20 units in a community, again, using the LIHTC program, and they're built right next door to our market rate units that are selling for $700,000, $750,000, and you can't tell the difference when you drive down the street, you can't tell the difference from the design, personnel, demographics, because remember, we're serving that 60% area median income,

[01:10:09] So when you talk about this, when you talk about affordable housing, it's really a lot of the public service personnel that you would have every day. Right. Thank you. Other questions? Council Member McQuillan. Hi there. Thank you.

[01:10:26] So I have a question regarding trash. I understand that you guys do trash a little different in your complex. Can you explain how this increase of residential units will affect that service? So, yes, in our garden apartment community, I think we were one of the first introduced, we have what's called valet trash.

[01:10:45] So it's picked up every, you know, picked up by our personnel at your doorstep. That's in the garden style buildings because those are walk-up buildings. These new buildings are center corridor buildings with elevators. Every one of the builders will have trash chutes and central trash collection areas in the garage, in the basement.

[01:11:07] So the trash will be serviced and picked up from the basement? From the basement. Yes, of the residential buildings. They're all central corridor residential buildings with trash chutes. Excellent. Thank you. Other questions? Council Member Peterson.

[01:11:24] Thanks. I wanted to go back also to the letter that we got from a resident raising a couple issues here. One question is, what is the current height of the buildings that are on site? I'm in 9900.

[01:11:41] I'm there. That's a five-story building with one story of parking underneath. And so the buildings we're proposing are the same five-story buildings with, and the garages are underground three-quarters of the way because of the way the hill slopes. You will have some exposed garage, but most of it's there.

[01:11:59] So we should be consistent building nights with 9,900 buildings. And your comp plan states that stipulates that we should be five stories, no more than five stories. So all of the buildings that are there at present are at five stories?

[01:12:19] No, just the center Main Street building. Okay, but when we look across the board at all the buildings, what does the height look like? The residential buildings are five stories. The one commercial building is three stories. The other, the building to the far west of the site is the first building we're going to build, Building D, which is the horizontal building on the left.

[01:12:43] That is a three-story building, three stories of commercial. The buildings on the right, the far building on the right is a two-story, but it's over under, which means that if you're on the right side of that building, it's one-story, and if you're on the left side of the building, it's two-story because you're at the basement level.

[01:13:02] Much similar to like we have in the mall area of the retail buildings today, where we have some stages that looks like one-story, and if you go down into the center core, it's a two-story consideration. So helpful to hear.

[01:13:17] I think it would also be helpful to have some visuals. We will have some 3D modeling and renderings for you when we come back before you. Right, because in the presentation, the one visual we have just has, yeah.

[01:13:34] That one there is the five-story, that building right there is, the one on the right is building A. It's the two-story commercial building. The building on the left is another two-story, but you're on the uphill side. So the building on the left is the top floor of that building.

[01:13:51] It's on that street level, and then the building to the back is the five-story residential bus street level. Again, thanks. It's helpful and would be good to see some visuals that sort of give you a more complete view of all that. What is the change in the open space that is available on the site from a before and after standpoint?

[01:14:16] I think we're pretty much in a neutral position on open space. I don't have the exact calculation in front of me, but we are trying to position this with additional open space and parks by going vertical, also handling the courtyards and the multi-story, the U-shaped buildings.

[01:14:34] That's a green courtyard in the middle, and we're creating some additional more usable courtyards than what we have today because today any courtyards we have are like buried between the buildings where we want to get them out on the streets.

[01:14:49] so they're usable by all of our guests and visitors. Okay, helpful to know because that's a point of interest that folks have. I think I actually have a slightly bigger picture question maybe for staff on this, and that would be, if I understand correctly, let me pull up the staff report here.

[01:15:22] The current zoning is commercial retail. current use is non-residential future land use designation is commercial corridor correct so i think the question is to what extent does commercial corridor involve residential and commercial corridor it's residential is not permitted that that's why um we would recommend that they would have a planned development district which would allow for the mixture of

[01:16:02] uses so you would have multifamily could have the retail office the existing bank the office space so to provide a mix of use and then it gives them some flexibility in terms of height and density but commercial corridor I mean commercial retail does not permit multifamily when you look up and down

[01:16:32] Main Street here is, how much of that entire corridor is a commercial corridor? I mean, is the commercial corridor kind of come and go segment by segment, or is it envisioned, or is there currently a contiguous commercial corridor stretch on Main Street?

[01:16:56] So the commercial corridor is a designation on the comprehensive plan and future land use map, and across Main Street, it is inconsistent, unlike Fairfax Boulevard, which the majority of it is commercial corridor activity center uh along main street we tend to have a mixed commercial corridor properties and various types of residential it's a patchwork that yes yeah and does this big picture impact that overall patchwork does it set a precedent for conversion of the patches that are commercial to residential in the future or is this entirely independent uh this is

[01:17:35] something we're going to touch on quite a bit in our next presentation uh but this site was discussed very heavily during the comprehensive plan review that wrapped up last year and so it was designated as a site where we would want to accommodate mixed-use development. There are no other sites along Main Street outside of activity centers where that decision was made in the comprehensive plan review. So by that logic, this would not set a precedent. So this is unique.

[01:17:59] Correct. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Very helpful. Other questions or comments for staff? Councilmember Hall thank you just one confirmation question this would feed into Daniels one elementary school is that correct thank you Jason I think Jason said yes head shake yes any other questions Councilmember Bates just want to say that overall I think this project has a lot of potential and I do agree with the

[01:18:36] The comment that was shared that we should see the parking more behind the buildings rather than right along Main Street, if to the extent possible, to create more of an attractive street frontage and more of a pedestrian-centric street frontage.

[01:18:57] And also, I think that's an opportunity to perhaps create more of a buffer with the existing neighborhood, if possible. And overall, I'd also like to see around the periphery maybe for the buildings to be a bit more consolidated without being interrupted by, you know, parking lots here and there.

[01:19:23] And I do love that we're seeing potentially a net increase in commercial space and also that the affordable housing number of units is above or anticipated to be above what's required.

[01:19:43] So long as we can do that without running afoul of the ordinance that we have in terms of placement. And lastly, I would like to see ideally at least the equivalent amount of tree canopy, 10-year tree canopy compared to what's there now, if not a net increase.

[01:20:06] But I know that's further down the line. I understand this is very preliminary, but overall I think it has a lot of potential. And certainly important to make sure that you're doing outreach to the community and responding to community concerns to the extent that you can.

[01:20:27] Thanks. Other questions or comments? Councilman Peterson. Just two questions. The first, again, we have a rendering here, and we'll have more, but to what degree is there flexibility over aesthetics of the actual building structure itself?

[01:20:48] It's a particular style right now, but presumably there's some flexibility around that. Yes, we understand we have to go through the architectural review for the city and maintain a certificate of appropriateness.

[01:21:06] So we understand this is just the first cut and it's the first blush and that there's always going to be adjustments and tweaks to the architecture. Well, and then it gets maybe to the second question, which is community dialogue and feedback and interaction.

[01:21:25] What is the plan and the process for visiting with people who are on site now or people who are around this area to get feedback in terms of their interests here? We will have a full-fledged community outreach program as we file the application and go start through the process.

[01:21:45] We do that on every application that I'm involved in in Northern Virginia or anywhere else. And can you just give a quick glimpse of what that is? We typically try to schedule community meetings. We've already had some discussions with some of our commercial tenants.

[01:22:02] We would have community meetings with our residential and commercial tenants to go over the final programs, or not the final, but the program as submitted. We would continue that dialogue and have ongoing communications with the local community. Great and helpful to hear.

[01:22:20] I would just say that a no-surprises policy would certainly be appreciated by everybody who's involved. The letter we got indicated really an absence of awareness around this until very, very recently. So I think we want to try to avoid that kind of a situation going forward and also be sure that we're engaged actively in dialogue so that people have a chance to, you know, look at things and then provide feedback and response.

[01:22:45] We understand. Thank you. Other questions or comments? Well, I'll just add my two cents worth. I like this project. Looking at this particular rendering, it actually reminds me of Fairfax Corner, The different heights of the buildings, it leads to that.

[01:23:01] The fact that you have commercial buildings that are lower and residential buildings that maximize the use of the space. I think this is kind of in keeping with other development that we're seeing around the region, not just in the city, but around the region, Mosaic and Fairfax Corner.

[01:23:19] Reducing the amount of asphalt parking lot, I didn't hear anybody ask how much we're reducing the amount of asphalt parking lot. But asphalt parking lot leads to stormwater problems, and we've got a lot of it in the city. So seeing the best use of this parcel for multiple uses, retail, commercial, and housing, to me, is the best and highest use of this particular parcel.

[01:23:43] I appreciate the fact that you want to do it in phases so that you're not disrupting your current tenants as much as possible, and that you are offering more affordable housing units than what is required by our 6% set-aside. And as far as, you know, independent buildings, I know that this is something they're doing in the county.

[01:24:02] And for the same reason, it's financing, it's the LIHTC credits, and it's the fact that if you want to get more than 6%, if you want to get twice that many housing units, doing it this way gives us more. And at 60% AMI, it really is workforce housing, more than what people are thinking in their heads is affordable housing.

[01:24:20] It is workforce housing. So, you know, I think there's a lot of promise here. I appreciate the pre-application hearing. I think we've had great questions asked here on the dais, and we look forward to seeing more about this project. Thank you so much. Thank you all. Our next item is a discussion of a potential review of the City of Fairfax 2035 Comprehensive Plan pertaining to mixed-use development outside activity centers.

[01:24:46] Paul Napty, Division Chief of Planning, will provide the staff presentation.

[01:25:00] Thank you, Mayor Reed and members of City Council.

[01:25:41] The purpose of this presentation tonight is to consider whether to re-evaluate the city's comprehensive plan guidance on mixed-use development to make it more amenable to mixed-use development outside of activity centers. This stemmed from feedback from both the Planning Commission and City Council work sessions on the Gatewood proposal at 10201 Fairfax Boulevard.

[01:26:07] This was a proposal to replace an existing office building with mixed-use development, And that property sits outside of an activity center. And so the current comprehensive plan has no means of supporting that type of development. To answer the question from Councilmember Peterson earlier, at the City Council work session on February 4th, staff heard informal feedback from Councilmembers Bates, Amos, and Mayor Reed that suggested that we relook at the guidance of the comprehensive plan to give us a venue to support this.

