Coraggio Consulting
Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Housing Committee, Tuesday, February 10, 2026

Date: Tuesday, February 10, 2026
Place: Fairfax County Board of Supervisors, Virginia
Length: 1h 6m (video)
Official meeting video (Fairfax County): https://video.fairfaxcounty.gov/player/clip/4036
Official Board of Supervisors page (Fairfax County): https://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/boardofsupervisors/

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 2026-10-28. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:02] I used to have the power of when I was school board chair. All right, we're going to get started. Welcome back from lunch, everybody. So I want to welcome everyone to this first meeting of the Housing Committee for 2026, and my first meeting as committee chair, so very grateful for that.

[00:00:24] Just a couple things before we move on to presentations. Similar to earlier, I want to first thank Chairman McKay for his faith in me. I know this is a huge priority for the board, and so I'm really honored to be chairing this committee. And a really big thank you to Supervisor Palchuk also for her years of outstanding stewardship leading the housing committee.

[00:00:42] As we all have talked about, housing affordability is at the core of many challenges that our community faces today and a huge impact for two reasons and two imperatives. An economic imperative, an economic development imperative to have a wide range of housing so people can live and work here. And a moral imperative grounded in our commitment to One Fairfax.

[00:01:01] And so with those two imperatives in mind, I'm really appreciative of the board matter brought by Chairman McKay in 2025 regarding housing initiatives to increase housing production, as well as the 2022 board matter to set a goal of 10,000 affordable housing units. Those are all really, really great initiatives to address our housing issues.

[00:01:18] And I'm deeply excited to work on this very fundamental matter. So today we will have two presentations led by our housing director, Tom Fleetwood. And I know he's supporting his work by Deputy Director Anna Shapiro and Director of Real Estate and Community Development Finance, Callie Seltzer.

[00:01:34] I hope I said your name right. The first presentation will feature highlights of the recently competed housing needs assessment, which I'm going to anticipate is going to generate a lot of discussion today. And the second presentation will provide updates on the work towards a 10,000-unit affordable housing goal and the work of the interagency staff housing task force.

[00:01:52] So before Mr. Fleetwood begins, does anyone have any comments on the summary of the July 2025 housing committee meeting seeing none i'll turn to mr fleetwood for your presentation thank you uh madam chairman uh good afternoon tom fleetwood with the department of housing community development uh and on behalf of the staff i'd like to thank you to uh and welcome you to uh to this work and we're very uh very much looking forward to working with you going forward thank you uh today's uh today for today's agenda we're going to be addressing two issues uh as chairman said

[00:02:27] Highlights of our housing needs assessment as well as highlights of our progress on our housing initiatives and recognizing that there's probably going to be Significant discussion on the first I'd like to go ahead and get started I will note that in addition to miss Shapira and miss Seltzer. We're also joined by Philip cash of HR&A associates that worked on the Housing needs assessment as well as Megan Van Dam of the Department of Housing Community Development. All right, so Just taking a step back in terms of where we stand on this issue, the challenge of housing

[00:03:05] affordability is a national issue, it's a state issue, and it is especially an acute challenge here in Fairfax County. As the board is aware, housing for all income levels, a healthy housing market is essential to our economic success and affordability, for job creation, retention, and success for low and moderate income families as well. The headline concern here truly is that not addressing the challenges in our market could lead to an out-migration of people and jobs. And that's why

[00:03:41] this is so terribly important for our community. Go ahead to the next one. We have essentially two housing markets, one for homeownership and one for rental. And neither of those markets is meeting the needs in our economy, especially for low and moderate income working families.

[00:04:00] Fairfax County residents have very high median incomes. Renters have a median income of over $93,000, and owners as of 2023 have a median income of over $178,000. But homeownership today is effectively out of reach for all but those with very high incomes, freezing out young professionals and people who want to move on from renting into homeownership, a population that was identified very clearly in the Chairman's Board matter in

[00:04:34] September. So we thought this slide was especially compelling, and it shows job creation versus housing delivery between 2013 and 2023. And as you can see here, Fairfax County has created more than two jobs for every housing unit delivered during that time. And that is as compared to our regional neighbors. And that's a testament both to the desirability of our jurisdiction, the effectiveness of our economic development strategies, but it does highlight

[00:05:13] that housing production in the market has not kept up with demand. Turning to the question of the rental market, we have a major gap for households at 60% of the area median income and below. And other than those being delivered through the board's investments and policies, the market is not and will not deliver for low and moderate income households in this community.

[00:05:42] To afford Fairfax County's typical market rent of $2,500, a household would need to make at least $100,000 a year. To purchase the median home, you need an income of nearly $230,000 a year. Single workers earning between $50,000 and $70,000 can afford a monthly rent of $1,400 to $2,000 a month. And there's an existing housing shortage for this cohort, meaning they're cost burdened and renting homes beyond their means. Nearly 80% of the households earning 80% of the area median

[00:06:20] income and below are cost-burdened, spending over 30% of their incomes on their housing costs. Overall, 45% of all renter households are cost-burdened in Fairfax County. Taking a deeper dive into home ownership, there is truly a widening affordability gap for for-sale housing in our community.

