Coraggio Consulting
Hanover County Board of Supervisors Meeting - Regular Meeting/Budget Adoption, Wednesday, April 9, 2025

Date: Wednesday, April 9, 2025
Place: Hanover County Board of Supervisors, Virginia
Length: 3h 41m (video)
Official meeting video (CivicClerk): https://hanovercova.portal.civicclerk.com/event/1379/media
Official agenda (CivicClerk): https://hanovercova.api.civicclerk.com/v1/Meetings/GetMeetingFileStream(fileId=3696,plainText=false)
Official minutes (CivicClerk): https://hanovercova.api.civicclerk.com/v1/Meetings/GetMeetingFileStream(fileId=3739,plainText=false)

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 2026-10-25. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:04] Hello, everyone. It is 2.01 p.m., and I will now call the April 11th meeting to order. As is customary, we will begin with an invocation led by Mr. Stoneman, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance led by Supervisor Pritchard, Mr. Stoneman.

[00:00:22] Thank you, Mr. Chair. Bow your heads and pray with me, please. Father in heaven, Lord, we humbly come before you today, Lord, to seek your guidance, to seek your wisdom. And, Father, it's an honor and a privilege to lead in this community, Hanover County, and we're so proud of it, Lord, and we know that it's a gift from you.

[00:00:43] So, Father, as we go forward throughout the day, Lord, I just pray that you would help us to provide us with clear minds and tender hearts one toward another. And, Lord, that all that we do and say today would be pleasing in your sight, Lord, and that we would have everyone's best interest at heart as we make decisions that will carry Hanover County forward, Lord.

[00:01:03] And we just ask for your blessings on this proceeding and for the remainder of our day. It's in Jesus' name, amen. Please rise if you're able for the Pledge of Allegiance. Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

[00:01:29] Thank you, Mr. Stoneman, and thank you, Supervisor Pritchard. Next on the agenda, consideration of amendments to the agenda. Are there any amendments to the agenda? seeing none we will move on to comment period i will begin by recognizing our sheriff who is with us today welcome sir good to have you with us and also chief anderson welcome sir good to have you

[00:02:00] with us also i would also like to mention that some good news on the internet expansion uh out in eastern hanover all points broadband who will be here later today connected their first customer on old church road this is good news for unserved areas countywide i would like to mention obviously somebody has to be first and there will be certain areas where where customers are connected before others i also want to mention that we're not forgetting about anyone else we're going to

[00:02:35] continue to work on this uh countywide the good news uh one of the best pieces of the news is that all points now has their main line in and their cabinets in and the system has been tested and and it's operational so now it's uh more along the lines of expanding and adding more work uh over time county-wide so that concludes my comments for today uh any other comments from board members mr davis thank you mr chairman mr chairman this is a little unusual um over the past

[00:03:15] couple of days a couple of board members have gotten uh some emails and a number of different uh correspondence from folks within the community and it was a case that was out of out of my district and so i responded to a number of emails uh refilled a lot of phone calls and one of the things that became apparent was that providing some of some information on on this case was beneficial i received a couple of emails back from constituents who said you know they were appreciative of the accurate information um as it relates to a special exception that the board

[00:03:52] heard earlier this year uh the nomenclature was positively i believe it might have been positively perfect uh but positively and i forget the se number somebody's here mr budeski probably has it but it was a special exception for a dog kennel that was being run in a residential neighborhood i came to the board and i just want to uh have i have a few comments here that that i prepared just to make sure everybody understands the facts of this certainly happy to field any questions but this is a land use matter that related to a special exception the business that was mentioned

[00:04:27] was located in a residential subdivision and while it was zoned agriculture it was in a subdivision with neighbors and adjoining property owners in proximity to the business operations at the time the property was purchased by the sub purchased by the the business owner the subdivision restrictions prohibited this type of business however the business did operate in violation of those neighborhood restrictions now caveat to that uh everyone knows that the board is not bound or hanover county is not bound by restrictive covenants but the restrictive covenants that were in place at the time did prohibit that and that does give an idea of what uh what the flavor of the neighborhood

[00:05:06] was at the time which is one of the reasons that i moved to deny that request additionally the business operated in violation of hanover county ordinance for close to a decade a per the purpose of a special exception is for the board of supervisors to try to find a way to say yes if possible for an otherwise prohibited activity special exceptions are not guaranteed because each case is different and therefore each case is viewed as independent i further went on to say in this case many people who utilize the business ask the board to grant the special exception which is understandable. They valued the service of being able to board their pets in the facility and the

[00:05:44] neighborhood in which the facility was located was close to many of its customers. While many of the customers didn't live in the neighborhood, the neighborhood was close to many of the folks who drove in sometimes on a daily basis to drop off their pets. So that's understandable that that was a convenience for these folks and they found value in that. With that, it did create a great deal of concern and impact for those who actually lived in that residential neighborhood.

[00:06:12] After the exception was denied, Hanover County has worked very hard to assist the owner of the business in finding another location. While it isn't a mandated expenditure of taxpayer resources when a special exception is denied, I did attempt to do as much as I could, along with the support of my board members, to help the Meltons as a transition. Additionally, I met with and asked Economic Development, Hanover County Planning, Animal Control, and the County Attorney's Office to assist Ms. Melton. With that, arbitrary enforcement is not appropriate. What the Meltons have asked for is if we can just not enforce the lack of an SE and allow them to continue to operate

[00:06:51] their business. The last request was for another five months. A substantial amount of county resources have been dedicated to helping these business owners. However, simply not enforcing the zoning laws is not an option that is available i do appreciate folks positions on this many folks have contacted me back and said they were unaware of the details of this case having a facility like this is a benefit to those who utilize the business that's well understood and generally accepted this said the board is also charged with evaluating the impacts to neighbors and or adjacent property