[01:26:36] Again, this was informal feedback. It was not a direct request. In addition to that, we received similar feedback from four of the six planning commission members who were present at the work session on this project on January 27. This resulted in direction from the chair of the planning commission to staff to proceed with the presentation to explain what it would take to review this portion of the comprehensive plan we just recently adopted.

[01:27:00] And so since the planning commission is the overseer of the comprehensive plan, we had this presentation with them in March. And based on that presentation, they took a formal vote of five to one to make a recommendation to city council to receive the presentation and not to proceed with changes to the conference plan at this time.

[01:27:19] So if there are any questions on that, I can address them. Otherwise, I'll proceed with the presentation. Councilmember Peterson. Well, let me see if I understand correctly. Informally, two council members said they were interested in this being brought forward?

[01:27:42] Correct. that one if i may um may read mr peterson uh the discussion the comments there was not a specific request so we react we were reacting to the comments that were made which was um exploring exploring this concept further because you had you had a um just like you had here with van meter you had a pre-development on the gateway it's a gateway plaza gateway plaza so

[01:28:18] it's replete you know to replace an awful current office building with mixed use and residential so that is what the staff we are we're reacting to the comments about thinking you know about that topic generally not necessarily specifically on the Gateway Plaza project and so that's sort of what we took from that discussion and then of course it then went to the Planning Commission with the staff took it there which is the logical step plus I think

[01:28:54] they had Planning Commission members speak to that as well so let me if I might circle back to that in a moment but with respect to the Planning Commission do I understand that by five to one the recommendation was not to move forward with amendments that's correct that discussion happened later uh so the the feedback received from the planning commission during the gatewood proposal um was that we review the comprehensive plan because a reminder staff could not support that proposal based on the

[01:29:32] language in the comprehensive plan and so they requested that we review that we went to them in march which was a month and a half later and explained various reasoning why we would not want to move forward with that and then following that discussion they made the recommendation five to one to not proceed so they had changed their position and so uh it was seemed to make sense that we would follow up with the city council with the same discussion but this but the planning commission was not interested in moving forward correct but they recommended that we review with the city council as well the entire planning commission voted five to one against it but

[01:30:11] then recommended it be moved to the council to see a council agrees with their decision they didn't want it to just be their decision to not move forward they thought that council should have their say as well on whether to move forward or not just to be and just to be very direct about this council member peterson the the discussion the notion of of residential and the commercial corridors is a pretty fundamental issue within the comprehensive plan probably not one that is appropriate to be debated in the course of considering an application

[01:30:49] or certainly at a public hearing considering an application. So providing a different venue for that kind of discussion in a work session like was done with the Planning Commission when they voted 5-1 to recommend not moving forward. And as we're doing here tonight, to be able to have that discussion kind of outside of the auspices of a specific application, certainly seems to be a productive uh productive type of discussion so this discussion is decoupled

[01:31:19] from the gateway at the gateway correct okay so that's just was sort of a catalyst if you will for the broader conversation is that the best way to understand it i think that's a fair characterization um okay and then also just uh so i understand historically what happened here we had a discussion among the council I I don't remember as a body that the council asked us to come back and revisit this at the time I think there were a lot of questions among them and I asked a question about fundamentally

[01:31:56] whether that application and specifically and in general whether we what was the perspective on residential development in a commercial quarter and I think you responded that that was not something that the staff favor here it was inconsistent with that i'm just wondering um is the only thing that changed that that the planning commission despite its five to one vote thought somehow or another we should come back and reconsider this again or or is there some general need for us to be revisiting this that's above and beyond that it was just that discussion council member there hasn't been other you know

[01:32:32] other discussions about this topic, but seeing as there was differing viewpoints at both the Planning Commission and the Council on this issue, it certainly seemed reasonable to have follow-up discussion, particularly given that the comprehensive plan had been updated about four months before this discussion was held.

[01:32:58] So it was certainly something that seemed to be unresolved, perhaps. And so we wanted to make sure we had an opportunity for the council and the planning commission to be able to discuss this and consider changes if changes are desired for the comprehensive plan.

[01:33:19] If not, we continue to move forward as we have with adopted policy. Interesting. Well, there's a lot to discuss here, I think, about the specifics of the issue, and I'll look forward to that, but it is a little bit difficult to track exactly how it got here.

[01:33:39] Thank you. Understandable. We'll try to be as clear as we can. Thank you. Okay, so we will proceed. To start us off, I wanted to do a quick history of mixed-use development in the comprehensive plan in the city.

[01:33:58] Historically, mixed-use development has always been supported in Old Town as long as we have been a city as long as we had prepared comprehensive plans. But beginning in 1997, the city began to look for other places to support such development, particularly to encourage revitalization of areas along what was then Lee Highway, what is now Fairfax Boulevard. And with the 1997 comprehensive plan, they established what is called the urban zone and identified the areas now known as Camp Washington, Northfax, and Fairfax Circle as locations where we should support mixed-use development in order to revitalize those locations. This concept continued to evolve with

[01:34:35] subsequent comprehensive plans. And I won't go through all these changes, but I do want to note that in 2007, the city prepared the Fairfax Boulevard master plan. This was not a part of the comprehensive plan. It was a separate study. And this study identified what were known as centers and connectors. The centers were similar to what were previously called the nodes and what are now known as activity centers and the connectors were the areas in between. This plan suggested that primary redevelopment efforts be focused on those centers and it went on to say that those were ideal locations for redevelopment, mixed use development, and more intense development

[01:35:11] because of their locations at key intersections which allowed for easier access and because they had the land area that allowed for appropriate transitions to surrounding residential neighborhoods which the areas in between did not. With the preparation of the 2019 comprehensive plan these centers were then referred to as activity centers which is more consistent with language used by Metropolitan Washington Council of Governance as well as the Code of Virginia and it was recommended that smaller plans be developed for each of the five activity centers also note at this time the Pickett and Main activity center was added. Then with the

[01:35:50] 2024 comprehensive plan. This is the current comprehensive plan. This was developed as part of the five-year review of the 2019 comprehensive plan. The five-year review was required by state code. And during this process, we'll get into more detail about how this occurred. The idea of a mixed-use place type was added. Before this, the only place where mixed-use development could occur was in the activity centers. And so this began to broaden that a little bit. However, it remains fairly restrictive. There were only two sites that were identified in the city, one of which is a Fairfax Square site that was talked about earlier. The other is the Inova site on Chambridge

[01:36:29] Road. These are the only two sites in the city that were identified as potential locations for mixed-use development outside of the activity centers. So based on that, when the Planning Commission and City Council received the work session presentations on the proposal at Gatewood, which, as a reminder, is not in an activity center and is not one of the sites that's designated for future mixed-use development.

[01:36:53] Staff was unable to support the proposal because it conflicted with the recommendations of the comprehensive plan, and so it was suggested that we review that guidance. So as we review this and try to make a decision on whether to move forward with potential changes to the comprehensive plan or not, I'll give you a quick summary on the recent review of the comprehensive plan.

[01:37:15] This is a 2024 review that resulted in the establishment of the mixed-use place type. We'll talk about potential issues that could arise when we seek opportunities to expand mixed-use development. We'll take a quick look at the Gateway proposal and how it aligns with the mixed-use place type, so if that was applicable there, what types of issues we might still run into.

[01:37:37] We recognize this is not meant to focus on that proposal, but wanted to use it as an example since it was the genesis of this conversation. And then lastly, we'll look at next steps and clarify the type of recommendation we're seeking from the city council and the guidance that we will need to proceed.

[01:37:54] So on the 2024 comprehensive plan review, when this process began, some of the information we had was the completion of the 2022 housing assessment, which included a survey where 57% of respondents responded to somewhat support or support replacing some commercial lots with residential development in the city.

[01:38:18] We also heard feedback during initial outreach sessions about exploring this and in follow-up conversations with the City Council Planning Commission and the Economic Development Authority. We heard some support for this idea with limitations. There's a general concern about expanding opportunities for mixed-use development outside activity centers too much.

[01:38:37] So during the review, the Planning Commission conducted several types of analysis on properties that are outside activity centers on where we might want to consider supporting mixed-use development. We looked at things like building-to-land value ratios, property sizes, and proximity to activity centers.

[01:38:56] And ultimately, the Planning Commission landed on the two sites I mentioned earlier. And the mechanism that they suggested on how to manage this in the comprehensive plan was to rely on what are called parcel-specific considerations. These are properties that are located throughout the city where there might be more than one reasonable future land use type.

[01:39:19] So the Comprehensive Plan provides some descriptive language for each of these properties on how we might want to consider alternative land uses. It doesn't actually change the land use that's on the future land use map. We can only have one land use for each property, but it provides a venue to make arguments for changes if we want to do them.

[01:39:37] property owners would still have to go through the process of requesting the change to the future land use map. And in addition to that, in addition to defining where those properties would be, we wanted to give some guidance on design for mixed-use development outside of activity centers. And this is provided through the descriptions in the place type in the comprehensive plan, as well as the text with each of the parcel-specific considerations.

[01:40:04] So the design criteria for the mixed-use place type, this is just a summary. Each of the different place types in the comprehensive plan has similar types of criteria, whether it be residential or commercial or mixed use. So I won't go through each of these, but generally these were established during the comprehensive plan review process. And it doesn't just look at things like bulk and density, it looks at how buildings should be oriented and how we want to accommodate pedestrians and those types of things. Then we have the two partial specific considerations. So those two sites that were identified earlier have language in the comprehensive plan,

[01:40:41] that specifically suggests that the mixed-use place type, and that's highlighted in the purple here in each of the descriptions, that that place type might be an appropriate alternative place type to what is shown on the future land use map. There are no sites in the city that are shown as mixed-use place type as their primary land use on the future land use map.

[01:40:59] I also want to note that the Inova Emergency Room property was previously recommended to have mixed-use development in the previous comprehensive plan. However, there was no future land use map type that could accommodate it. So this was the venue for that. Fairfax Square was then added.

[01:41:16] This is primarily based on the building to land value ratios and the overall property size that can accommodate a comprehensive mixed use development. So when considering whether or not we want to review the current guidance of the comprehensive plan, some things have come to be considered.

[01:41:39] The first is the long-term economic conditions. There are concerns particularly from our economic development staff about repurposing significant amounts of commercial space and how this may make it more difficult to attract businesses when we have fewer options and where to place businesses in the city.