[00:06:46] Renters in our economy wanting to make the leap to home ownership have seen the gap between what they can afford and the median house price more than triple between 2010 and 2023. This challenge is compounded by the continuation of a high interest rate environment post-pandemic, which further depresses purchasing power. Rising home prices have deeply constrained purchasing power. As of right now, at 100% of area median income, a household could afford a mortgage of

[00:07:25] about $586,000. The median renter household earns about $100,000 a year, but the median sales price in our market, which ranges from about $730,000 to $770,000, is affordable to households earning 140% of median income and above. It's important to note that in 2022, for example, if we can go to that next not that one the next one it's important to note that in 2022 forgive me back to the

[00:08:03] previous slide I'm sorry in 2022 for example the median renter household could could afford only about 20 percent of all homes sold next slide that one from 2021 to 2025 only 13 percent of the for sale homes produced were affordable to families earning less than a hundred thousand than 100% of median income, and most of those were likely produced by the board's inclusionary housing policies. More than a third of all new homes during that period sold for more than $1.1

[00:08:38] million, including every single family home produced during that period. Buying in Fairfax County requires high levels of upfront cash. 50% of all homes sold from 2022 to 2024 had at least 20% in cash for a down payment. And of those, 20% were all cash transactions. Back to our median renter household, which we think is a very good proxy for, you know, sort of the challenges that

[00:09:14] low and moderate income families are facing getting into homeownership, they would have to save for about 15 years to get to a competitive 20% down payment. Again, purchasing power for moderate income households, or the lack thereof, coupled with the lack of supply, is an essential barrier to accessing the homeownership market in Fairfax County. Now a deeper dive into the rental

[00:09:45] market. As with home ownership, constrained supply is a major challenge. We see here Fairfax County as compared to our regional neighbors with regard to multifamily rental production. I'll note that that 5% shown for Fairfax County equates to roughly 15,000 rental homes. Next slide. The majority of lower income households are cost burdened. This means they're paying more than a third of their incomes towards housing. And as you see in the charts provided, nearly all

[00:10:24] households earning less than $75,000 a year are cost burdened. At $50,000 a year and below, large majorities are severely cost burdened, meaning they pay more than 50% of their incomes for housing. That's 43,200 households earning less than $75,000 who can't really afford the housing that they have, often forcing them to make difficult decisions about necessities like education, food, medical and child care, often with long-lasting negative impacts.

[00:10:58] With respect, focusing more on the lower-income households and as renters, there is a deep shortage of housing that's affordable for people at 60% and below right now. We have a standing deficit in our market right now of about 13,800 units. And we have 60% and below households that are having to compete for units that are not affordable to them. This affordability mismatch

[00:11:33] where lower income renters are renting at higher prices because that's what's available in the market, except for affordable housing we have and are producing. Looking to the future, Fairfax County can expect to need 41,000 to 95,000 new homes across all incomes by 2035. These estimates are broadly in line with what we have in the Comprehensive Plan housing section and are driven

[00:12:06] by job and population growth. Based on these estimates, we believe our 2019 work on the need for 15,000 net new units at 60% and below was at least correct and potentially conservative.

[00:12:22] And again, that doesn't include the deficit I referred to earlier of nearly $14,000. Looking forward, production must double in Fairfax County in order to reach the low estimate of what we believe will be needed.

[00:12:42] And there are a couple of points that I wanted to make here. Between 2014 and 2023, we had 20,000 new homes permitted. During that same period, the board has approved rezonings for 96,000 new units.

[00:13:00] So just to give you an idea of what's getting produced versus what you've approved. And I think that's really an important point. Based on the projected need at all income levels, as I said, we must at least double between now and 2035.

[00:13:18] And we must continue our path to the 10,000 new affordable units at 60% of AMI and below. Identify and identify paths to move to homeownership for renters particularly moderate-income workers and young professionals and before we go to questions I'll just note that we are anticipating issuing a more fulsome version of this report via NIP in the coming week or so But we had wanted before doing so to provide you with this sort of high-level view Of what we were seeing in the market with that madam chairman. We're happy to answer any questions

[00:13:56] Thank you very much, and thank you for this presentation It is as you said very sobering and shows the great need for some of the great board matters that have been brought recently around Housing production around looking at our housing processes and permitting processes You know I think what I just wanted to lift up really briefly is that it highlights the need of housing at all levels except for those making the very highest incomes.

[00:14:24] You know, focusing on the six-run AMI is very important, the Alice population. But all levels, we just need housing in this county, and it's an economic and a moral imperative. So with that, I will start with Chairman McKay for remarks. Yeah, thank you. I think you said it well. This demonstrates that there's, you know, not really a market that we're serving adequately.

[00:14:43] And that should be a concern for the very economic reasons you mentioned before. And I think, you know, when we talk to people, this is, as I've said many times before, this is move beyond a moral imperative into an absolute economic imperative, that the places that are going to be successful are the places that rise to the challenge and meet head on the production numbers that we know are necessary here.

[00:15:08] When you look at that job to home number, it's pretty alarming. I mean, I'd much rather be where we are than Montgomery County. When you look at that map, they've got a much larger problem than we have, which is, you know, a job growth issue. But we can't rest on our laurels, and those jobs only happen if there's housing here that people can afford to live in.

[00:15:29] That's the only way that continues to happen, and so we have to maintain that. And I say that because I know that as a result of the board matters, and first of all, I do appreciate the conclusion that we're on the right path when we did the 5,000, we upped it to 10 000 affordable units i mean those numbers were loosely scientifically based but now we know we're on the right track in terms of what's needed if if not uh being conservative um but but i would say that you know the the housing board matter um that i more recently did that our county executive jen miller is working on when that information comes back to us in the

[00:16:08] spring um we need to act we need to be bold we need to do things unconventional and we need to address this challenge. And the data is here that demonstrates just how significant this challenge is. And so this is a good primer for those recommendations coming forward because staff and the teams of staff that have been working on attacking this issue are going to come forward with some ideas that, you know, might not be popular in every corner, might be difficult for us to deal with.

[00:16:41] But if we're going to address the long-term economy of Fairfax County and at the same time grow our workforce and respond to this moment, we're going to have to do things outside of the box. And so when those come forward, I hope we keep an open mind to those because we're going to need, as has been said before, when it comes to affordable housing, we're going to need every tool in our toolbox.

[00:17:00] And so it's going to be production of a lot of housing units at every market rate, every market bracket. It's going to mean using our county-owned property creatively like we've had. It's going to mean leveraging our nonprofits. It's going to mean higher density and transit-oriented areas that have infrastructure.