[00:07:25] owners when a business like this desires to operate in a residential neighborhood if anyone is inclined they may wish to view the board meeting uh on that case and mr walter will be able to give the exact date of what what day that was he didn't know i was going to say that but i'm sure he can pull that up uh and that information is housed on our county website and certainly my cell phone number at 04-439-2289 is always available if anybody has any questions but because i got a lot of phone calls and my fellow board members were receiving emails from folks who maybe didn't have some accurate information while uncustomary i did want to address that at this board meeting and put that on the record

[00:08:05] thank you sir thank you for your comments mr davis any other comments from other board members seeing none mr bedesky thank you mr chairman just to follow up to mr davis's question the case in question was se 2024-00018 and that is available that case online a couple updates today i wanted to just reflect on last night's spirit of volunteerism awards uh we all had the pleasure to be there that's one of the events that we we get to go to that's not work at all it's such a

[00:08:44] pleasure to be around so many folks that give of their time and their talent to this community and for for folks in our community to recognize them by nominating them for for those recognitions it was one of those events that just keeps you going about how folks are passionate about this community and thank the board for your participation but i really want to thank debbie preston for her leadership on that event and all of the staff that participated to help that event the volunteers that assisted with us with that event as well it's just one of those special nights and

[00:09:20] if you haven't been to a spirit of volunteerism awards i highly recommend you try to attend one in the future or consider nominating someone that's doing some amazing work in our community there are a number of events and activities that are coming up that i wanted to to recognize on april 12th that's coming up this coming weekend uh in addition to the history and hops that will be held here on this campus this is our second most exciting event of that day is the e-waste recycling event that will take place from 9 a.m to 1 p.m at the mechanicsville convenience center

[00:09:57] this is primarily for e-waste so tvs and tablets and other e-recycling will occur at the mechanics ville convenience center on april 12th from 9 a.m to 1 p.m and if you're not familiar where this is this is at 7427 verde lane also coming up there are two different events beginning on april 14th our school board with community partners will be recognizing and honoring the legacy of the hanover eight there's two different events and there are two different locations i wanted to

[00:10:32] clarify these the first ceremony honoring arlene and harriet thompson will be on april 14th at 5 p.m at patrick henry high school there's a second ceremony honoring raymond bagby jacqueline and blanche holmes and walter norbert and phyllis lee that's april 21st at 5 p.m at mechanicsville high school and so uh looking forward to those activities and they're open and communities welcome on april 24th fire station 17 ribbon cutting will occur we're excited to introduce

[00:11:07] that new station to the community that's at 3 30 on april 24th fire station 17 ribbon cutting and the final update i'd like to share that on may 7th at 6 p.m at hanover county airport sliding hill peaks road roundabout uh public hearing uh will be at 6 p.m on may 7th mr chair as i wrap up my comments today i'd like to recognize deputy county administrator todd guild killed off we have a new department head that has joined us i'd like him to just recognize

[00:11:43] that addition so thank you thank you mr podesky mr chair members of the board as you're aware we have been without a director of general services for easily eight months now we had a very long long search for that person and that is a very critical position to the county for several reasons that not only oversee our fleet which includes buses and fire trucks and police vehicles it oversees telecom it oversees our facilities and probably one of the larger chunks that that department deals with is all of our capital projects that's the montpelier rec center that was just completed fire station 17 the upcoming fire station 4 fire station 10

[00:12:23] wickham annex the list goes on and on and we want to make sure that the person that fills that role is the right person for the job and i'm proud to say that we have filled that role with a professional named dana fox who's here dana if you wouldn't mind standing up and giving a quick way she asked me not to embarrass her and tell her to come down and do a speech so i will i will honor that request but we are very proud to have dana here and she's going to oversee the entire general services department and she's got an extremely strong background in construction management so we're very proud to have her here so i want to thank her for being here and thank the board and mr bedeski for this opportunity thank you any other comments from board members

[00:13:04] supervisor dibble i just want to uh piggyback on um mr kildas comments that um dana is a homegrown beaver damian so um we love when we add more homegrown hanoverians to team hanover so welcome any other comments okay seeing none we will move on to agenda item four citizens time i have four cards i'm sorry i have five cards besides the five cards i have received is there anyone else

[00:13:40] who would would like to address the board at citizens time seeing none that means five minutes per speaker citizens time is an opportunity for members of the public to present comments and information to the board regarding any matter within the scope of the board's authority that is not on today's agenda for a public hearing. There are cards available in the back of the room.

[00:14:06] You are not required to fill out a card. However, it does make it easier for our board clerk to get the spelling of your name correct, and it gives us your contact information in case we need to follow up with you after your comments. Speakers who wish to address the board are requested to follow these guidelines. Each speaker is asked to give your name and the magisterial district in which you live. You will have up to five minutes to address the board. The vice chair, Mr. Davis, will keep track of each speaker's time. And with the new equipment, you should receive a warning.

[00:14:43] Otherwise, Mr. Davis will attempt to give you a warning before your time has expired. Speakers are addressed to address their comments to the board and not to the audience. The board does not permit the use of slideshows or other projected materials during citizens time however speakers are invited to provide printed copies of any materials that they have to the board the board requests that the audience refrain from interrupting speakers during recognized time okay we will now open

[00:15:18] citizens time the first card that i have is mr bob nelson please approach sir and after mr nelson we have mr earl wilkins if you could be prepared please state your name the district in which you live you will have up to five minutes certainly good afternoon chairman hersberg and board supervisors my name is bob nelson i reside in the ashland district last night the school board had planned to vote on redistricting his preferred option the green plan it couldn't here's why redistricting under the green plan would affect the assignment of 15 or more of the average daily

[00:15:56] membership at not one or two, but four elementary schools. Cool Spring, 237 students, 27.8 percent. Mechanicsville, 85 students, 16 percent. Rural Point, 177 students, 28.1 percent. And Washington Henry, 212 students, 57.8 percent. Virginia Code requires public notice in a newspaper and public comment at a public hearing before a proposed redistricting action can be approved with a 15%

[00:16:29] or more impact on a school. The school board should be like wise mandarins who at least check boxes and carry out their powers and duties responsibly. The school board lacked that wisdom and had done nothing to comply with Virginia code requirements. At its March meeting, a school board member declared that he would be voting for the green plan. Prejudgment is never wise when a public hearing is required. As Supervisor Davis has stated, he has changed his going in vote based

[00:17:02] on the hearing. Comments, reasons, and analysis can be decisive. A class from addition to Cool Spring Elementary eliminates the need to remove 154 Giles students from the school. Only 83 students would be transferred to Washington Henry. By my calculation, and I have to use mine, because the school division its consultant never considered Virginia code, Washington-Henry would likely be the only elementary school affected 15% or more.