[01:41:58] The fiscal impact of individual properties, now those will vary depending on the specifics of developments. It varies on the development that's there today as well as what the proposal would be, And there are various types of residential development that could be included, which would have various types of impacts. So some of those might not necessarily be negative, but others would be, and so it raises some risk.

[01:42:19] There's concern about potentially displacing successfully performing commercial properties. There are a limited number of Class A office buildings in the city, as well as other Class B properties that are higher quality and then can accommodate a variety of tenants. And there's a concern that if we are too flexible with replacing commercial development of residential or mixed use, then we can lose some of these properties.

[01:42:42] And then from a planning perspective, there are concerns about scattering new residential units. Since in the comprehensive plan before this, the only places that mixed use development could be accomplished was in the activity centers. The idea is that those areas would receive the most development and would become essentially urban neighborhoods.

[01:43:02] And developments would feed off of each other to create that character. If we disperse it too much, it would make it more difficult to achieve that. So in support of some of these arguments, we, in coordination with the Fairfax City Economic Development, we looked at things like office vacancy rates in the city compared to surrounding areas.

[01:43:22] We hear a lot about office-to-residential conversions happening in places like Washington, D.C. and Arlington, where they tend to have higher office vacancy rates and have a higher need to replace those with other uses. But looking at this table, you can see this is a variety of jurisdictions, but the key lines to look at are the dark blue line, which is Northern Virginia as a whole, and the dark red line, which is Fairfax City.

[01:43:46] And you can see that as time goes on, the vacancy rates in Northern Virginia as a whole are steadily increasing, where the vacancy rates in Fairfax City are decreasing and actually lower than they were even before the pandemic. So this says to us that there isn't as much of a dire need to try to replace existing office buildings as there are in other jurisdictions.

[01:44:08] That being said, we recognize we are a small piece of the large pie, and so this will be volatile, and we'll have to monitor this in the future because this could change very quickly. In addition, the Planning Commission requested that before we present this to City Council, we look at how this breaks down in different types of office buildings.

[01:44:26] So by looking at office class with Class A being generally higher quality offices and Class B being generally more moderate quality, you can see in the chart on the left, the blue lines are much higher in most other jurisdictions, so the Class A offices tend to have higher vacancy rates.

[01:44:44] In the city, that's not so much the case, but they could also be because we have a very limited supply of Class A, so all it takes is one or two well-performing buildings to make us even out more with the Class B. By looking at building size, you can see that smaller buildings tend to have much less vacancy, both within the city and throughout the region, than the larger-scale buildings.

[01:45:09] And this applies within the city as well, though it's not as much of a concern or as much of a discrepancy in the city as it is in other jurisdictions. And then the point about dilution of investment in activity centers, we wanted to look at the amount of residential development that could be expected based on the market analysis that was done as part of both each of the four adopted smaller plans, as well as the housing assessment that was conducted in 2022.

[01:45:40] And as you can see by the numbers here, the citywide housing assessment projected a demand over approximately the next 10 years of just about 4,500, 4,600 residential units. Whereas when you combine the projected demand from each of the adopted smaller plans, it's also about 4,600 residential units.

[01:45:59] Keep in mind that these are only in activity centers, not looking at other areas outside. And so by this logic, we believe that we can accommodate the majority of the demand for residential development within our activity centers, recognizing that there may also be some additional development outside of activity centers.

[01:46:20] So as I mentioned, we want to do a very high-level review of the Gatewood proposal. You all received a post-application work session on this back in February. And looking at the general language that is in the mixed-use place type description in the comprehensive plan, as I mentioned, there are some suggestions about bulk and density, but also a lot of language about building orientation and design.

[01:46:43] In general, that proposal was very successful in accomplishing a lot of the goals with regard to design and how the buildings are oriented and those types of things. However, the proposal exceeded the maximum height recommended for the mixed-use place type by two stories.

[01:46:59] and exceeded the maximum recommended residential density by almost double. So the purpose of this is just to show that if we did make this change and simply added or allowed the mixed-use place type to be applied to this property, there would still be some issues that we need to work out for that proposal.

[01:47:17] So based on that, the staff recommendation is not to proceed with a re-evaluation of the comprehensive plan at this time because the changes are recent and based on a deep review of the issues that occurred with the 2024 conference plan review as shown in those previous graphs the market does not indicate an urgency with trying to accommodate for a loss of commercial demand as we see in other jurisdictions but as i said that we will continue to monitor this because that remains a volatile market uh with our concern with eluding investment in activity centers as we said these that those are the areas where we want to see our investments where we want

[01:47:54] to see neighborhoods created and if we distribute that too much it could impact that and one thing we didn't mention earlier is that in going back and reviewing the comprehensive plan we just want to clarify that the plan that was created that was adopted in 2024 went through a very long and significant review process it had a lot of community input a lot of participation from other boards and commissions and so we wanted to open this up we don't think it would be as simple as is modifying that language we want to go through that process again and so would be a fairly complex process and then the last thing I want to mention here this is information we didn't have for the Planning Commission back in March but

[01:48:34] there are a couple of additional analyses that are coming up that can help inform this and so even if we don't open up this discussion now we can potentially open up in the future there's nothing saying that we can't and And one of those is an analysis on office to residential conversions that is being conducted by Fairfax City Economic Development that will be expected to be presented to the Economic Development Authority in October or November.

[01:49:03] And then there is the Affordable Housing Strategic Plan, which may include recommendations about better ways to provide locations for affordable housing. If that conflicts with this, then we're happy to open it up and review it again. And then lastly, we are looking at conducting reviews of each of the adopted small area plans, and depending on the various outcomes that could come from that, that could give us some reasoning to want to explore additional residential development outside of those areas as well.

[01:49:34] The Planning Commission recommendation, based on their conversation in March, as we mentioned earlier, they agreed with staff and recommended that we do not proceed with a re-evaluation at this time. They had a lot of the same reasoning as a staff, provided some additional reasoning as well, which is summarized here, essentially that they felt that we should be continuing to rely on the guidance we have, focus on the activity centers before we try to expand opportunities for mixed use development too much beyond that.

[01:50:04] There was one dissenting vote that suggested that we do look at revising this sooner rather than later. And the reasoning was that, first of all, they felt that we should have an on-ramp to consider proposals. So, as we mentioned, there was no way for city staff or the comprehensive plan to support the Gatewood proposal as an example.

[01:50:26] The mechanism that we have set up in the comprehensive plan can only support mixed-use development in certain areas. And even if planning commission and city council supports a project, there is no way for the comprehensive plan to support it. It's not to say you couldn't approve it. You would just be approving it against the recommendation of the comprehensive plan.

[01:50:43] And the planning commissioner felt that we should have a way to accommodate that if we wanted to. And the other point they made was that single proposals won't impact the viability of small area plans. This was to, based on the staff's point about the concern of diluting too much investment outside of the activity centers.

[01:51:04] And the thought here was that if we don't support mixed use development in one location, it doesn't necessarily mean that they will invest in an activity center. they could likely go elsewhere out in the county or something else, which I believe is a valid point. So with that, the guidance we're seeking from city council tonight is whether or not we should re-evaluate the current guidance of the comprehensive plan.

[01:51:27] If so, it would help to get feedback on what aspects should be reconsidered. What we're asking here is what types of things should we look for when trying to consider where to support additional mixed-use development, What type of re-evaluation criteria should we have?

[01:51:44] If there's anything that you have in mind. As we mentioned, we looked at things like property size and property values with the previous review. Or if the city council would like to receive additional information before giving us any further guidance.

[01:52:01] And with that, I'm happy to answer any questions. Council Member Hardy Chandler. So thank you for your report. What I really appreciate is that staff tried to, it sounds like to me, come back and close the loop that we opened up back in February.

[01:52:18] So we were one month on the job, and I think there were multiple requests for additional information as we were kind of learning the parameters of the things to explore. So I appreciate, first of all, colleagues that made that request, but I appreciate staff for so thoughtfully closing that loop.

[01:52:37] For me, in addition to the staff recommendation and the vote by the Planning Commission, I would not support making amendments at this time. For me, the dilution of the activity centers is a compelling argument, but again, I just want to reiterate the responsiveness of staff to an early request and for closing that loop.

[01:53:01] I appreciate your time and effort. Thank you. Council Member Amos? No, I just wanted to thank staff. I appreciate the presentation. We've been through a lot since February, so I will admit this slipped my mind. I had just a few questions and then just some general comments.

[01:53:17] But I guess first question, and this kind of relates to the activity centers, is one of the major concerns that it would also hinder our ability for consolidating parcels? Would that potentially affect this, or is that not really related? It hasn't come up.

[01:53:33] It could be an issue. And I think that the study that Fairfax City Economic Development is working on about office conversions or the idea of conversion to residential, we'll get into more detail. I don't know if it'll touch on that subject, but if it were to come up, that would come up through that.

[01:53:51] If you have any thoughts on that, we'd love to hear them and consider them as we will likely review this in the future. So, I mean, in terms of one of the planning commissioners recommending potentials for on-ramp, I'm assuming that that would be targeted at low-performing office spaces, which, if I recall correctly, Gatewood is not.

[01:54:12] It was actually a high-performing office space, so that was unique in its own circumstance. Is there any type of evaluation for some kind of performance threshold currently, or there's no language for that at this time? There's not, and that's the challenge. That's the type of thing where we would likely run into issues with state code if we tried to include evaluation in the comprehensive plan.

[01:54:33] So that's the reason we try to use that mechanism to identify properties specifically, but not leave open-ended language that would use that as an evaluation criteria. And I think something that's for, and it could be future discussion, whenever we reach that point, it would be better to strengthen the city's position and being able to acquire properties, which, going back to the consolidation discussion, this might make that more difficult.

[01:54:58] So I understand that perspective. My general thoughts on it are I would concur with the Planning Commission. I do think we need to prioritize activity centers currently. We're about to publish an affordability and housing strategic plan. I would like to see what that recommends before we make this type of decision.

[01:55:16] Also, more experience on the job helps. We do have a lower vacancy rate compared to our neighbors, so if it ain't broke, I don't want to fix it either. I want to make sure that we do support housing but not at the cost of commercial. And so I think that's an important factor moving forward.

[01:55:33] But I do appreciate the discussion. Thank you. Councilmember Peterson? First, a big thank you to the Planning Commission and the staff for doing some very helpful analysis here. I think the vacancy rate analysis is particularly helpful.