[00:17:17] It's going to mean all of those things, and we're going to have to address that moment as a community. And I believe wholeheartedly that our community is ready to do that and understands the magnitude of this problem. There's not an event I go to where there's somehow not a tie back to the housing affordability issues that our communities are facing.

[00:17:37] It doesn't matter what the subject is. Somehow it always circles back at some point into a conversation about housing affordability. And so I appreciate all the work that staff's done on the data. It cements the direction that we have sent our staff into, and it also cements the direction the Board has taken with affordable housing.

[00:17:57] And if anything, it means we need to keep the momentum up and step it up a notch. So thank you. Thank you. Sorry, Supervisor Jimenez. Thank you so much, Madam Chair. And thank you, Mr. Fleetwood, for your presentation. to your staff's hard work on this issue.

[00:18:15] First off, let me mention that the board matter to which the chairman was referring to that he introduced is really a lifeline. It's going to help every single one of our districts hopefully bring the housing needs to where they need to be. Obviously, as you mentioned, Tom, this isn't a local issue.

[00:18:32] It's a national issue. It's a national crisis. And luckily, we're here to address it. We know what the issue is. We know what the problem is. Now we need to move forward. And that means working, as Chairman McKay said, in finding solutions that we haven't used in the past. Obviously, each one of our districts has different housing needs.

[00:18:51] You know, for example, in Mason District, you know, there is a huge push and a request for senior affordable housing. And so that's obviously something that we're obviously taking a look at, as well as affordable housing and all the different types. But, Tom, when you mentioned on, I don't know what page this is, but you mentioned the need for 41,000 to 95,000 new homes by 2035, what's it going to take for us to get there?

[00:19:20] Supervisor Jimenez, first, thank you for that easy question. The short answer is that it's going to require a whole of community effort, and it requires both your investments in affordable housing and working to make the market deliver more housing for everyone.

[00:19:44] So it really is an all of the above, both and effort. I know that our Deputy County Executive, Jen Miller, is going to be talking a little bit uh later today about or later during this meeting about sort of the road to the recommendations for the housing task force and i think um when we deliver those recommendations you know there will be a much more fulsome answer uh on particularly with respect to sort of the more middle and upper income you know type of housing that we're talking about as well as the affordable housing Thank you so much.

[00:20:23] Thank you. Supervisor Palachuk? Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you also to the chairman for the board matter that is really kicking off this incredible work. Thank you to Tom and your team. You know, I think what's really important is that you're highlighting that housing isn't just under the housing authority or the housing office to oversee, right?

[00:20:45] the fact that we've gotten to a point where, whether slowly or quickly over time, every single type of housing in the county, regionally, but especially in the county, is very much needed. That's what I appreciate, and I look forward to looking at some of that.

[00:21:03] What I really find fascinating, and as you said it, I wanted to be able to repeat it and have you repeat some of those statistics. I know they're here, and I hope as we get the report, we'll get some of these great graphics to share out. Every single family attached home built in 2025 sold for more than $1.1 million.

[00:21:28] I mean, I just sit with that. Those of us who live it every day are not surprised. But I think just the fact of how much the cost of housing has grown since 2010. We see it in 30- to 50-year-olds moving out.

[00:21:44] We see it in people not selling their homes when they're too large because there's not an alternative that's affordable. We see it in families making tough decisions. And often on the school board we see three families sharing an apartment just to be able to afford to live here.

[00:22:01] So it's across the board, and I appreciate that we're taking this holistic view. And I think the other thing that stood out to me is the graph on slide six. That's something new I hadn't seen yet, and the economic development piece.

[00:22:20] And as we continue to focus on our jobs and knowing that our Alice population spends most of their money on housing and child care, that we can keep building all the jobs we can bring and the EDA can keep helping us and we can keep bringing business, but we are falling behind our neighbors and housing for those families. So all of these things are compounded and they impact our human services. They impact everything we do. So I appreciate that we're taking a very bold look. And I know some of us have had conversations. I've had two roundtables to understand. It's easy for us to point to Richmond or Rita or someone else, but try to fix

[00:23:00] and understand our things that we can fix in the process. I know I would ask you today what they are i know that's something that um jen miller's team is working on um and i hope we take this seriously because it's not it's i think it's imperative that we build the 10 000 plus affordable units but it's not enough right um it's not enough until we have enough options for our seniors to retire in it's not enough that we have enough options for families to have a first-time home for families to be able to build their nest, to feel stable, right?

[00:23:34] And so I just think it's huge and it definitely is your work, but also the land use work. So I don't know if there's anything more specific as we ask for, you know, what can we do right now that you've seen or anything new in some of the research or to that slide on number six, because that really, to me, was astonishing.

[00:23:55] Mr. Fleely. One thing I will note about slide number six is you'll see in what we delivered to you via NIP an updated version of this slide, which includes, you know, sort of the impacts of what we've seen over the last 13 months.

[00:24:13] And what I can say is, and I'll look to my colleagues here to make sure I'm saying this right, but what we've seen is that it's actually become more acute. And it's not surprising because the next thing I was going to say is, well, we might sit here and say, hey, it's not as bad as Montgomery County.

[00:24:32] and my round table, I heard that, oh, they're learning their lesson, right? And they now have a new shot clock approach that seems to be working very well. Arlington County has been doing different streamlined work. So as we sit here and say, oh, it's not as bad. I'm actually only a little shocked to hear that it's gotten worse because there is a lot that we have to do. I think those like Montgomery who maybe got there before we did are starting to realize they have to change what they're doing, and we can't keep falling further behind.

[00:25:04] So thank you for that work. I don't know if there was anything else on that piece. It seemed like you wanted to add something, Tom. Mr. Fleetwood? Just briefly, I might ask Ms. Seltzer and Mr. Cash if they'd like to share a perspective on that from the national level.

[00:25:26] Perspective on how challenging it is or a perspective on? Other jurisdictions that have not produced sufficient housing and the challenges that they have. I mean, it will destroy your economy. I think the framing at the top there is 100% right. So HRA, I do our housing practice, but we also do economic development.