[00:17:38] Cool Spring would certainly be out, and likely the Domino's schools, Rural Point and Mechanicsville. Four affected schools under the Green Plan become one school if an addition to Cool Spring is funded. Under the Green Plan, students from new developments will take the place of Giles students.

[00:17:58] In fact, Minton filed a construction plan in February for 16 single-family homes and correctly labeled it Giles Section 14. Yet under the Green Plan, students in Section 14 would attend Cool Spring.

[00:18:16] Students from every other section of Giles would not. There is no justification whatsoever to discriminate in favor of Minton's students. The Green Plan is the worst plan. Pitt subdivision against subdivision and back-of-the-hand treatment continues to be the message to citizens in the Atlee and Atlee Station Road corridor.

[00:18:40] In addition to Cool Spring, should be funded in this budget. Thank you. Thank you for your comments, sir. Next, Mr. Wilkins, please state your name. The district in which you live, you will have up to five minutes.

[00:18:55] Thank you, sir. My name is Earl Wilkins. I live in Beaverdam, and the issue I wanted to bring up was my concerns about the status of the broadband initiative. uh i'm concerned that the work will not be completed before the project end date shown on the dhcd dashboard which is the department of housing dashboard as per the dashboard of 1224 it was showing zero connections made i understand now we have the first connect yes sir one yeah as you say one now uh as i remember in the october status which was not posted for hanover four five and

[00:19:35] six districts those are the districts by all points broadband they would be installed in q1 and q2 and connected in q3 as of december 15 status report i still saw no poll request for the district 6 which i live in and that is after no poll request had been made from january through june because they were working with the legislature to try and reduce the cost for rec uh poll work so we've had really no poll requests in that district for over a year uh given the status

[00:20:09] december all points broadband would need to connect connect 25 people per day that's a heck of a lot of people per day connected uh and yet i see no connections or three percent in prince william zero percent in chesterfield i see a lack of progress so it's possible a great status report today will you know blow away all my concerns but i have to ask first rather than after the status report so here i am i'm asking number one if somebody can confirm the date of the end date

[00:20:46] right now it's showing on the dashboard that the end date is december 31st of 25. i find that extremely unlikely and i'd like to know if it can be extended to 26 or if that's it and we lose if it's not done by then and then there's some updates to the status report I'd like to see which would be in terms of good project management I'd like to see the project report to happen once a month or once every two months we're in the endgame here you know you know this is the end zone let's go ahead and let's put out frequent status reports and post them for people so that they could see

[00:21:23] the transparency I'd like to request that information on service locations planned and connected be added to the status report the last one from December 15th did not show any that's 6198 or something like that let's see what the percentage is of that on a monthly basis I'd like to request that the all points broadband detail on when poll requests will be completed for my my district of 06 you know nothing happening for 12 months I think we should we're owed that

[00:21:57] I'd like REC to confirm if they have the resources available to go ahead and address those when that SLUA request comes in. I'd like to see that all points broadband confirm if they have identified the right-of-way approvals necessary for all of these areas, especially where they're going to be digging up. I haven't seen any evidence of that. And then last, I'm a little bit concerned about the tariffs, as we potentially all are for different reasons. Have they, believe in the past I heard that the material was already all purchased and staged if it hasn't I'd like to see all points broadband confirm that any

[00:22:37] increases in prices of materials are not going to impact the end dates and those are my questions well thank you sir for your comments and I would like to compliment you on understanding that you had to speak before the presentation so that was good you got your questions on the record so thank you okay next we have mr. Hurst please state your name the district in which you live you will

[00:23:10] have up to five minutes Doug Hurst I live in Montpelier beaver dam area and I apologize because I had two chocolate chip cookies that kind of set me off so anyways something I don't I'm not sure that you're if you're so ensconced in connect Hanover. If you live east of I-95, anywhere in Hanover County, according to T-Mobile's coverage map, 5G coverage map, you can get 500 megabits to 1,000 megabits per second internet

[00:23:50] for $55 a month, $50 if you use auto pay. That's not true if you jump across to the west side of I-95. We've got about three towers. The one in the post office serves central Montpelier at about two miles radius. If you lose that, you can be on T-Mobile there for 50 bucks a month. I am. But if you lose that tower and Bright Speed has cut the fiber there a couple of times, you're out of

[00:24:21] internet. And worse than that, if you're in FS4, 5, 6, or 7, most people in that area are paying over a hundred dollars a month for Starlink and they also have to buy equipment or they're on Viasat and or HughesNet. Those are also over a hundred dollars a month and they're also data limited and maxed out at 25 megabits per second. So my question to the board is how on earth did

[00:24:56] you give priority to FSA 1, 2, and 3 when clearly the need is in FSA 4, 5, 6, and 7? It just doesn't make any sense to me at all that those people that out there have suffered for so long and people on the east side can get 100 500 to a thousand megabits per second anytime they want from either verizon or t-mobile or in some cases xfinity it's just i just don't see how come we

[00:25:27] have to come in sucking the rear end anybody got any reasoning for that sir this is not a question an answer for them well okay i made my presentation thank you you're welcome sir thank you for your comments next peggy lavender please state your name the district in which you live and you will have up to five minutes you guys are lucky okay my name is peggy lavender i live in the mechanics

[00:26:05] field district um we're familiar with each other i'm here to wish you a happy national library week um i celebrate libraries every day as an advocate and a volunteer for over 20 years it's one of the places that helped make me feel like i belonged here in hanover way back when my last daughter was born and i lost my mom so today is national libraries week and every day has a theme get my

[00:26:41] my phone let's see so monday was the right to read day where libraries celebrate the freedom to read. Tuesday was National Library Workers' Day, where we celebrate our librarians and our library staff who are not in it for the money, as you probably know. And then today is National Library Outreach Day. Our library is really ramping up in that department. They've ordered materials, spending some funds, and you're going to see them out and about a lot

[00:27:17] more than they have been already and tomorrow is National Library Advocacy Day so I'm here to talk about one thing that has come up where our director position has been posted and the library board has seen fit to offer the position to people who do not have an MLIS degree and that will result if that goes through if we hire somebody who does not have that certification state

[00:27:50] State library funding will be cut by 25 percent year over year, and that amounts to about $150,000 a year, and that money gets spent on books and materials. State funding is in question overall with what's happening at the national level.