[01:55:51] But I think the other observations and kind of strategic insights here in terms of dilution and what have you are really very helpful. And I do very much agree that this is not something that merits additional work based on what we've seen here in front of us.

[01:56:12] There's nothing here suggesting that we ought to be revisiting this. But I have just maybe a reminder, big picture question. Maybe it's for Mr. Hardin, because now I understand you're wearing yet another hat that could be of interest here.

[01:56:28] And that is to put in perspective for us the city's goals in terms of the balance of revenues that we derive from commercial versus residential development. It's my understanding that at some point in the past it was exactly the opposite of where we are now.

[01:56:48] It's kind of a 30-70 thing switched. Is it not the case that a primary goal that the city has in terms of economic and commercial development is restoring that balance for fiscal health reasons? I think the quick answer would be it certainly is.

[01:57:10] And this discussion and staff's recommendation on this issue certainly reflects our desire to be cognizant of that balance and supportive of the healthy commercial development that we have today.

[01:57:25] And am I correct in understanding that in your new position, you're going to be making the vacancy rate issue even worse here? That's a call for us creating more opportunity to breathe life into in terms of attracting commercial business here.

[01:57:43] We've certainly seen good interest, and we will continue to pursue that, so that will remain a focus. But when you're competing against other jurisdictions that have a much bigger vacancy rate, it probably makes it a little bit tougher, right? It does, but because we have a smaller supply, it's something that we need to monitor closely and be very thoughtful about where other jurisdictions could probably make a lot broader strokes, so to speak.

[01:58:11] One of the observations here is the one about dilution being very careful not to starve out those commercial opportunities when we've got really significant demand opportunity there. okay again thanks for the analysis it makes a difference very helpful any other comments councilmember Bates thank you I want to thank staff for the presentation it's important for staff to try to anticipate what information is beneficial for the city council to have based on our conversations as well as what is beneficial for the community to see in terms of discussions

[01:58:51] that we have up here now I may be kind of a lone voice on this but personally I would like to be a bit more open to residential development and commercial corridors more in you know in a targeted approach but more on a case-by-case basis you know for example I and also more efficient land use so in general I support increasing the housing supply and including the affordable housing supply

[01:59:28] and also I would say that eliminating a separate above-ground parking garage behind a building in favor of underground parking that enables us to expand the building footprint it is more efficient use of land and I also think it is important to at least replace a significant portion of the commercial being taken out um but really i kind of look at it on a case-by-case basis i'm a bit more open to residential in commercial corridors than perhaps a comprehensive plan is um but you

[02:00:06] know again i'm just one voice up here so um you know with regard to gatewood um i would like to see residential incorporated into that property in some regard um and so i'm not closing the door on that but uh you know again um we'll have to see uh what the future brings and i do on the other hand agree that we should prioritize mixed use development primarily in activity centers thanks any other comments council member hall thank you um thank you for the presentation

[02:00:45] and the information um like most of my colleagues up here i would support not moving forward with reconsidering this, reevaluating criteria, et cetera. I do think that we, in comparison to other jurisdictions, have a lot less office vacancies. We also have a lot less office space to begin with. And I think that that is evidenced by our commercial tax base decreasing. And we're doing some of these other development centers and activity centers. I think we are also talking about not replacing all of the commercial that is often being taken out. And I think that there

[02:01:24] are added costs that go along with that that don't always come immediately, but that need to be considered in the long term. And just as far as our 2026 adopted budget goes, I just want to point out, so the residential tax base is one component of it, 5.6 billion. I'm sorry, that's the, doesn't matter the numbers. But when you look at the breakdown of the residential versus the commercial. Of the commercial tax base, 26% of that is actually apartments. So while I think

[02:01:59] we think of apartments as being residential, it makes up about 26% of our total commercial tax base. So that's in addition to what we're getting on the residential side, but it's in a commercial presentation. So I say that only because it is a large chunk of what you might not think of as commercial already. And so to add that in further, to me, just would put more of our burden on housing, housing, housing. And I think that we've seen that there can be housing crashes, there can be changes, people are moving up, moving out. If we continue to put in one or two bedroom

[02:02:37] units, and if they're all apartments, then we're going to lose the opportunity to potentially put in opportunities for our residents to buy and to stay here long term and to invest in their future and our city's future. So I think that containing the increase in mixed use to comprehensive plan, personally, I think there's already too much of that in the comprehensive plan. So I definitely don't want to see any more of it discussed in global picture. I am open, obviously, to a one-off, you know, something that needs to be done, an underdeveloping property that maybe is struggling

[02:03:17] for some reasons that we can't work through at that one location. But to your point, Mr. Nabte, about underperforming, I think it's at times easy to make a property look like it's underdeveloping if the owner's intention is to switch from commercial to residential.

[02:03:39] So I think that that is a slippery slope of is it really underperforming or not. So I'm happy that that's not a criteria that is going to be used. But I do appreciate the presentation. I think this was very, very interesting and provided a lot of information.

[02:03:55] So thank you. Other questions or comments? Council Member Peterson. Just a final clarifying question. On the presentation on slide 12, which is essentially a sales analysis, is that sales of new buildings or does that include resale?

[02:04:20] This slide. this is a a market analysis we had separate market analysis that were done for each of the smaller air plans as well as a housing assessment so this isn't looking at sales this is looking at anticipated demand for residential uses well and is the is the expression of demand sales it could be it's a mix oh where it says for sale for rent is that what you mean Well, okay, so the housing assessment says for sale for rent.

[02:04:54] We've got units here. So we're counting the number of units that are up for sale, right? No, this is what the market analysis in the housing assessment, it broke it down for rental or apartments versus for sale units, which would be condos or townhouses or those types of things.

[02:05:14] So that was just anticipated market demand of those. The smaller plans didn't break it down between ownership and rental. Maybe let me ask this a different way. This is over a 10-year period. And do we have any sense for the combination of sales and rent, the number of transactions that take place during a given year, during a decade, the total transactions for real estate in these categories?

[02:05:44] We do. I don't have that information, but we have it through our real estate database. Okay. And then these would be a subset of that. This would represent an area where we would have transactions for a set of units. This is all looking at anticipated new units.

[02:06:02] Okay. Right. That's what I was after. Right. So this is new and there would be. Okay. And over a 10-year period, this would be the built and occupied?

[02:06:19] That isn't clear. I think it's projecting built and occupied by that time, but also to clarify, the 10-year period is very rough. Smaller plans were developed over a course of five years. They were roughly targeting around 2035 for their target years, but it kind of depends on when they're developed.

[02:06:38] And the housing assessment had a similar kind of projection. So I wouldn't say that this analysis is finite enough that you could say that by this day, this number of units would be built and occupied. But this generally anticipates, yes, these are not under construction, not approved.

[02:06:55] They're actually completed units. Do we have any sense of the turnover rate for either of these categories? How long do people stay in place before they are replaced by somebody else? I think we can get that information for owner-occupied or for sale units.

[02:07:13] I'm not sure if we can get it for rentals or not. I'd have to check with our demographer. I think it would, from my standpoint, be helpful background information just to have to sort of put this in perspective in terms of what this marketplace looks like and how our actions are affecting it.

[02:07:33] Again, thanks for the homework on all this. Other questions or comments from anyone? Okay. Well, it sounds like that there is general agreement on the dais that no more investment needs to be made in the comprehensive plan at this time.

[02:07:53] So thank you so much. This has been illuminating, very robust conversation up here, and we appreciate it. Our next item is a presentation, discussion on the CIP reconciliation and reformatting. I'm going to recognize Gwen Riddle, Budget Director, to provide the staff presentation.

[02:08:19] Good evening. Give J.C. a moment to pull up the presentation.

[02:08:38] Mayor, members, council, the following presentation and discussion are intended to provide an update and overview on the CIP reconciliation project, including the reformatting of the capital expenses based on some defined parameters for the FY27 and future budgets.

[02:08:56] So quickly, we'll start by reviewing details of the CIP audit, go over what was approved for in the FY26 to 2030 CIP, provide updated budget balances based on the defined general fund categories, and then discuss the changes for the FY27 and beyond CIP development.

[02:09:21] So my team and I, which I have one analyst, Jess Imes, give her a lot of credit, we reviewed approximately 200 base projects and performed comprehensive audits of approximately 100 of those projects projects some of the audits went back 10 years or more we will continue to update the update these audited data the audited data to provide complete project information for the city's major projects this task took us about eight months with just working about four months on just the audits so besides budget she was just doing audits in

[02:09:59] In completing these audits, approximately $1.4 million of general government appropriated funds were determined to be no longer needed. Mainly projects have been completed or never started. There is an additional $700,000 of capital funds specifically related to completed school projects.

[02:10:21] We have worked with the superintendent and his staff to determine which projects are complete and what is still needed for ongoing projects. One big note is that with the city's financial system conversion to Tyler, the data is only accurate in our current system starting from July of 2024, so it's fiscal year 25.

[02:10:42] However, data from both systems, our old legacy system and our current system, was used to pull together the full project audits, and that's what the balances you'll see going forward. So the reason we're going to continue to maintain those audits is to have that full comprehensive project data, especially for those main, the larger projects.

[02:11:05] And any project that you want, we probably have or could get. Next page. So this is just a summary of what was adopted in the FY26 to 30 CIP. As a reminder, approximately $48 million was appropriate for general fund projects, along with an additional $48.8 for CIP-related projects with other funding sources.

[02:11:30] The remainder of this presentation will concentrate on the general funding, which is highlighted in the brackets. So the first section down to the schools is what we're going to talk about in the next page.

[02:11:46] So one thing's been missing on the CIP summary sheet is available budgets for these projects or funding that was already appropriated in prior years and what's been spent. Therefore, we adjusted the summary sheet that you saw on the previous slide.

[02:12:06] We're now showing a revised budget number, how much has been spent and encumbered, which is included in an ACT-ENC rec column. So that includes all actuals, encumbrances, and any requisitions that are still in process. And then we'll have an available balance number.

[02:12:25] So just to note, the data used in this presentation is as of August 20th. There are currently 122 active projects with available appropriated budget in our capital improvement program. The majority of the projects fall within three main areas, general government, recreation and community appearance projects, and infrastructure repair and maintenance projects.

[02:12:47] Also note, $120 million in outstanding appropriations, two projects make up 65% of this available balance. The two projects are listed below, which are Fire Station 3 and the Willow Sherwood Community Center.