[00:25:42] One of the top things we're doing when we're working with businesses about expansion or growth or relocation is cost of housing and schools and safety. That's primarily what they're looking at. Can I get to an airport that can go to lots of places? Are the schools good quality? Is it relatively safe? And how much more am I going to have to pay my employees based on the cost of housing?

[00:26:02] And that is a top driver. You can look at it all over the country. And to give Montgomery County a little bit of a hard time, they stopped building, and their economy has – it's about a decade of 15-year lag time, and it goes – it's pretty clear. And it's pretty much a one-to-one ratio.

[00:26:19] It's a free market economy, and there's supply and demand. And you think about – you talked about $1.1 million. Think about what that means right now with interest rates. That means somebody's coming up with $60,000 a year and just interest payments to buy a new home.

[00:26:34] Think about how high those salaries have to be to make that possible. That's a much higher part of the economy, but it's a free market economy, and it just goes down each lever, and it compounds at the bottom of the economy, but it hurts all parts of your community. And then for each affordable home we build, now we have competition from those who can't buy a market-rate home or vice versa.

[00:26:57] So thank you. I mean, I think clearly we have schools and safety, and the housing is, from what we see, a number one challenge. So I appreciate that. Thank you. I appreciate it. Supervisor Alcorn? Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Really interesting conversation. I'm looking at slide six, and what jumps out to me is something historic, and he's not here for me to beat him up, but a certain father of our colleague, Supervisor Herity, in the 1970s led an effort of this board to accelerate jobs and growth of the commercial sector.

[00:27:35] That's how we got a lot of Tysons. That's how we got a lot of Route 28 corridor. And it's funny, you know, looking back now and what we're dealing with in terms of our housing crisis. Back then, everybody was thinking about traffic and everybody was thinking about tax rates.

[00:27:53] But now we're dealing with basically success in a way that really is affecting all of our economic futures, I would say. terms of not having enough housing. I guess one thing, and Tom, I appreciate you noting the difference between production and our actions on this board in terms of rezoning units. And I believe you said, how many units was it that had been rezoned?

[00:28:25] It was approximately 96,000. 96,000, only 20,000 built. Is that right during that time? That's correct. Okay. And this is something I, and I know others on this board have talked a lot with folks in the development community about. And the number one thing I hear over and over and over again is the challenge of financing, that basically developers would love to go forward with their projects, but they can't get the financing for it.

[00:28:57] So, I know during the chairman's board matter, this was something that was discussed and brought up. And I think it may be one of the things, hopefully, that we're looking at. Realize it's a big challenge for us to do anything to move the needle, at least on the supply side when it comes to finance.

[00:29:17] There may be some things we can do to make finance more attractive here across the board. But I would ask staff to look at that. Frankly, I was a little surprised that in this this presentation on housing There was no mention of financing which my understanding is is number one reason. We haven't produced more units in Fairfax County, so That's something I would hope you know as we get the later recommendations That that is addressed one way or another even if it's we can't do anything about it and the other thing I would just ask Supervisor Beerman and I

[00:29:55] We're in Richmond on Thursday, and we're having a conversation with Delegate Josh Thomas, who comes out of the real estate development industry. And we were talking about this exact issue in terms of how to finance not just affordable but market units.

[00:30:11] And he has a study, a bill that got pushed into a study for next year that looks at creative ways to finance housing and, frankly, creative ways for the public sector to be involved in the financing of market rate developments.

[00:30:33] So I would ask us to engage in that, if we could, and to be a part of that discussion, because I think to really move the needle, we've also got to deal with the biggest issue here, which is the money. Thank you.

[00:30:49] Madam Chair, if I may, you know, I haven't seen the research that says that. I've seen different research, so we have HRNA here. I don't know if they have the research on that. I think it would be helpful. I don't know if that's coming forward in the full report. I've heard very different things from the development community. So what are the biggest challenges to building market-rate housing?

[00:31:09] We know what they are for affordable housing. What are the different avenues we can use? And what is it that we control right within that? So I'm going to hear the chairman. Yeah, so that, I was just going to say, all those questions are within the scope of what our deputy county executive is working on.

[00:31:25] I mean, I know that, you know, I hear a lot from folks that they would love to come back through our process and change their development, but it takes way too long, costs them way too much money to do that. That's on us. And so I think there's a myriad of things that are challenges that they're facing and why those aren't built, and those are all within the scope of what's going to come back to us, all the questions that we've raised here.

[00:31:46] Thank you. Supervisor Bierman? Thank you. On slide 14, it says that the percent change in renter-occupied homes from 2013 to 2023, we went up by 5%. Montgomery County went up by 12%. Arlington County by 21%. Alexandria City by 22%. Why are we lagging so far behind on rental housing? It's not your market strength. Your market's strong. You have the rents, and that was a low interest rate period. It's your development

[00:32:24] approval and land use regulations. They're going to be your primary drivers. So it's just that we aren't entitling it fast enough? I would need to dig deeper into exactly which parts, whether there's entitlement or whether that's just not that much land they do it so you have your land prices are a little higher right because you have strong for sale marks so there's competitions other uses but you have the rents to support far far far more development than you are seeing in your market so it's a land it's primarily a land use and regulatory constraint okay what about the fact so this goes to the point that was just made in the question about uh entitlements i mean i've

[00:33:01] got a plot of land in my district that's had over 1,000 units entitled on it since 2019. They still haven't built. We've tried to meet with them multiple times, said, whatever you need to do to potentially change this entitlement, we're in. We'll do it. We'll figure it out. It happens to be next to a big church that wants to see more housing right there. It hasn't happened yet. So tell me what we got to do to make that happen. Supervisor Bierman, if I may, I think that that That is truly a discussion that is going to flow out of the work of the housing task force.