[00:28:08] The IMLS is being destroyed. The funding is being cut, and that money that goes to the states then comes to us is also at risk. asking that you try your best to advocate through your appointees to get them to hire the best the professional expert librarians to handle our library system in the director position why you wouldn't want an expert in that position I don't know I suspect I know but I will say to please educate yourself about

[00:28:45] what is involved in MLIS, why you would want somebody directing our library system who knows the library field, best practices, newest information, tips and tricks, trainings, all of that comes through someone who is a certified professional librarian. The other concern I have with the job posting was the morality clauses in the job posting. Why you would have that in there as opposed to other words like ethics and integrity.

[00:29:23] Also, I don't know, but I suspect I know. Let's see. Demonstrates a commitment to ethical and moral behavior and to the core values of the library and the community.

[00:29:39] The moral behavior is not defined. Anybody applying for this job would want to know what exactly that means, why you would have that in a job posting for someone who's directing a library. I don't know. And if they look at the history and the public discourse in Hanover County, they would see that morality is a debated topic.

[00:30:02] It means different things to different people. And morality dictation should not be part of the job of a library director or anybody in the library field. That's not the job. The job is to provide access to information freely, fairly, and equitably.

[00:30:20] So I have a concern about the legality of the word morality in the job posting. And I think that should be reviewed. I'm not here to speak on my position on the electoral board, but I went to a training this last two weeks. And for the first time in their 50-year history, the Virginia Electoral Board Association consulted and developed standards of conduct for election and registration officials.

[00:30:46] And I brought this so I could show it to you and share the terminology that would be better suited for a job like this. knowledge and expertise, honest and partial, upholding the Constitution, fair equitable treatment, professionalism, responsibility, integrity, not morals.

[00:31:08] We don't agree on morals. That shouldn't be in a job posting. Your final comments, ma'am. Pardon? Your final comments. Oh. And please look at the data that's provided on the PRL website to show how popular our library is, how highly functioning and valued it is in our community.

[00:31:25] Tens of thousands of people use it every day, well, every month. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Next, Pat Jordan, please state your name, the district in which you live. You will have up to five minutes. Good afternoon, Chairman Herzberg and other board members.

[00:31:47] My name is Patricia Jordan, and I represent the Chairman's District, Cole Harbor. And I'm here this afternoon to share with you about a few things. I heard a sermon this past weekend, and Dr., he told me that he shared with us that there's a beast in each of us, and we can choose whether we're going to share that beast part of us or whether we're going to display the good part of us.

[00:32:25] How are we going to control the beast that's in us? And for me, I looked at that, and I say it's a way that we can each look at ourselves, look within ourselves, and determine when we decide to make decisions ethically, are we making a decision based on the beast in us, or are we making a decision that we've thought about?

[00:32:56] Is that decision based on just what we feel, or have we researched, as I've seen Mr. Stoneman ask for, give me the research, let me know the fact about it before I make a decision.

[00:33:15] With all of that, I too am concerned about the tariffs that are going to hit us here in Hanover County, and have already started to hit us. This morning, I read where the library system has been cut $800 and some million, the Virginia State Library System.

[00:33:40] All of that's going to hurt. It's going to trickle down and will cause us problems. I, too, am in agreement with Ms. Lavender that we need someone who knows the library system, not just anybody with a master's.

[00:33:56] Because as I shared, my son as a master's, but his is in logistics, that's not going to do any good in a library. But according to the criteria that is now posted, he would be eligible for that position.

[00:34:14] So I think, again, we need to look at that. I'm also concerned that on last night, as we were at the school board meeting, Mr. May made the comment to our school staff that there was not enough money to fund the nine additional math coaches that we need.

[00:34:39] But we just spent $30,000 for a nationwide search of a superintendent who was already there. We spent 90-some thousand dollars to bring in people to coach or train our baseball team in how to behave.

[00:35:02] But we don't have the funds to send math coaches. Our schools are here to educate our kids. The main thing you hear is reading and math. I believe that should be a priority of funding where our money is spent on that.

[00:35:25] I'm also concerned again because here we are again with Brown Grove. We're talking about a landfill again. And years ago in 2017, they said, nope, nope, no more. And all of a sudden, here we're back with a request to continue a landfill in Brown Grove.

[00:35:49] How much more are we going to ask Brown Grove to take? How much more? They are trying to get that community built up with homes. And so we're asking that you look at that.

[00:36:08] And since the landfill has already been in several violations, I see no reason why we would trust them to do what they say they're going to do this time. Believe it or not, I can close on that.

[00:36:27] I thank you all for the time. Thank you for your comments. Is there anyone else who would like to address the board during citizens' time? Seeing none, we will now close citizens' time.

[00:36:43] Next on the agenda, agenda item 5, consent agenda. Mr. Davis. No comments, Mr. Chairman. Pardon me, hearing no comments, Mr. Chairman. I move for approval of the consent agenda. Second. All in favor of approving the consent agenda, please indicate by saying aye.

[00:37:02] Aye. Any opposed? Consent agenda has been approved. Next on the agenda, agenda item 6 of presentation, transportation update. First, we will hear from Mr. Marshall Wynn. Virginia Department of Transportation, with a presentation. Transportation update, highway matters.