[02:13:07] So moving into FY27 budgeting, we've implemented a new policy to better define how CIP projects will make it into our capital improvement program. This policy has been reviewed by our external auditor and complies with all accounting and reporting standards.

[02:13:27] Some of the main highlights of the policy are reviewing of projects to ensure the CIP requirements are met, move recurring maintenance and repair projects to the associated operating budget, and ensure projects remaining in the CIP will either create or enhance a capital asset.

[02:13:43] With the implementation of this policy, the transfer from the general fund to the CIP will need to be reviewed to ensure funding remains in the general fund for necessary repair, maintenance, and subscription needs. We will incorporate the necessary financial policy changes needed in the FY27 Financial Policies and Council Budget Guidelines that will be presented to you on October 28th with hope of approval in November.

[02:14:14] Finally, we have what we are showing could be projected out on maintenance. Now, this is just an estimate. It's what I determined. We will be reviewing every CIP project as a budget action team, and our meetings actually start next week.

[02:14:33] So we're looking at approximately 8.3 million reduction in the CIP per year, which is about 35 projects. So this number will be better defined beginning next week when we start our CIP reviews. We're looking mainly at projects within infrastructure repair and maintenance, 24 projects, and technology and infrastructure, 8 projects.

[02:14:56] Thank you for your time, and we are available for any questions. Thank you so much. Are there questions on this from anyone? Councilmember Peterson? Well, thank you, both of you. This is a very important issue and step forward, I think, and I can only imagine how much work you've been putting into it because it's a big ball of wax here.

[02:15:22] Generally speaking, it sounds to me like one of the things you're doing just fundamentally here is structuring this to appropriately match sources and uses of funds. and you're putting some thresholds around what that means. For those thresholds, whether it's the $50,000, the five-year useful life, et cetera, are those based on standards, generally accepted standards?

[02:15:47] And if so, could you maybe tell us a little bit about what those standards are that give us guidance for how we structure in that way? There's no minimum or max that you can define. Every locality can define their own. It's what we've seen in the industry.

[02:16:04] I've talked with my counterparts in other localities, especially going to the national conference this past June, and that's pretty much what the guidance of a lot of localities have, especially ones our size. Larger localities, a county, you may see higher limits, but with our size, about 50,000, it seems reasonable, and that's just a guide.

[02:16:30] It's not hard and fast. So if there's a project that comes in that will create an asset, and that, for me, is the biggest thing, is that we're putting into the program items that will create an asset or enhance an asset, that we can still put that in the CIP, show it as a project, because that project, putting it in as a project, allows us more detail into how those funds are being spent.

[02:16:54] And if I could add, as Ms. Riddle stated, we did consult our auditor who also audits other localities, counties, cities, and towns, and we also got concurrence from them. As Ms. Riddle also stated, we also conferred with other localities and try to see where we would compare, but there is no standard. GASB nor GFOA does not actually institute or recommend any standard. It is very discretionary to the locality of what they think is appropriate, and that's sort of where we are right now.

[02:17:34] A financing question, there's one piece of this, which is it goes into long-term financing. Is that done by putting things into a pool and the pool has one standard rate, the 25 and 5, I think, is what you've been working with?

[02:17:56] Or do we structure long-term financing differently based on project-like duration, et cetera? We're going to have some five years. We're going to have some 10 years that would be handled differently than putting them all on a 25-year 5% structure.

[02:18:13] How about you take that one? I'll answer that one. So in discussions with our financial advisors, Davenport, we have a very standard time frame of 25-year useful life with a projection of a five-year interest rate, which is a little conservative on that side.

[02:18:33] It's about 4% or slightly below that is what we've been getting in the last few years. And then that goes into a pool, to use your words. We actually have and created a new fund, a debt service payment fund, that now allocates all debt service payments into that pool as well.

[02:18:50] So it's a standard 25-year time frame with a projected 5% interest rate or what the actual interest rate is whenever we do issue debt. And we're still proposing that there's still some PAYGO coming in from the general fund to pay for those smaller projects that we probably would not want to fund with 25-year debt.

[02:19:12] That was my next question. What do you do with the things that are under the wire, but still are capital intensive, not annual expense things? And so you just case-by-case amount of PAYGO if needed, is that? So, correct. So currently we're budgeting about $12 million in transfer from the general fund to the CIP, as Ms. Rittles stated.

[02:19:32] Looking at this number right here, it's about $8.2, $8.3 million per year on just maintenance activities that we are proposing to transfer out of the CIP to the general fund. So if you reduce that $12 million by about $8 million, that still leaves about $4 million that could be transferred from the general fund to the CIP to account for PAYGO and try to maintain a decent ratio of how much is being cash paid versus financed.

[02:20:03] Well, I know others have questions, so I'm going to yield my time for the moment. But really, again, appreciate what you're doing here. Other questions? Council Member Hall. I can't thank you enough for this. I have been looking and begging and asking and pleading, and I can't believe it took you, I mean, I can believe it took you eight months and one staff person, but thank you for dedicating the time, the resources, the energy to doing this.

[02:20:33] Not only did we uncover $1.4 million and $700,000 for schools, and it's not found money. I understand it's not that. But it's a new or different way of looking at where numbers have gone, where money has gone and hasn't been fully utilized, but maybe we thought it was.

[02:20:52] And now there's a potential savings in other areas. So I think this is really, really helpful. I know I like to say what it costs to keep the lights on around here. It's a term that I'm sure you're all tired of hearing. But I think this really helps to break that out, and I am very excited.

[02:21:10] So thank you for the time and the energy that went into this. I think it's just looking at the infrastructure repair and maintenance. I mean, over the course of the, what is it, four years, 2017, 2019, 2030, $21.6 million. This is an extraordinary amount of money that we're still going to be paying, we're still going to be doing.

[02:21:29] But it's just a much easier representation, I think, of what it costs to keep the lights on. And I also just want to make note with that, especially the repair and maintenance, some of those projects that we currently have in the CIP still have balances. We are not saying we're going to get rid of those balances.

[02:21:47] They can still finish utilizing what was already appropriated. Yeah, I think that's a really good point. No one's taking anything away. It's just shifting the view so that it is a little bit easier. And I tend to go with, like, the five-year, you know, asset value.

[02:22:02] I know we have a 5,000 as opposed to 50,000 for the company I work for, but we obviously have very different needs. But I think it's really good to have a barometer by which you are, you know, comparing things and having a policy for that is really, really great. So I do want to thank you again.

[02:22:19] I'm sure with the multiple systems, it was even much more fun for you guys to handle. So thank you for keeping all those records. Absolutely. Council Member McQuillan. I just wanted to echo Council Member Hall's sentiments and say thank you for all the work that you have done on this having done audits myself i know how fun that is especially working with two different systems but it's very much appreciated and i think it's very helpful as councilmember hall stated to have that information in this manner um your work is very much appreciated

[02:22:52] thank you other questions councilmember amos just a quick comment from i remember at the budget open house or jc you were like the star of the show you had this line almost going out the door i imagine With this separated, it'll happen again, and you'll have an even greater breakdown of it for when we do our second one.

[02:23:13] So just appreciate everything that you all have done. Other questions or comments? Council Member Peterson. So you have restructured and you have a snapshot right now of what that looks like, but it sounds like you also will be updating it, refining it.

[02:23:33] When will the next update be to scrub numbers? And then how frequently will you be doing that to provide updating as you monitor these projects that are in place to see if they're on schedule and then adjustments of what comes in and goes out?

[02:23:52] How often does that happen? So the CIP process is yearly. We're in the midst of it right now. The departments will be submitting their projects for 27 to 31 at tomorrow they're due. And then the committee will meet and review to have the proposed CIP to the Council and Planning Commission at the beginning of November.

[02:24:16] But we will be reviewing the current CIP regularly. I look at it daily, if not more than that. But it's actually something we can probably add to our quarterly review, our financial review, now that we have the data.

[02:24:38] Before, we didn't have any data, but now that we have it, it's easy for us to get it and update, to provide updates and to monitor. And we're always in communications with the departments on what their needs are. Good to know.

[02:24:54] Let me just state the obvious, which is cost to complete is a moving target. And so it means the sooner you can do those updates, the better, where you get cost to completes that could change significantly. And I would think it would be important for you and for the council to know where you have changes in cost to complete of some significance that we could be made aware of.

[02:25:19] Because some of these are very big ticket items, and even a small change in cost to complete can have very major implications. And I would support, I hope the rest of the council would, having a more frequent look at those numbers to see where we are on them.

[02:25:37] I also am just curious to know what do you do within the debt pool when you get a shift in cost to complete. I know there's some flexibility in that, and at some point that may trigger a council action if you've got to shift that structure around a little bit.

[02:25:52] How does that come back to us if we've got a project in there and then we get a shift in cost to complete that affects it? Go ahead. Sure. So to answer the first question, what Ms. Riddle and her team and the new actual financial platform Tyler is allowing us to do is she has instituted a project for every single CIP. So it very clearly delineates now in this new system by specific category, whether it's engineering, construction, A&E services, all that, where you can break out

[02:26:27] and actually have multiple budgets that roll up. So we could very clearly and easily see where we are sort of like our own checking account balances for every specific CIP project. So when she talks about the 100 or 200 projects that are out there, her and her team of one have actually built project ledgers for every single CIP. So it's a lot easier for us now in this new Tyler system to glance and report back as need be and see when we're potentially starting to approach

[02:27:01] the upper barrier or budget of a specific project to answer the second part when and if that were to happen we would come back to council and ask for potential supplemental appropriation to account for additional funding for that one specific project have the project manager provide reasoning or feedback of what is driving that potential overage and then at that time ask council if they so choose to fund the appropriation or the supplemental appropriation.

[02:27:35] One of the things that I also want to note is a good practice, a good best practice, and something that I've been wanting to institute here, and additionally that has been communicated by our financial advisors. Again, Davenport is very similar to our general fund where we have unassigned fund balance.

[02:27:55] We should have something similar built in to the CIP. We have it built into the stormwater fund and the wastewater fund, but we have yet to do that to the CIP fund. We should try to create some type of reserve or fund balance within the CIP that in the event that we were $150,000 over on a project, we would have the ability to tap into that reserve or fund balance to account for that.

[02:28:25] Understanding that we would put parameters or policies in place to do that without having to go to council if that's what council chooses or if council wanted to know every single time we could. But there is no balance now. I know we found, as Council Member Hall stated, we found money that could be reappropriated and go into a contingency reserve right now.