[00:33:38] Okay, preview it for me, please. No, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but we've asked down the line, we've asked a bunch of questions and heard just wait. We are in a meeting right now, and we're asking fairly obvious questions about this slide deck. Preview it for me.

[00:33:54] Tell me. Start previewing it, please. I'm Supervisor Beerman, so let me just make sure I understand what you're asking. You're asking me to talk to a – or somebody to talk to a person who owns the land to build density on that land. No, that's not what I'm asking.

[00:34:09] So what are you asking? What I'm asking for is – I mean this is – what speaker am I? Am I like fourth, I think? There are problems that we're identifying and we're asking to be previewed for what the work that has been going on for the last roughly five months.

[00:34:31] And on that one, it was a question of, hey, we are lagging very far behind in the rental market. The general answer was we've got some changes that might have to happen in our entitlement or regulatory processes. I mentioned a situation where we are trying very hard to get something through.

[00:34:50] And now I'm asking essentially, OK, so what are those changes going to look like to make that better for our rental market? What are some ideas? Like preview, please. Deputy County Executive Jennifer Miller. So a few things. So we have, under the two initiatives you've heard about, there are 51 separate initiatives.

[00:35:08] So I could start, you know, talking through each of them. The intent of this, and we're going to be presenting them to the chairman and the Land Use Policy Committee chair at the end of February. So we have them in a stack, but how do we, to the specific question here, was lay the foundation, because to Supervisor Palchuk's question, what we plan on having is, number one, establish that there is a problem. And while I think the board all knows there is a problem, I actually don't know if you ask the average resident, do we need more housing in Fairfax County, that they would say yes. I'm afraid they would say the value of my home will go down and my traffic will go up. So I don't know if there is. So it's intended to be an outward facing that

[00:35:47] we're all speaking from the same page on what is the crisis that we all agree we have. Side two of that one pager, the glossy, the easy to understand is that what are the things we're doing to address it. So when you talk about the land use policy, it doesn't necessarily mean that even if we said there are no proffers and we're going to rubber stamp everything that comes through, that you would still solve the problem, right? So what is it? Some of it is density. And some density is acceptable to this community and the board, and some is not, right? Some of it is interest rates.

[00:36:18] Some of it is the cost of construction. A lot of those things we can't control. But if it's something that is close to being developed, but it's because of a regulatory process that we have put in place, or we can have smart density increases, that's where we're coming to the board to push the envelope. Some of it is a little bit of things that will require board approval.

[00:36:37] Other pieces are the internal elements. And when we talk about how have we gotten this information, we've spent the bulk of the last four months meeting with NAOP and VIBA. We've had planning focused four-hour development sessions. We've had land use focused four-hour development sessions Thursday, we're bringing VDOT in to have a four-hour, actually five- or six-hour session where developers give us their feedback. We talk to VDOT, what's inhibiting development. We've sent out surveys. So we actually have quite a bit of data that we'll present. And I think someone else asked, you know, is it the financial incentives? One of the initiatives we're looking at is what financial incentives could the board consider? You know, are we willing to consider some of

[00:37:16] these incentives so at the end of february is the intent to present um to the to the to the chairman and to land use policy committee chair here's the things we'd like to pursue are you comfortable with this march 19th is when we roll out to the development committee not just here's all the things we plan on on pursuing that relate to both of the board matters which of these will have the biggest impact to you which of these will actually help on the things that the county can do that would actually move the needle from you know we're not going to get everyone to be building homes, single-family homes, but what are the things, the levers that we could control to make the improvements and to focus on those areas? So I don't know, you know, if you have specific

[00:37:55] questions, like on a specific development, that's a little more challenging. That's a good answer. That's a good answer, and that gives us a roadmap, and that gives something that I can take back to my constituents to talk about what we've been doing over the last four-plus months on this. That's a good answer. I look forward to seeing the report. I hope that we do go bold in it and that we have a lot of good ideas in there.

[00:38:17] Thank you. And if I may, part of the purpose of this presentation was that communication so the public is also aware of the challenges that have been laid out in this presentation. And the next presentation will be a little bit about current initiatives so far. And I think you gave a roadmap to what's coming. So that will go to Supervisor Lusk.

[00:38:35] No, I appreciate all the comments that have been made so far. And I'll say that recognize the difficult situation that we're in. But I'm also thinking about those who are really trying to figure this out.

[00:38:52] So even on slide 12, when you talk about how long it would take for the median renter to be able to save for a competitive down payment, this certainly creates a situation that's going to be difficult for those who want to stay in this community, who want to purchase in this community, and to be able to raise their families in this community.

[00:39:19] And that is something we should all be very, very concerned about. I mean, I think about myself, and I'm fortunate that, you know, we were able to buy our house. Our first house was not even a townhouse. It was a single family, which is just unheard of to think about today.

[00:39:36] It's impossible for someone to almost consider moving into their first house as a single family detached. And I think we've got to be thinking about ways to make it possible to maybe bring down the costs for these homes.

[00:39:53] And I know that modular has been talked about. I hear people talking about the pre-manufactured housing in factories that comes out in different segments that you can pretty much put together almost like a jigsaw puzzle.

[00:40:10] I mean, I think we've got to start to think about that as a possibility, too. I understand that that's going to allow for the housing to be constructed at a lower cost. I don't know what data, what information has been collected on that, but I'd be certainly curious to see what opportunities we might have relative to considering manufactured housing.

[00:40:32] And I say not just for single families, but I'm thinking townhomes, I'm thinking about even multifamily. You can build manufactured multifamily units. So we need to be looking at this in a totally different way in order for us to be successful in addressing what we see as a clear need and a clear obstacle for the residents who so dearly want and deserve to have housing.