[00:37:19] Mr. Wynn, thank you for being with us, sir. Mr. Bedeski, Marsha Wynn with VDOT. This past quarter, we had 1,042 work orders. We completed 1,055.

[00:37:35] Had 61 after-hour call-outs. Been doing extensive pothole patching the past two or three months, and it patched 4,779 potholes to date. Been doing pipe replacement and cleaning, ditching and shoulder work, tree removal and debris removal and cleanup, sign replacement and sign repairs, trash pickup.

[00:38:03] Been seeing some areas that are being patched prior to our schedule work that's coming up, and that schedule work is slated to be completed by the 1st of November of 25. I do want to make one announcement.

[00:38:20] My last day on the clock will be at 8. I've sat 4.30 p.m. on June 24th after 48 years of service. So it's been a pleasure working with Hanover since I was 22 years old.

[00:38:38] So I've been here all my life. I grew up in Rockville, so I know what Hanover is about. I have one other item I forgot to tell you about. Elmont Road, Route 626 is going to be a bridge replacement that will start on April 21st.

[00:38:57] It's right there at Stoney Creek and here at the Pentecostal camp and that road will probably be closed for three to four months While that bridge is being replaced. Other than that. I don't have any other questions I'll let you have some. Well, thank you for your presentation, sir Any questions or comments from board members Supervisor Pritchard? First of all, Mr. Wynn, I want to say Thank you for all that you do for us. I think It might be underrated by the public sometimes because you come up and talk to us every couple months you answer some questions and you go away and I don't think anybody knows how

[00:39:35] hard you guys work when we don't see you and and we're very appreciative and as someone who's also retiring from her full-time job on June the 1st I'll take you for a drink when we're done I want to ask you a question about the Elmont Road closing where will that traffic be diverted because it's it's hard to get into Ashland another way if you're coming down Elmont Road so do you do any idea where that diversion will be only way you go is walkney church center okay that's the plan okay

[00:40:13] mr davis thank you mr chairman i don't have anything as it relates to transportation but boy i sure got a whole lot when it comes to marshall you know i'll start my comments with this it's easy for folks to beat up on vdot uh talk about don't get things done and they're always tired of driving through northern virginia and so on so forth and sometimes i tell folks it's not not a whole lot in northern virginia for folks in hanover anyway but it does get frustrating you kind of beat up on folks and i have consistently since i've been in office said you know i hear

[00:40:49] your concerns virginia beach and so on so forth thank goodness we don't have those issues here and thank goodness we got marshall win and i'm sure you would have served any county and in any region well you just happen to be homegrown and i think that's an additional benefit a toughest thing i think out of this situation is whoever follows in your footsteps that's that man that's tough that's tough because they're going to be compared to marshall wind for years it'll be it'll be somebody it'll be somebody good and we know it will and i'm sure you probably had a substantial amount of input in that but i just want to recount a few things you know it's always the stuff on the

[00:41:27] ground that makes a difference it is i would imagine that most folks don't know the the level of service that you have provided to this community and the size and the scope of things that your leadership has directly impacted for the good here in Hanuman County and I think that's actually a hallmark of a public servant I really do sometimes I think things just kind of get done but when they're not done I've had a time or two where I've called Marshall and I just want to recount a few of these because I think it's important it may seem small compared to all of

[00:42:04] the things that you do behind the scenes but I remember one time during a really bad snowstorm years ago we just trying to pre-treat and the rains and the sleet would come and wash the pre-treat off and then came the snow and man we had ice and it was bad for weeks it was bad and I got some calls out of one of the neighborhoods a senior community and said is there anything you can do and said we're working as hard as we can and I called you I said Marshall is there anything that you can do and you diverted some snow removal equipment to clear a path in the middle so folks could get out to their dialysis so the family members could pick them up and so we could get

[00:42:41] fire engines through there. And it was done within hours. I've seen tree limbs removed within hours of making a call to your cell phone. I mean tree limbs. That's just amazing. I've had conversations with you over a small pothole. I've had conversations with you about shoulder wedging.

[00:43:02] There's never anything that, one, you didn't get done in an expeditious manner, and, two, that you didn't have thorough knowledge not only of what needed to be done, but you knew specifically where I was talking about every time I called. And somebody who knows route numbers, I mean, I thought Bucky was good.

[00:43:19] I thought I was okay. I mean, the route numbers you throw out and you know what's going on. You just did it with Mitch Pritchett. Well, maybe you can go this way. I say this as a compliment. It will be a loss for BDOT when you leave. now i'm not really concerned about you and miss pritchard retiring so much because i'm not retiring so i prefer not to hear y'all's retirement stories we'll be back here working but all kidding aside marshall uh you have done a phenomenal job for this community and for the years that i've sat on the board i have mentioned you by name uh i've i've spoken uh shep and i've had secretary and

[00:43:56] i've had conversations and i have brought your name up and of course he knows obviously who you are and he knows what a great job you do and the reason i told him that i was going to mention your name the first time i met him was i said i don't want you to be the only transportation secretary that i've worked with since i've been on the board that i have not mentioned marshall win and that came during our first conversation and and i'm going to miss you uh personally and professionally i am really going to miss the level of attention that you gave hanover uh you've done a phenomenal job and i just commend you for everything you truly epitomize what it means to be a public

[00:44:33] servant so thank you marshall thank you thank you very much thank you mr davis any other comments seeing none i'd like to make one and i'm sure you're glad that the uh traffic calming request and project has been completed at a whole church in mcclellan uh you know we talked about that quite a bit over uh three years and me personally i think it i think it's a great improvement when i go through there I see those yellow lights flash and I do think that it it was a good improvement I'd like to take this time to thank you for your time and

[00:45:10] your efforts and your work in getting that done not everybody thinks that's the best way to do it some people think should have three stop signs but you know the VDOT experts they're called experts for a reason they're the VDOT engineers they went out they evaluated they measured they checked the speeds and they found the issues and they said this is what we recommend and I think it was a good decision and it does bring traffic calming we had an accident there recently had nothing to do with really the intersection there was a motorcycle

[00:45:45] on 606 heading west and it just slowed down to make a left turn on McClellan and somebody ran into the back of them and it was very sad and some people got upset and worked up understandably so but if they're not going to slow down for these yellow flashing lights telling them to slow down, that's what I consider driver error.