[02:28:48] That would be a potential recommendation and or if council wanted to do something else. But it's one of the other better practices that we are going to be striving for as we continue to look at the CIP. Well, it's great to hear. The shift to a project-based accounting system has enormous benefits.

[02:29:07] Great to hear. It would seem to me that when we get reports out on the list of CIP projects, it would be nice to have some sort of a report out on variances, how we're doing. And thank you so much for raising the mechanism by which you deal with variances that could be, you know, there's a class that happens within that mechanism and a class that requires you to come back to us.

[02:29:31] But I think for us to know what the variances look like of any significance would kind of be helpful. There's a parallel question, which is for projected, the projections of projects that have not yet gone into debt issuance but are being contemplated. Again, we've got some really big ticket items here, and those are moving targets as well as terms of, I mean, in this day and age, cost figures are things you have to, you know, watch pretty carefully.

[02:29:57] How often are those cost figures for the projected cost figures for things that are proposed but not adopted or planned but not adopted? How often are those updated, and how often are we able to see what those updates look like?

[02:30:14] Yeah, right now it's on a yearly basis. Some of our larger projects, say for Fire Station 3, as they're getting updated numbers, they're providing those to us. So we're getting real-time updates on a lot of the big projects.

[02:30:30] But the smaller ones that may have a funding source of multiple years, we update those on a yearly basis. Are you able to share those updates with us? It would be great to kind of know. It sounds like you're getting them. You will get them.

[02:30:46] When we pulled together the proposed, we're working on that right now. But more frequently than just once a year. Yeah, I think that's something we could strive for. We do have a good collaboration with the treasurer. So the treasurer actually manages the actual bank account and the cash balances.

[02:31:04] So we do have discussions with him and sort of have a forecast of our burn or spend down on some of these projects along with some other operating commitments. So we have pretty regular communication, I would say, at least quarterly with him on where our cash position is and how urgent it would be to potentially have to issue debt on some of these larger CIP projects.

[02:31:30] Well, again, appreciate it. I think it would be very helpful, particularly for big-ticket items, to as reasonably often as possible have updates on how that's looking. If we've seen any changes in forecasted costs, those are important for us. We have to make decisions that impact other things, and so sooner the better in terms of being able to get access to that information.

[02:31:52] Thank you. Council Member Amos. And just wanted to reiterate, considering we know you're a team of two for the most part, we appreciate all your time that you've put into this, including some of our requests, and we will take that into consideration as well. All right.

[02:32:08] Other questions, comments? All right. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Also, Gwen, I think along the way, because you apparently had all kinds of spare time, you managed to get a new certificate. I did.

[02:32:25] Can you tell us about that? I have earned my Certified Public Finance Officer, CPFO. It's through the GFOA, National Recognized Credentials, that now I can put at the end of my name, so my husband's not the only one with letters.

[02:32:42] And it was, there's seven tests that you take and just kind of a lot of studying. So during budget, during all this, yeah. My kids were studying, so I figured I needed to, you know, do along with them.

[02:32:59] And I just want to say the Fairfax Library is quite nice as a study spot. I went there a lot. All right, Ms. Shinaberry. All right, our last work session item is a discussion of a resolution for the reappropriation of general-slash-operating capital and enterprise funds carryover to FY2026 that were appropriated in FY2025 and have not yet been spent as of June 30th, 2025.

[02:33:30] I'll recognize J.C. Martinez, Chief Financial Officer, to provide a staff presentation. Mayor, Council, thank you again. Just really quickly, it's going to be a verbal report out, and you can look at the staff report for some of the information I'm going to be covering.

[02:33:46] As stated, so each year the finance team presents to City Council a list of general operating capital and enterprise funds with a recommendation as to whether or not those funds should be reappropriated. The situation occurs when funds are either, one, appropriated, but at the end of the fiscal year have not been spent or obligated, or two, purchase orders were issued but not fully expended, and the remaining encumbrance balance should be carried over to the new fiscal year 2026.

[02:34:14] It is recommended that the appropriation resolution is an administrative action, and it is presented to council at this time every year in order to take into consideration any year in adjustment and final audit work.

[02:34:31] As the adjustment for the general fund falls below the 1% threshold that is set by Virginia Code, it does not require a public hearing. Formal adoption is scheduled for the September 30th council meeting as a part of the consent agenda.

[02:34:47] If you flip through the staff report, there is a table that breaks out by the big buckets, specifically the general fund, the capital fund, or the CIP, the wastewater fund, and the stormwater fund. Those amounts are what we're requesting to basically carry over from FY25 to FY26.

[02:35:09] These are all exclusively associated and tied to a purchase order. So it's not like I'm asking or we're asking to carry over any additional funds that are not already encumbered, again, via a purchase order.

[02:35:26] We traditionally don't have to come to council for a capital, wastewater, or stormwater. Those are enterprise funds. The general fund is really where we want to be fully transparent with council and ask to carry these over again These were FY25 funds where there is a purchase order. We're still expecting that those expenditures happen And just very very quickly for a comparison review in the general fund We're requesting about 1.3 or about 47 POs that are being requested to carry over from 25 to 26

[02:36:02] In FY24, as a comparison, that amount was about $3 million, so it's about half less this year that we're requesting to carry over. In the capital fund, the amount, it's a little more this year. It's about 26.5 or about 170 POs.

[02:36:19] Those are all capital POs. Capital usually takes greater than a year to complete when you're talking about construction, engineering, and A&E services. For comparison purposes, FY24, when we came to council, that amount on the CIP equaled about $15.1 million.

[02:36:37] On the wastewater fund, we're asking slightly over $1 million or 32 POs to be carried over. In FY24, that amount was $1.4 million. And stormwater fund this year, we're asking about $3.7 million or 73 POs to be carried over.

[02:36:56] Last year in FY24, when we came to council, it was about $1.5 million for comparison. So happy to answer any questions. Again, this is a very straightforward administrative process. It is all the amounts listed here are exclusively tied to a PO.

[02:37:14] Questions for Mr. Martinez? Well, it was indeed very straightforward. And there you go. Brilliant, brilliant presentation. Thank you so much. Thank you, Councilor. Okay. I will now reconvene the regular meeting and we will go on to future meeting topics mr. Foster Thank you mayor So you should have the future meeting topic lists at your seat The clerk provided so I want to focus at the moment your next meeting for September 30th There will be, of course, several presentations.

[02:37:55] Then on the consent agenda is an introduction of an ordinance for a license agreement with Breckenridge homeowners regarding gas lighting. They want to keep their gas lights, so this is a license to let them continue to do so.

[02:38:12] This is the first part of our normal process. It just gets introduced. There will be a public hearing at a future meeting, and then you'll take action at yet a different meeting. that's how that typically works so this is just the formality of introducing the ordinance uh the second item is what mr martinez just went over and then the third um we have a separate a different appointment than the one that you did uh upcoming for um uh the retirement plan uh committee i think it's a public safety is public safety um slot um so while while let me pause right there um and

[02:38:50] just ask i've noticed um in the last several times several meetings where there's been an appointment um that there's been a desire to take that off of consent if that's the case we just won't put it on consent we'll just put it on the regular agenda is that the preference of council just to do it that way we want to make this easy um and if it's if it's something if it's if you don't want on consent that's fine we'll happy to put it on just the regular agenda just we just like to know council member peterson i think it's a courteous and customary thing to do but i think

[02:39:23] it can be very brief okay so that's fine so we will we will uh we will content we will have appointments just in general this so we have this one but any future appointments that need to happen from council we will um just have on the regular agenda and not on consent um uh then they're there's currently scheduled two two public hearings um the first is the land use application for the for willard sherwood i know we had a request from council member hall um to perhaps

[02:39:56] push that um off to october um which we can certainly do um this is following sort of the normal schedule of any land use once all the the pieces uh come together and then we go ahead and schedule it so this was how it was how it fell on the calendar um but i uh understand that you're wanting some additional information which we won't be able to provide to you till the september 30 meeting so if you wish to move it um we we have the time to do it because we have not yet advertised so we have time to to cancel once i cancel not run the ads for that meeting um and would suggest

[02:40:36] putting it on october 14th uh is is that acceptable or would you rather be at a different meeting council member hardy chandler my question is just are there any general um deadlines or anything uh that we should know in terms of timelines with the county in terms of changing that date are there consequences i i as far as just moving it uh to the next meeting no i don't think there's any any real harm in that we were moving down parallel tracks and so this is this is purely the land use piece there's some special exceptions

[02:41:16] that are required I think the city attorney communicated with you some that one's not tied to the other so we can you we can do them independently it doesn't obligate one does not obligate you for the other so you still have your full range of options and the contractually speaking if you want to do that unless mr. Harden is going to come correct me if I misspoke no he's just there I guess if something comes up it just agree with everything no no corrections there but just in terms of ensuring that we have the project team

[02:41:55] available for that we would certainly want to confirm if we're if we're moving from the 30th to another night in october perhaps just having a little bit of latitude in case we don't have the right staffing available again that that would not not impact the schedule at this point council member hall thank you um thank you for bringing up my request to delay this um there's a variety of reasons and i think that moving it to october is better personally i did ask for not to be on the 7th because i won't i'll be virtual and i was hoping

[02:42:34] to maybe bail out a little bit early so if we could do the 14th that would be preferred by me personally but i recognize that there's more than just me involved in the presentation and the discussion and all of those things so um will you be virtual on the 28th by any time i will not okay i will be here so i think so then i well what i'm hearing from brooke again if council if it's if you all would agree then we will not have it if that's what i'm hearing we can push it to october what we won't be able to tell you right at this minute is whether it'll be the 14th or the

[02:43:09] 28th let us confirm staffing availability and then we we can let you know specifically which one we want and we'll put it on for that time if that's acceptable council member amos and uh mr lubcom and uh verified this via email but irregardless whether it's the 14th or 28th that won't incur any additional costs i just wanted to like just clarify that here as well correct okay so so so we will do that's i'm sorry uh just by way of preferences i would prefer the

[02:43:43] 14th that's at all possible right because that yes we'll shoot for the 14th i think council member hardy channel is alluding to the fact that she's probably going to be out of town uh on the 28th so and the 30th so yeah um all right so so we'll shoot well we will confirm but it looks like i'm seeing nodding heads i think that seems to be the preference okay um the other public hearing is the one that you had uh we had talked about this was before you went on and had

[02:44:18] your recess this is on potentially amending the firearms ordinance um is that do you still wish to have that on that date if you don't we could potentially we still haven't advertised yet so councilmember hall um i was just curious if it would be possible i i recognize and i appreciate that um uh our new police chief will be here and can answer questions um i was wondering if it would be possible to have a representative from fairfax county either uh sheriff kincaid or another sort

[02:44:55] of higher up there that might be able to answer some questions about how it's been working or not working in the county if they're seeing additional time or costs or any of those things that they might be able to give us their two cents on it uh we can certainly ask and no no offense to the sheriff it would probably be better for the police department totally fine i just wasn't sure who would be the best person so I can have chief reach out and and I'm sure we can have somebody come over and and speak to that as well I think no guarantee I mean we'll have to ask but yes of course certainly do that of course thank you so

[02:45:32] much councilmember Peterson well yeah I agree with the request and support it I guess I have a timing question with respect to the public hearing I think the public would be interested in hearing that same information and would benefit from it and that could be helpful to their comments and a public hearing. So the question is whether we would hear from the police departments prior to the public hearing so that the public has the

[02:46:11] benefit of this new information as it's expressing itself around this? Sure I mean I think you do I I mean, it would be analogous to when you have a land use, you have a presentation before the public makes their comments. You just had that this evening.