[00:41:02] Thank you supervisor stork. Thank you, Madam Chair. I think the discussion has been great and I particularly appreciate the questions and and I appreciate Every kind of executive Miller just kind of highlighting what has been going on behind the scenes as well as I know for some of us We've had those conversations too and we know that there's a lot more to come But but just to have those connections and understanding I think is a way for us to Share with our community and frankly to prepare our community for some of the tougher decisions that are going to have to happen

[00:41:37] If we're truly going to reach what is my core objective, which is housing for all housing for all is because we have across the spectrum No doubt and but especially we have it for folks are 60 70 percent AMI and below I mean we we have to do something more there the county cannot get there by ourselves We're what our initiative maybe represents 10 or even 20 percent of the overall number that need to get built The private sector have to be with us. We have to help them but at least in what i see generally getting built in mount vernon district is at least with

[00:42:14] respect to single family homes is a million plus which is what's attractive to them and i think we have to figure out a way this is my comment overall we have to figure out a way to make these others you know less expensive units more attractive as well because that those are the building blocks of of our frankly our communities and i mean the other key piece is that i was gonna they're sitting behind me, but they're actually sitting in the audience. I have staff members who want desperately, very much, to live in Fervas County. And they make good income. They're not great income, but good income. And they can't do that here the way it is now. And it's very,

[00:42:52] very, very discouraging to them. Those are the comments I've heard from them. So I know that those are all parts of what we're trying to address and get through. The last part of this, and I know that I'm going to follow up again with, we have thousands of units, thousands of units in the Mount Vernon District that are already entitled, thousands. And some have been entitled for more than a decade. And my conversations with this one particular developer, which is about a thousand units, I've had every year or two, I've had this conversation. They keep telling me, well, the, you know, the rent prices aren't high enough or the financing's not there. But, you know, we

[00:43:26] know in the last decade that something's not right there because we know that financing was very very uh flexible and available you know a decade ago so i know that we are going to have to look for ways to to drive this really if you will not only champion it the way i think we're doing it here but you have to drive this outcome and i appreciate the presentation appreciate the conversation and i'm looking forward to our march deeper conversations about what what are the critical highest tier items to go after first so thank you all thank you um i think we're going to

[00:44:04] on to the second part of the presentation it sounds like there's some really great work being done thank you for that preview and also a realization i'm here from all my colleagues on the real need for housing which is very well illustrated in the data points you brought in here so let's look now turn to current housing initiatives underway as we wait for the final report from jen mill and her group so mr fleetwood uh thank you madam chairman uh just carrying on here uh looking at our path to the 10,000 unit goal. We are continuing to make really significant progress. When you look at our

[00:44:39] tracker here, it doesn't quite capture, you know, truly the scope of progress that we're making, in my view, because we have many hundreds of other units in our conceptual pipeline that actually, where they'd all come to fruition, which we hope they will, gets us closer to about half of our goal so we've got a tremendous amount of work ahead of us the support that you've provided has been absolutely essential and we're delivering housing as as chairman mckay says in

[00:45:14] every corner of fairfax county and we're very proud of that with respect to our inclusionary housing programs since the the beginning of your affordable housing initiative in 2020 We've delivered over 1,500 new units through the ADU and WDU programs since 2020.

[00:45:35] We've also had close to $9 million contributed to the Housing Trust Fund, and you see how it's divided there, the largest of which being the Tyson's Fund. But it's important to note here, particularly relative to serving middle-income folks, is that of all of the units that have been delivered since 2020, 78 of them count, if you will, towards our 10,000 unit goal, meaning that they serve 60% and below, but the rest of them serve above 60, up to 120%.

[00:46:13] So the work that quietly goes on behind the scenes with our development partners, with the private sector, and with your leadership through the land use process is making a real dent in that need as well and we're carrying continuing to carry on with that work we are launching a new homeownership loan program in this spring that we hope will be you know sort of a base a pilot for for attracting

[00:46:48] more investment for us to invest in folks who are low and moderate income to become homeowners, including people who are coming out of rental housing and looking at other opportunities as well. Next. Snapshot of our market affordable housing. This is the market affordability at 60% and below. As of right now, there are about 6,700 market affordable units that are affordable between 60% of median income and below. Most of these are one-bedroom units. Most

[00:47:26] of them were built between 1950 and 1970. And it's important to note that with the ongoing sort of volatility in the rental market, that any fluctuation in these rents can make them either affordable or unaffordable at 60% below on any given day. So we really look at this To borrow terminology from our homelessness work, we look at this as sort of a point-in-time snapshot of the condition in the market for the unsubsidized market affordable housing.

[00:48:03] Just a reminder of what the FCRAJ has and is providing, our former public housing portfolio, which includes over 1,000 units, serves households earning 14% of median income on average.

[00:48:24] And our Fairfax County Rental Program portfolio, which includes properties like Castellani Meadows or the Crescent or Wedgwood and a number of others, the average income served in that portfolio is 34% of the area median income.

[00:48:42] So it is the housing authority, even beyond the great work of our affordable housing partners, who is serving people who really do not have other options to be able to live here in Fairfax County. And just to note that the RHA owns and operates over 3,000 units of multifamily housing across the county, almost 500 senior units, 112 beds of licensed assisted living, and a number of sort of specialized units like group homes.

[00:49:17] And, of course, we also do own a manufactured housing community in the Bount Vernon District. So I wanted to highlight that for you as well. As previously discussed, we have been working since September on responding to Chairman McKay's board matter under the leadership of Deputy County Executive Jen Miller, and I'd like to turn to Deputy County Executive Miller for a few comments and to walk through our timeline in terms of what we've done so far and what to expect in the coming months. Great, thanks Tom, and as previously

[00:49:53] mentioned, this was really intended to be the laying the foundation piece. The work piece has been occurring in the last almost five, coming up on five months. The board's initial request was that we come out with an action plan in the spring and we're on track with that. So moving from left to right, it kind of describes the main steps that have occurred. The item, and I printed it out for everyone because I know it's kind of hard to read on the screen. The item in grayed out toward the bottom are those deliverables to the board and you can see some of the items that they've been ready to come forward. We've said, let's not wait until we have the May meeting. So as you know,