[00:46:06] If that yellow flashing light wasn't there, then I'd be concerned, well, geez, VDOT didn't do anything. It was a concern. Citizens have been concerned. They've asked. But fortunately, in this particular case, VDOT invested quite a bit of time, put a lot of effort into that intersection. The neighbors there support it, the ones right there. So I'd like to thank you for that.

[00:46:31] And I'd like to thank you for all of your years of service and your willingness to come before the board and make the presentation and uh you know i wish you well in your retirement sir yeah i can also assure you i'll be here till the 24th so if you need anything you know how to reach me okay very good sir thank you thank you next we have a second transportation update road project status report presentation mr joe vadunas traffic engineer department of public works

[00:47:04] thank you for being with us sir yes thank oops yes uh thank you um uh for having me um this is our quarterly update i got quite a few slides to go through today very pleased to begin though with route 360. so what began as a series of projects in the mid-1990s to expand the route 360 corridor from i-295 eastward is finally completed there are a few remaining adjustments a signal cabinet

[00:47:41] some work in uh to a basin in the i-295 interchange area but as far as the traveling public is concerned all work has been completed got a couple slides here on the left is a view looking back towards the west from lee davis and then on the right i believe that's from brandy run drive looking east this of course is the northern approach of lee davis with the high school

[00:48:17] there on the left and lastly this is the south leg of lee davis showing the dedicated left turn lane into the hanover village shopping center tractor supplies located and in the lanes there at the the intersection. So next is the shoulder conversion on Route 301 between Attlee and

[00:48:49] Attlee Station Road. A moment while I catch up. The contractor is in the process of securing a railroad agreement and a FDOT permit to allow for construction to begin. Once these items have been completed, we'll issue a notice to proceed to the contractor. We're anticipating this to occur within the next several weeks. And then once underway, the contractor will have 180 days to complete the work. This is what we are referring to as a paper street improvement to upgrade

[00:49:24] Shelley Lee Drive to a hard surface. This is a community located just off of Lewistown Road. This past quarter, the engineer performed additional survey and design activities related to drainage to ensure that we're in compliance with all stormwater requirements and that the project drains correctly. We should complete all engineering activities in the next several months and issue a notice to proceed to the contractor to begin construction.

[00:49:51] And once underway, the contractor will have 90 days to complete the work. This is a fall line trail, segments through Hanover. And as you can see from the photos, the trail is nearing completion with a ribbon cutting being planned next month.

[00:50:13] Once the trail is complete and open to the public, the county will be overseeing the installation of wayfinding signs on its portion of the trail. and that work is being funded through the CVTA regional allocations.

[00:50:34] So this is at Route 1 and Route 30, turn lane improvements. Admittedly, we're a little behind where we had hoped to be at this point as the consultant is still in the process of revising the design to address stormwater runoff. This area is very flat and has experienced long-term drainage issues adding to the challenge.

[00:50:55] But that said, there are several parcels that aren't affected by this And we're moving forward with right-of-way acquisition on those parcels. These are the pedestrian improvements immediately in front of the historic courthouse area. We have been under design since February and are expecting the preliminary plan to be submitted for review within the next month.

[00:51:25] This is the roundabout improvement at Lewistown and Ashton Cake Roads. Now that we have finished or completed the memorandum agreement, we are moving forward with right-of-way acquisition and right-of-way activities are expected to continue into the fall.

[00:51:45] There are a total of six acquisition parcels on this project. This is the roundabout at the intersection of Attlee Road, Business 360, and Cold Harbor Roads.

[00:52:01] We have scheduled a public hearing on April 22nd at 6 p.m. at the Mechanicsville Library. The engineer will give an overview of the project, and then we'll take questions and comments from the public. We received the initial design layout.

[00:52:22] This is Creighton Road. These are the proposed turn lane improvements serving Sleds Lake Road and Tammy Lane. We received the initial design layout for review, which is shown here. Next quarter, the engineer will begin advancing the plans to the 90% stage of development.

[00:52:46] So this is the roundabout at 301 and 54. I'd like to take a few moments here to discuss the sidewalk extension component of the project. So you will recall back in October, I presented a proposal to extend the sidewalk to the Mexican restaurant as an alternative.

[00:53:07] And as an alternative, you approved ending the sidewalk at the north boundary of the gas station, noting the potential for the sidewalk to be extended across the adjacent parcel if and when that were to develop. The estimated cost at that time, based upon a scoping level estimate, was $370,000.

[00:53:27] However, we now believe that cost for the sidewalk improvement, as shown in ACWA, is to be around $474,000. So the segments in green represent what was approved in October.

[00:53:50] And because the sidewalk improvements are located in the VDOT right-of-way, we need to meet something called logical termini. So logical termini is somewhat subjective, but essentially requires that sidewalks have a rational beginning and ending point. Another way to interpret this is that they must connect to something on both ends.

[00:54:11] On the south end, we meet logical termini because we're connecting to the sidewalk that ends at the post office entrance. However, on the northern end, we just end the sidewalk to essentially nowhere, and so therefore, under the logical termini rules, we don't comply.

[00:54:30] So this changed things as far as how we're planning to terminate the sidewalk at the gas station. The segment shown in orange is additional sidewalk, as confirmed by VDOT, that is necessary in order to meet logical termini.

[00:54:45] So in other words, creating connection from the right-of-way across the northern boundary of the gas station and tying into their walkway in front. Accounting for the additional right-of-way and construction costs plus a 30% contingency, we're estimating the total cost of approximately $400,000 to extend the sidewalk to the gas station.