[02:46:27] There's not actually a presentation. I don't know that we were prepared to do any type of presentation, but certainly you would be able to hear their comments and ask your specific questions along those lines so you can get that feedback prior to hearing from the public.

[02:46:46] And I think we raised this, or perhaps Mr. Lubcomen raised this when we last spoke, which is the possibility of submitting questions in advance. And those could be the basis of a presentation or the basis of a response from either our police chief or somebody from Fairfax County.

[02:47:11] But I guess the question is, is that something that we could do? because there may be a question set here, and it might be an efficient way to get information flowing. Well, certainly if council will provide us questions that you would like us to address in advance, that was always helpful.

[02:47:31] So, you know, it would end in time to be able to work up answers if they need research or something. So certainly, you know, if you could get us questions within the next week or so, that would be very handy.

[02:47:49] Getting questions on Monday, the day before, isn't still helpful, but not as helpful in terms of having time to, you know, to get answers, you know, so depending on what they are. So certainly, if you will send me the questions, any questions that you have, and then I can put them together and have Chief Pedroso review them and be able to have answers and also share those with his counterparts at the county as well.

[02:48:23] So that's easily done for us, but that's incumbent upon you all to send us the questions so we'll know what it is that you're wanting us to talk about. Thank you. I guess in an ideal world, as much of that or any of that that could be formulated in something like a staff report that the public would see before the meeting would also be ideal.

[02:48:48] It's the common practice for us to have staff analysis on these issues prior to their consideration. This is a big issue, and it would seem to me that we ought to have something similar here. We can certainly help guide that. Well, I would say it just depends on the questions.

[02:49:04] I mean, if you ask us questions that are simply yes or no, then we could answer those. I'm not sure that would be a staff report, but if it's something or, you know, a presentation. But if, you know, certainly any questions you have that require some analysis or whatever, we can certainly put that into a staff report.

[02:49:22] And if it's appropriate in a presentation format, we could certainly try and do that as well. Just keeping – the only reason I'm – I don't mean to sound evasive or hedging. It's just more of this is a council initiative that – why we're considering this.

[02:49:40] And so we're unclear as to what, you know, what the things you are that you might want to know. So certainly you sharing them with us will allow us to focus comments and responses based on that. And when are we planning to schedule a vote?

[02:50:02] That is up to council. Certainly you could vote that evening, but you do not have to. You certainly have a public hearing. You hear comments. You can close the public hearing, and then you can schedule any vote at a future meeting.

[02:50:20] You also don't have to take any action. I mean, there's no requirement. I mean, this is a proposal that you put forth, but if you desire to leave things as they are, if ultimately at the end of the day that's what you want to do, then there's no action required by council. It's only if you wish to adopt these changes would you need to take action, which you could do at a future meeting.

[02:50:43] And the next future meeting where that would be possible would be October 14th. That is correct. So if you want us to pencil in that as an item for the 14th or any future meeting specific, we can do that.

[02:51:07] Is that the preference of council? We can certainly put something in if you'd like. Council Member Amos? I think we can make that determination September 30th after we have discussion with both the county and our police chief. Council Member Bates? I would prefer not to put this off any further, but we need to have an agreement if we're going to get it done.

[02:51:35] So it could be amenable to the 14th. So it sounds like everyone's looking forward to asking questions on the 30th. Councilmember Amos has said we can decide on the 30th if there will be a vote to take place later on.

[02:51:56] Councilmember Peterson? Well, just to note, again, big issue area, we have not heard from our own police chief or police department or the counties or anybody else on this.

[02:52:14] And I don't think it is unreasonable to expect that a lot of information will be provided and perhaps even more will be requested. So for planning purposes, I think we ought to, at least at a placeholder basis, have something that we could do on the 14th if needed.

[02:52:35] Because, again, we're going to be hearing a lot of new information in terms of the responses and the presentation from the police as well as the public on this. And it's just a huge body of information that we will receive for the very first time at that meeting.

[02:52:53] And that worries me a little bit in terms of immediately moving into a boat. I would expect that you will have a tremendous number of public comment, which is why you'll notice there's no work session scheduled that night because we expect that you will have a lot of public comment.

[02:53:15] So to your point, I think that from a public's perspective, I think they probably would like to know in advance that you will not be taking action that evening if that's how you believe you're going to feel.

[02:53:34] And we can put a placeholder for the 14th is certainly very reasonable. But I would be shocked if the room was not full. Not full. i would be shocked if it was not full we don't need to prolong it put a placeholder on the 14th i'm good that sounds amenable okay okay council member hall just to clarify are we suggesting doing the information session with the police chief on the 30th then having the public hearing

[02:54:09] end the vote on the 14th or we're saying public hearing 30th then we close the public hearing decision on 14th because public hearing would operate as the information session okay so then if but if people wanted people could still come in on the 14th and speak up if they wanted to during public comment right or they could speak up on the 30th if they wanted to but that would give them a time to watch it later and be able to comment and learn from they will come to both yeah just i just wanted to make sure i understood right thank you council member hardy chandler did you think okay council member peterson i i wasn't there so i don't know perhaps council member

[02:54:49] amos does uh but it's my understanding that by the time the vote did take place in fairfax county it was like two in the morning and i would uh rather we not so that'd be all the more reason to push it out of the 14th look buddy the earlier we get out of here the better i'm cool with that 14th all right so city manager manager you're all right we're on the 14th i got it i've got it okay um that is so so that's what you'll have for the for the 30th um uh then um if you want to talk

[02:55:26] about uh some of the other future meetings we certainly can i would just note um on on the 7th is when etc will be present to give you give you the presentation and the results of the community survey I do know that they are in the in the process of tabulating they did get the required number of responses to make it statistically valid so I have no other information to tell you that they're in the process of process you know giving us all of that and we will they will be here on the 7th for that

[02:56:01] presentation and to answer all your questions and so forth and then the only thing that's a couple of things that are not on here is the there is a need for board and Commission interviews and I can let the clerk speak to that I believe we've got 11 applications for a variety of slots the only one I would specifically mention that we do have an application for is the Board of Zoning Appeals which is technically an actually an appointment by the circuit court in

[02:56:39] council makes a recommendation to the circuit court for that appointment only reason i bring that up is because you're short two people and a quorum is three so when they don't always have business but when they do all three have to show up in order to be able to do that and do it timely so um if if just purely for from that perspective that would be one an important one to try and get filled um and of course there's a bunch of others And I will, the clerk can certainly speak to that.

[02:57:10] I think right now we just need to figure out a date within the next couple weeks that we could possibly hold interviews. Looking at the calendar, I have jotted down Tuesday, September 16th, or we could do Wednesday, September 17th, or the following week.

[02:57:28] Since we don't have the meeting on Rosh Hashanah, we could still not have a meeting, just in case there are people who observe that holiday. But we can meet on the September 24th, which is a Wednesday, or September 25th, a Thursday, if that works for any of those dates work for anybody.

[02:57:51] Did you say the 17th, 18th? 17th, just 16th and 17th for next week. Yeah. You said 16th, 17th, 20th. 23rd, but we don't have to meet since that is the holiday that we're not meeting as a council anyway.

[02:58:07] So the 24th or 25th. So of those dates, only the 16th is when I'm available. Is that your good? Okay. I cannot do any of those other dates. Okay. The 16th is a Tuesday, which is your normal meeting day when you do meet.

[02:58:26] It's the third Tuesday of the month, yeah. I can do the 16th.

[02:58:39] Yes. I can do the 16th, the 24th. I can't. Okay. So, Mr. Bates, can you do the 16th? Yeah, yeah, and I can also only do the 16th. Okay, so it looks like everybody can do the 16th. Start time, 7, or you want to go earlier?

[02:58:56] What's your preference? i'm not available until 7 30 but then i don't think i really need to be available okay question mark yes when the council members can read the motion going in as long as there's four of them yep okay okay so i guess what is seven o'clock i'm sorry i'm sorry how many are we doing there's 11 people i have lined up so 15 minutes for each person so that's four an hour so three hours to do 12 yeah roughly so normal for how many slots um i know one is no actually

[02:59:30] two or reappoint sorry three or reappointment interviews and um others or other openings like the eda planning commission bza i could start at six if that's preferred by others that that would be difficult for me yeah so seven it looks like seven then we'll still leave it at seven o'clock

[03:00:00] All right, so we will calendar that for the 16th next week from today for just a closed session for board and commission interviews. No other business for that evening.

[03:00:16] Thank you. Are there other questions or one other thing, piggybacking a little bit on the presentation that JC and Gwen just did, We have tentatively scheduled a fall budget open house in anticipation of the budget, which is one of the things to ask for, and that is scheduled for October 21st.

[03:00:48] October 21st, your third Tuesday or third or is that a Wednesday? It's a Tuesday. Yeah, all right, so your third Tuesday, we have lined that up. You will have the results of the citizen survey, and so know what people have said.

[03:01:05] We'll have financial information, which we're still working on. But, again, you wanted to hear some citizen input on the front end of the budget process, so we have scheduled that at the Sherwood Center for the 21st, probably 4 to 7.

[03:01:22] Well, probably 4 to 7 because we learned that we didn't have anybody come. We had, like, two people come between 7 and 8 last time, So we would suggest just the four to seven. That's when people seem to prefer. I will just say that it's my 19th wedding anniversary, and I love the idea that I can do budgets for three hours and then get to go out with my husband.