[00:50:29] we've been talking about the ALU standards. Some of the, we've discussed this at various committee meetings, like the workforce housing topic. And we plan to be done with a presentation in March that we'll be sending out. And so one more expansion on that. I mentioned some of the groups we've engaged with. I neglected to talk also about the Chairman's Roundtable, the NVRC Housing Symposium, Council on Economic Opportunity, Housing Development Forum. So we feel like we've cast a really broad net saying, if you have an interest in this and have feedback to give us, please do. We're happy to hear it. So we've used that as the foundation. And then when we roll

[00:51:08] out the initiatives, we've actually pre-prepared a survey, as I briefly mentioned earlier, that will ask each of the people who see the initiatives that we roll out. We have two categories. One will be staffs thinking on what will have the biggest impact on housing, and the other will be this entirety of the development community. And that actually includes, we mentioned, like the faith community partners on where they think will have the biggest impact. We will present those findings to the board. These are the things that may be difficult, but have the biggest potential impact as evaluated by staff in the development community with our recommendations of the action plan. The

[00:51:45] action plan that will, we'll, we'll revise our plan based on what we hear from the development community in, um, March. And we will provide the final report to the board in April. In the May 12th meeting, we, we plan to present the recommendations that include a very detailed action plan that will be by quarter of the year, what step we're going to be taking each of these elements. Um, and Ben Aiken has been a great partner, uh, on the housing piece. We'll be tracking then on a Gantt chart, like all of these 51 action items when they're due, when they're overdue, and then we plan to

[00:52:19] come to the board with the updates either quarterly or biannually. So that's the remaining timeline. Thank you. We'll start with Chairman McKay. Yeah, I just want to pick up where we left off the conversation a minute ago because I just want to emphasize again that, you know, I'm driven by speed too, but I think the language that's used here is an unprecedented all-of-government effort actually isn't even demonstrative in my mind of what's going on because of all the private entities that you just mentioned that are also involved in this. And so this is a nationwide,

[00:52:57] region-wide, we know that problem that communities across the country are facing, in some cases across the world are facing. Nobody has all the answers here. Jen Miller doesn't have all the answers. Chairman McKay doesn't have all the answers. Supervisor Rush to Sizemore Heiser has some of the answers but but the point is is that we wanted a broad array of initiatives coming forward and and we know that as was mentioned earlier that some of these things are going to require the board to adopt some of them may require going to the planning commission some

[00:53:32] require may require us to put into our budget some may require us to do you know change our zoning ordinance and so there may be a number of things here that have to happen so while i'm interested in speed always, what we're interested in is getting this right and making sure that when these initiatives come out, they have been very well vetted already, professionally, professionally very well vetted so that when we get them, we're ready to go. Obviously, we're going to want to vet them with the community, those elements that have to be going to the community, but that we're ready to go. And so, you know, my board matter did specify a time frame. We're within that time frame.

[00:54:11] that specified a scope, which was wide. I'd encourage everybody to go back and read it. Financing was in there. The things we've asked here today, they were all in the board matter, if you go back and read the board matter. So it was all-encompassing. It was broad, and it's on a very short schedule in terms of the significant technical issues that might be coming forward to us, plus the path that we will have to navigate in order to accomplish any of those things, which could be very different depending on which the recommendation is. And so this problem wasn't created in a year or 10 years.

[00:54:46] It was created over many, many decades. And the communities, as was a part of the earlier presentation that we got, the communities that are able to address these are the ones that are going to have economies that look as strong as Fairfax is now. And that's what we can't afford to lose. And so, yes, time is of the essence, without a doubt. But as you've heard, we are well in our way. We now have to have the political courage to accomplish these things when they come forward. And I know putting everybody in a hard spot to be agreeable to something you haven't seen yet, but this is not going to be normal stuff. This is going to be some outside of the

[00:55:23] box thinking. But outside of the box thinking is what built a strong economy in Fairfax County to begin with. And it's what's got to continue to have happen to cement that moving forward. And without the housing component, there's no cementing of that. And that's how important this moment is. And so I appreciate all the passion. I just want to temper it a little bit by saying our staff has been working their tails off in these task forces to come forward with us something that's very comprehensive so that we don't have to spend another five, six, seven months debating those things when they come forward. If they look like we're ready to go,

[00:55:59] we have the political courage to do them, let's move forward with them and make sure that we can we can do this in a timely fashion. And so I just want to thank the staff. I thank Jennifer for her answer and Tom being in the tough spot. As was said earlier, this is not an RHA problem. It's not a Department of Housing problem. This is a community problem. Developers, elected officials, residents who show up and don't like housing, banks, all the things you can imagine. This is a community-wide problem that has to have a community-wide solution that we can drive. Thank you very

[00:56:38] much, Vice Chair Smith. Simple question on slide 25 that I might not want to hear the answer to. I don't see anything listed for Springfield and Sully. That's what I'm afraid of. It's a low 0.1%.

[00:56:53] The challenge that you are very much on the radar, Mr. Chairman, but But I will say that it's largely a result of the age of these properties and how long ago they were developed.

[00:57:14] And I might turn to Megan Van Dam to make any further comment on that. Good afternoon, Megan Van Dam. I think you hit the nail on the head. I mean, there are multifamily properties in these districts. It's just a matter of where the rent is and how it compares to others.

[00:57:33] So, yes, we do. Yes. Madam Chair. Thank you. Yes, Supervisor Palczyk. I have one question, which I hope can be included in this. I assume, speaking of history and when this county grew quite a bit in the 70s and other times, I think some of us are learning and know a little bit.

[00:57:55] Others know more about how we got to where we are and what it looked like when the county was growing at different decades and different times. I don't know if we have some of that history that we could compile, Because I think as we communicate with a community, it's really, really important to understand how we used to do things, how we got to where we are, to understand why we're maybe looking at a new direction.