[00:55:09] That's the green and orange segments. I should also point out that the blue rectangular feature represents a proposed stormwater basin, which is needed for the project and it's likely that the parcel on which it's located will be a full acquisition. Therefore, eliminating the potential that sidewalk would be extended across that parcel by development, future development. Mr. Chairman. Mr. Davis. Okay. Can we, okay. So

[00:55:44] we're talking about 400K to go there initially. And I agree with the board of citizens and I supported that. Can you go back one, Mr. Vidunas? Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Vidunas. Is there any logic to reconsidering a termini to go north instead of to do this dog leg in?

[00:56:09] I get it. I would actually agree with VDOT on that, that you need to have that termini. But what's the thought process of you're going to do that, revisiting, going back to what we initially said, while that wasn't a plan, some of it was in the board's discretion.

[00:56:26] Is that logical? You know, now I'm looking at creating that dog leg in the orange to basically walk through the parking lot. Is there any logic in revisiting, maybe going north to the roundabout?

[00:56:48] And first I've heard of this, so I haven't discussed this with any of my colleagues. But I don't see anybody throwing anything at me yet either. So what do you think? Maybe, Mr. Chairman, I respectfully, maybe if other board members have comments before I asked Mr. Vidunas that might be unfair maybe see if they got any comments but that would be my comment and my question thank you sir I have question comment that builds on mr. Davis is unless you want to go first mr. stone I don't want to fall too hard on logic here but why is the library a

[00:57:24] logical termini but the last business going north on 301 is not I mean library business fiscal business I mean business business well what what's the difference there why is not one not a logical terminal so I believe the difference there is at the library we're actually connecting to an existing sidewalk network okay so it's part of a continuum and and trust me when I say

[00:58:00] this we we really pressed hard back on this issue and trying to understand and why logical term and I wasn't being met, why we couldn't just end it where we wanted to end it and looked at every possible way that we could accomplish that.

[00:58:22] And if I could just jump ahead one slide, because this shows it a little bit better. We explored the opportunity of perhaps extending a sidewalk along the south property boundary between the post office and the gas station.

[00:58:40] That wasn't very viable. We have a ditch there that would have to be filled in and piped. We might have parking impacts. I mean, I just, as an able-bodied person, if I were walking north and I got to the southern entrance of the gas station, I would simply leave the sidewalk as an able-bodied person and walk through the parking lot to the convenience store.

[00:59:03] I would not continue to the north and then make a right turn along the orange path back into the entrance. It defies logic. But at the same time, we share the frustration, but these are the rules, and this is what we are.

[00:59:26] And that's, quite frankly, just jumping ahead. and to your point is why we wanted to raise this with you to affirm that we were either on the right path or this was something that you wanted to revisit. We weren't trying to renegotiate what we brought to you in October, but the circumstances are changed. They're different, and we felt obligated to share all of this with you and, again, seek your direction on which way it's the right way to go uh thank you for your your comments sir and i'll just say something real

[01:00:04] quick mr stoneman uh represents the beaver dam district this is in the beaver dam district we both serve on transportation committee uh it's my recommendation that we uh move on through the agenda we send this to transportation committee i will uh recognize mr stoneman thank you mr chair uh did did i hear you say that it it did meet a natural termini at the post office if we stopped there and didn't go any further no i thought i thought i heard you say that but if not

[01:00:40] we'll just um where we connect so we need to meet logical termini on both ends and what so obviously if on the southern end where we're connecting to an existing sidewalk if i go back so oh shucks i'm sorry new pointer okay so on the southern end of the the new proposed green segment we meet logical termini here because we're connecting to an existing right okay uh on this end because

[01:01:13] we're kind of ending nowhere it does not i got that yeah okay i'm good with chairman hersberg's suggestion go back to the roads committee okay one comment supervisor dibble i'd just like to go on record with regard to this issue it doesn't even seem to me that this conversation should even have the word logic in it and yet we keep saying it because none of this makes logical sense to me

[01:01:48] and i would just like to go on record as saying most of this from my personal opinion is a huge waste of taxpayer money and not something that i would ever support this green stuff so that's it done any other comments quickly from board members mr hudson mr chair yes sir thank you uh i also would support uh the chairman's decision to take it back to the transportation Committee, but I'd also like to publicly echo Ms. Dibble's sentiments. It frankly makes me sick

[01:02:20] for my own citizens, who I see risking their life just to get to the Dollar General. And we could do a lot of good for a lot more people for $400,000. And as a citizen, as a supervisor, it's offensive, honestly that they want to force us to to to do this i see it one more area that the state is slowly trying to erode at the local board's authority so thank you mr chair thank you

[01:02:55] any other comments supervisor floyd thank you um i agree with my colleagues i'm thank you so much for bringing this to us um there obviously is not logic in this logical termini and i i do not support spending this amount of money on sidewalks that i don't think are needed right there so i think it would be good to go back to transportation thank you please continue sir

[01:03:24] with your presentation yes thank you for that uh feedback okay um creighton road creighton parkway walnut grove roundabout right-of-way plans were submitted last month for review this is pursuant to beginning right-of-way acquisition later this summer this is our sliding hill peaks ashcake Road Mount Hermon Road proposed roundabout we have scheduled a public hearing on May 7th at 6 p.m. at the Hanover County Airport the engineer will be present to give an overview of the project and then we'll take questions

[01:04:03] and comments from the public so this are the proposed turn lanes to the Mechanicsville Elementary School on at Lee Road we recently became aware of the budget proposal for replacement school at Mechanicsville Elementary we understand that that's on the board's agenda later today we reviewed this with the transportation committee and they acted in favor of pausing the design until action was taken on the budget to determine whether or not there would be

[01:04:43] a new school going forward the concern was that if a new school is built the turn lane improvements that are currently under design might not align and probably wouldn't align with the plans for the school so it would be it would be kind of irresponsible to to go forward and design something that's not going to to match up with the school and so committee wasn't presuming anything about what happens later today with the budget but they wanted that to occur and

[01:05:13] then at that point decide how best to proceed based upon that okay this is the Ashland Road, Ashcake Road, Greenwood Road, Blanton Road, Roundabout. You will recall we developed two options of variations of a roundabout, both of which operated almost identically. However, we have landed on this option because it is the least impactful overall to the adjacent properties and because it has a smaller footprint. Therefore, we're moving forward with this layout as the preferred

[01:05:50] option. The design has been submitted to VDOT for their concurrence and once we have that then we will look to schedule a public meeting to present this plan to the Jason property owners and the general public and get their input on the design here we've received the initial design layout for the left turn lane improvements at gotten sale Road off of 54 this plan is currently under review and we'll be looking to present this initial layout to the public in the

[01:06:22] coming months pole green road widening we began making offers to property owners last summer, and we have settled or come to terms with about half of the owners represented by the parcels that are shaded in green. Each negotiation is unique, but overall I feel like things are going well, and I'm optimistic that we can come to terms with most, if not all, owners. Mr. Davis? Mr.