[03:01:46] So this is actually a really nice way to spend my anniversary. Consider it our gift to you. Glad to be of service. So if there aren't any other questions on the – or happy to entertain any other questions on the futures list.

[03:02:01] Just a clarifying question on the budget open house. Will we receive a budget briefing in advance? I don't know what's being presented at the open house. So it's my understanding it's going to be very similar to the one that was conducted earlier this year, I think on April, in the month of April.

[03:02:28] Very similar structure, but as the manager stated, a couple of potential changes is we would have the results of the community survey, so we will probably be going over that with individuals who show up as well and see if there's any additional feedback that they would like to give. Additionally, we had a meeting today internally with staff and communications regarding the PAPHR, which we did receive the award with our first submittal, and we're already preparing for our second submittal and trying to get feedback from residents on that.

[03:03:00] Potentially have other things. Actually, while we were at this meeting, I sent a meeting request for a planning committee to sort of start formulating what needs to be done and see if there are other areas or opportunities in discussion with the manager of areas that the residents may want to identify specifically as priorities for the FY25 budget development that we could get input, as the manager said, try to get that on the front end versus earlier this year we had already proposed, the manager had already proposed the budget, so it was at the back end or the tail end.

[03:03:39] So now we're doing it, I guess, in the more traditional sense of trying to get input prior to actually developing the FY27 budget. And it's really more, we're not going to have a lot of details in terms of, there's not going to be like a proposed budget for people to react to.

[03:04:00] It's really about what our, you know, finding out what their priorities are, what they want to see, and whatever financial, I mean, we can, we'll have, you know, year-end, we'll have our, you know, you will have gotten, you will have gotten the first quarter, or we will have first quarter data and preliminary year-end results for the year that we just ended on the 30th of this year for fiscal 25.

[03:04:30] so but it's really it's really about priorities and and desires to help us formulate the budget it is not there's not going to be a specific we are proposing to spend X number of dollars and what's your opinion on that where we are not that far along but we don't have any information about the expected circumstances of the upcoming budget well we'll have the we'll have what the current you know we'll have financial trends we just received and just

[03:05:05] distributed to you the school tuition update we've just had Davenport's financial presentation on the proposed how to fund the school bonds and the update for that so we'll have all of that information yes for the to share and to have for folks but it's really about what folks what what are their priorities in terms of what they want to see you know in and for you to get that feedback and hear some of that on the on the front end if I could add really

[03:05:41] quickly so it's sort of like a step process I think there will be more clarity and more information provided to council during the November 8th budget retreat at that time it will be very comprehensive from a micro from macro micro level we would also have pretty accurate revenue projections for FY 27 along with expenditures as well having come off of the budget open house having come off of the community survey responses as well so incorporating all

[03:06:18] that feedback on the November 8th budget retreat for council having a department budget edo Davenport and others present and then basically at the end of that discussion of like okay provide us guidance going forward and what our council's priorities for FY 27 CIP and operating budget I think that is the meeting where it collectively sort of comes together for October would we have an updated CIP list or is that too soon that's too soon it's too soon all right

[03:06:57] any further discussion on that I don't have anything on that but just a real quick question because I think maybe it's been a while but the discussion on October 7 for possible video testimony for public comment how it are we getting a presentation and then going to be in a position to potentially take action is that what we're looking forward to well right now we're testing because we're trying to figure out how we can do a form on the website for people to sign up to speak or to submit a video because i'm working with cable right now even with like a

[03:07:32] possibility of getting youtube links from residents that or anybody in the community that wants to submit um i mean we're trying to go through things just see if we can do it smoothly on our end we've gotten information from other jurisdictions so we're just trying to figure it out so we're hopeful to have we'll have a presentation but it'll be a consensus of the council if they want to move forward with adding that feature to the meetings okay anything else okay so we'll move on to the manager report out nothing else I just wanted to say thank

[03:08:11] you for your comments about the finance team and the work and presentation that they've done up to this point this is something that we've been working on on quite honestly um since i've gotten here or started helping out back in january jc and gwen and i both we all have worked and been in other places and so a lot of the things that we're doing is certainly um i would say sop for us and what we what we've been used to but as the city has

[03:08:46] done it may be in the past done things a little differently so we've been having these conversations just want you to know you know we've been having these conversations and we're continuing to work on these things to try and streamline make it more efficient make it more user friendly getting you the information that you're wanting in the format and what you're wanting to admit to allow for better decision making from your perspective but also from the staff side you don't manage it better because some of those because you know some of us were like we're just kind of scratching our heads like this seems odd but and I don't mean to sound critical of how things were

[03:09:23] done in the past it's just but as things evolve and you know new ways of doing things and so forth so I just wanted you know that we something we've been working on for some time and these are the kinds of discussions that we have very frequently and I just want to say thank you for recognizing the work that that the team has been putting in um and and we very much appreciate it okay so we'll start with council member amos i'm sure others are going to mention this but very excited for civic connections uh starting up tomorrow yeah there you go jennifer right over there and uh city

[03:10:01] partnering up with the central fairfax chamber and thank you to our comms director for for really leading the charge on that i know that's one of the first things we discussed as a group so it's kind of nice to see that uh everything's coming together finally there we go some smiles uh but outside of that that is it for me shout out to my soon-to-be wife excited for that this month go councilmember hall thank you can i fire that oh yeah okay so um councilmember quillen and i are part of the women's sorry the woman's club of fairfax that one always throws me off should be women's um and we are doing a free shred event and food drive on saturday september 27th

[03:10:38] from 10 a.m to 1 p.m at fairfax high school um we are asking that you bring non-perishable food items for the Fairfax High School food pantry. And you may bring up to five boxes of documents to shred. No cardboard, no binders, no magazines, no heavy plastic or trash. So paper is what we're looking to shred. So I don't know if you can zoom in on this or not, but you can find this. I will repost this again. I don't know that we zoom in. And in addition to that activity with the Women's

[03:11:11] Club of Fairfax we are also doing we are collecting donated items for the forensic assessment and counseling team we are collecting brand new sweatpants sweatshirts underwear and stuffed animals new stuffed animals nothing used and these are for victims of domestic abuse and sexual violence so that they have clothing and things like that to go home in when they arrive at the hospital their clothes usually get taken so this is to give them a little bit of dignity on their way out and not send them home in hospital scrubs so these items we will

[03:11:46] be delivering them on September 26th so if you would like to donate please reach out to me directly or to council member quillen as well and we can coordinate getting those items from you so thank you for finding other ways to help support your community and those in need and I'm sure I'm missing other things that are going on but thank you to everyone councilmember Hardy Chandler

[03:12:11] Lots of good things going on over the summer, but I do want to call out something that Mr. Martinez said very subtly, and I want to say it out loud and very specifically, that our CFO and their team won the popular annual finance reporting award on their first submission from the Government Finance Officers Association.

[03:12:32] So there's a lot of work that staff do that we don't see behind the scenes, a lot of things that they're accomplishing on an ongoing basis. This is just the latest. And so congratulations to them and their hard work and their ongoing success on everyone's behalf.

[03:12:51] And let's give him and our finance team a hand. Well deserved. In addition to that, I just want to acknowledge the ribbon cutting for the city hall, our front door to the city. The video that's associated with that, if you were not able to come to the ribbon cutting, but just not only the landscaping and how it looks but being a rain garden also and hearing some of the stormwater components that are built in our city should be very proud of our city hall and our front door so thank you councilmember peterson well thanks to everybody tonight great

[03:13:29] meeting and thanks again to all the staff a number of them are not here right now but hopefully our thanks will find its way to them one thing I want to thank all of you for is getting a head start on the budget my experience in the last month or two is that when I run into people in the community who want to talk about the council it's the number one thing they're asking about the number one thing they're thinking about they have a lot of questions I think they are feeling that there are a lot of big issues we're going to have to work through and and there's a lot of uncertainty we're gonna have to work through this year.

[03:14:06] So those questions and those comments are coming in early, and I think it's great that we are sensing that and getting ahead of the curve on that. The other issue that's out there that I hope we could find a way to chat about and maybe take action about at some point is the energy issue.

[03:14:25] I know we've seen a little bit of interest in a letter to Dominion. The electricity forecast for us and for Virginia is pretty different than it's been in the past because we're now living in a world where we have data centers and AI, and Virginia has a very acute case, but we also have a world where there is now less support federally for renewable energy and energy efficiency, and in a world where you need every electron you can get to deal with the increase in load, that's a big deal.

[03:15:04] So all local governments and state governments are caught up in this, but households are caught up in this because energy rates have the potential for going up pretty significantly, and that has a big ripple effect through a whole lot of different things. So I think it's a key issue.

[03:15:19] I think it's something we should find a way to talk about and take action on in terms of expressing our interest as a city. I think really every city, every county needs to be doing that right now. So I'd be very open to figuring out how we go about doing that, but I just want to say I think this is a big one, and it's not going away.

[03:15:39] Thanks. Council Member Bates? Thank you. No comments. Council Member McQuilla? Yes, just some quick reminders of some events that are coming up. Tomorrow night at 5 p.m. is the Daniels Run Elementary School Back to School Night and Family Picnic.

[03:15:57] And then this Friday, September 12th, is the Pier Midnight at Fairfax High School. great opportunity for all of the students in our Fairfax High School feeder schools to come on out and get to know the staff and to see how exciting it is to be at Fairfax High School. Then I believe it's the Saturday Movies Under the Moon at Van Dyke Park is at eight o'clock. It's Raya the Last Dragon. So I hope to see people out and about and enjoying all those events. Thank you. So first of reminding the public that we will not have a meeting on september 23rd we're moving it to

[03:16:36] september 30th because rosh hashanah is the september 23rd and 24th jensen chan is hosting what he believes will be the first inaugural ama event at high side on monday the 22nd and it's ama ask the mayor anything and so it's a free public event at high side is from five to ten He hopes to invite other community leaders on a monthly basis to Highside for a community engagement.

[03:17:03] And I would just finally like to say congratulations to our Congressman-elect, James Walkinshaw, who was elected with nearly 75% of the vote, and I am sure he will be sworn in tomorrow and will ably represent the 11th Congressional District and have to believe that the late Congressman Jerry Connolly would be pleased.

[03:17:24] And with that, I will adjourn the meeting at 10.17 p.m. you

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