[00:58:21] So I just think that little history snapshot might be helpful when we get the report. Thank you. Thank you. I'll just take a quick turn. I think as I'm listening to the conversation and being new to this, but not new to realizing this issue exists in the county, having lived here for 25 years, I think we're at a similar pivotal moment that we were perhaps when, as you mentioned, our colleague's father saw the need for economic development. We're in that similar moment. We're seeing the need for economic development where the federal government is a plus, but that can't happen without housing for all income levels,

[00:58:57] but especially for, you know, 100% AMI, 60%, 80%, the Alice populations, all the ones we've talked about. And it's a supply issue, but there's a lot that goes into that supply issue, right? It's not so simple as saying, just build more housing. I think being creative about the types of housing, whether it's modular, whether it's 3D printed housing, which I know some jurisdictions are looking at that, looking at lessons learned from what other jurisdictions are using and how our zoning laws fit. But I do think there's a change management aspect to this that I think was touched upon in your board matter that is important for us in this moment while we're waiting for the report to focus on, whether it's talking points to the board that encompass some of this information

[00:59:35] So we have the data when we're talking to our community about the need. I think people understand there's a need, but whether they understand the need to be aggressive to address that need is what I think may be a bridge for us to gap. But we can do all the great work we want to do, and your group can do all the great work.

[00:59:52] But if we don't have a change management component to bring our community along, it is much more difficult to then do the work that you recommend. So I think having that component, whether it's in communications as a part of it, engagement is a part of it, but it's a culture change. And having the data and the information and the history of we've done this before, and here's another pivotal moment in time where we are looking, facing the long-term health and survival of Fairfax County. I think helping frame that in a way that we can go out to your town halls and communities, I would feel as one board member, not to speak for my colleagues, would be extremely helpful in this moment as we then lead up to the

[01:00:31] work that's coming out of Deputy County Executive Miller's group. So when that work is out, we've already started to do the work of bringing our community along to then the actions we'll need to take coming out of that work. So that's my two cents on this. Obviously, it's a huge need, and you can't, I think people need to understand, without economic development, we don't have the funding to continue safe communities and strong schools and robust services and excellent parks.

[01:00:58] That quality of life depends on the economic development, which depends on housing. They're all pillars of a strong house. So that's my two cents on that. So I'd love to see some that change management aspect built into some of the reports um supervisor stork did you have a comment just a couple points one is on slide 22 i mean i think this is some of what's being brought up is there's some areas that have more housing that's occurring and i just in general what's driving that i know some of it is what the county already had and then slide 26 i think also kind

[01:01:32] touches on that. If any particular things, I mean, is it again where the county owns housing now, or is there some other kind of effort or initiative that's helped that to happen more than other areas? So first of all, with respect to the delivery of new housing, much of it is opportunity driven. What emerges in the market, what we're able to pursue. So it's both where the housing authority in the county have had have or have or have had assets uh for example you know the

[01:02:09] parking lot here at the government center um north hill for is another great example but it's been both those and opportunities that have emerged in the market so it's it's if i may it's more it is at least as much art as science and are there things that individual board members can do to help that process? I think absolutely. I mean, first of all, the board members know their districts the best and we really view all of you as our primary advisors in terms of trying out

[01:02:48] new ideas or thinking about opportunities on certain properties. You all certainly understand the challenges, the history, the context in a way that we don't. So I think that is an incredibly important role that you can play.

[01:03:03] I mean, I know all the board members here, I think, have been deeply committed to that, and I appreciate that. And then the map itself that's here, I would just, it's not that, it's the one on 26.

[01:03:21] If you could, in the future, if you could identify or separate out those areas that we can impact and those areas that we can't, specifically Fort Belvoir's on here, and it's huge part of that area of the county, and even though we have, to my knowledge, we have very little impact that we can have. Obviously, the Fort Belvoir staff and soldiers that are there have desperately needed additional housing. The federal government, I don't know, 10 years ago did a lot more to try to create that, but they aren't part of anything that I feel I can directly influence and put a different color on there or something to indicate that it's not an area that

[01:04:01] we can really have much impact, I think it's helpful to me. And then the other thing, and maybe this is part of what you'll all only do when you present, is the number of units of where staff you all think the greatest opportunities are.

[01:04:20] I'll use an easy example. Transylvania and Development, Huntington, lots of opportunities there, and a lot of housing has already been entitled there. And showing what that potential is and showing it with the map that shows by density what we could produce there maybe the most.

[01:04:37] So around Huntington, you know, 4,000 or 5,000 units, you could easily see where that could happen. You wouldn't necessarily put that down in the southern part of Mount Vernon District or in Lorton at this point in time. It's not something that it's ready for, but I think that's a way of us looking and saying, okay, if we're going to get to 100,000 units in 10 years, you know, where are our biggest opportunities for doing that?

[01:05:01] And if you will, color the map so we can see and people around the county can see what, at least in general, are maybe the easiest things to get hold of, the target-rich environment, if you will. So thank you. Thank you.

[01:05:20] I don't see any others who wish to speak at this moment, so I will just say thank you for the presentation and for, I don't want to thank you for the sobering reality, but thank you for the sobering reality of our housing. I think this information is important to talk about and to succinctly say. And I look forward to the work from Deputy County Executive General Miller's group around this board, Matt.

[01:05:39] As you can see, we're very eager. And Mr. Fleetwood, I believe you wanted to say something to conclude. MR. Just very briefly, Madam Chairman, I was remiss at the beginning of this presentation not to recognize and thank Lenore Stanton, the Chair of the Redevelopment and Housing Authority, for being here and who plays such an incredibly supportive and guiding role for us in the delivery of affordable housing in the community.

[01:06:03] Thank you, Madam Chairman. Thank you. And again, thank you all for all your hard work. Thank you for my colleagues. And I really look forward, I think we all do, to the report coming in May and the work to be done before then. So with that, this meeting is adjourned and you have 20 minutes of your life back.

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