[01:06:54] that do this is uh if you go back one side sir is 54 uh parcel number 54 is gray um all that's good i know it's under gray i'm sorry the green or the parcels uh under which we have um completed negotiations we've settled and i understand we're in negotiation but on 54 uh under consideration is that is that meaning that been presented yes i'm i'm sorry yes so we have present everything that's shaded in grade we uh have presented offer to yeah i got that under consideration meaning

[01:07:34] has that been delivered yes under consideration comma and have they communicated anything back or mindful that you know understood they deserve their their right to to negotiate with the government uh has there been any communication about that's it that's a very important parcel for a number of reasons yes in the construction of this um and i know on uh 22 we've talked but on 54 they communicated back yes we got it we're reviewing yes we've actually we we have presented it to them and since we presented the offer there has been some communication back and forth what i

[01:08:13] need to thank you yes very well thank you okay this is um the phase two widening of at least station road uh preliminary right-of-way acquisition activities have been underway since late last year including title work and appraisals and we expect to begin making offers uh later this summer and i'll bring forward then a map similar to the one we just saw on full green this is the third phase of at least station we've completed the traffic analysis and the initial design layout

[01:08:49] which is currently under review and we'll be looking to schedule a public information meeting in the next several months rural point road is the next road scheduled for shoulder widening and overlay we don't have a start date but the contractor has been been given until june 6 to complete the work vickory hill road improvements this is the the last slide this past quarter the consultant completed the survey located existing utilities and performed the necessary environmental

[01:09:28] field work next quarter he'll begin advancing the plans to what we call the 30 stage of development and so mr chairman i know that was a lot we did have a lot to get through but i'm happy to take any questions any other questions or comments from board members seeing none thank you sir for your presentation and please remember to add that agenda item to the next transportation committee thank you sir okay the time is 3:11 I

[01:10:04] think we have time for another presentation this one quarterly connect Hanover broadband initiative update mr. Todd killed up deputy County administrator after this presentation is complete we'll probably take a short recess and then we'll go into agenda item eight which would be the presentation for the adoption of the budget we are still on agenda item seven mr kilduff thank you mr chair members of the board mr padesky mr walter todd kilduff deputy county administrator and i'm happy to provide you with

[01:10:39] the next quarterly update for the connect handover broadband initiative before i get into the presentation i just want to thank mr kevin nelson who has retired from us if you recall mr nelson and i tag-teamed this project for the past several years and i wish him all the best in retirement there's a piece of me that hopes he's at home watching and there's also a piece of me that hopes he's not at home watching hoping he's enjoying his retirement and with that another thank you to the full board of supervisors last december you approved a new position for us called an assistant broadband administrator that position was really created because the amount of work that

[01:11:15] this broadband project not just this broadband project but all things including verizon comcast glow fiber and some other broadband providers adds a lot of work to our plates and with me and kevin doing that and kevin now retired it would have been a significant amount of work so i did want to thank the board for that new position and we have actually filled it with mr rook rogers rook if you wouldn't mind standing up just saying hi rook has been a great addition to the team he's also a hanoverian and his background well he's done a significant amount of construction I don't mean to gloss over that too quick, Rook, but this project that we're doing here in Hanover, he's actually done numerous times in other localities.

[01:11:53] So it's great to have him on the team. He did the same project for almost the entire state of Maryland and several locations in North Carolina, so we're glad to have him here. And with that, this is the first update that we've been able to provide to you where our contractor, All Points Broadband, has fiber in the ground, so we're very excited about that.

[01:12:10] And I say our contractor because Mr. Chris Dillon's here with Bright Speed, they actually began installing fiber for your last update. There wasn't as much in the ground, but they actually did install fiber in the western side of the county. So Bright Speed's going to dissect that 50% number that you see on the screen a little bit more because they actually have three sections they're working in, and each section has its own percent completes.

[01:12:32] But the overall project that they have from design, permitting, everything you see there is approximately 50% complete for their backbone fiber installation. and and chris can actually update you a little bit more on the home connections he's starting to make so that's exciting as well and all points broadband at the last quarterly update there was zero miles of fiber in the ground because we were for the past several years stuck in this make ready phase just to touch on that real quick the make ready phase was a significant amount of upfront work with dominion power rec trying to get pole loading analysis complete pole loading surveys replacement of poles notice proceeds the list goes on and on but that was taking a significant

[01:13:10] amount of time but as you can see on the screen as of today there's about 40 miles in which a little over 10 of the entire county of what the entire county is 326 miles so a little over 10 right now which leads us to probably one of the most exciting things that mr hersberg mentioned a little bit earlier was we actually have our first home connection as of monday mr newton tiffany was very kind in allowing us to come into his house and take a few photos with him and we wanted to show you some of the equipment that all points had brought that got him connected he was so excited that once he got the wi-fi turned on his house and by the way his house was built in 1830 so it's very thick walls very dense walls so he wanted to run all

[01:13:49] over his house and check every single room to make sure he had a connection on his phone and he did so it was a very exciting day and the the entire process for the in-home connection took it well this one took about an hour but it's anywhere from one to two hours and i just mentioned that because as home homes start to be connected in your districts um you may get get the questions and that that's what they're doing we do have a video here hopefully it works but this video is footage from the actual installation of all points broadband in the county it's going to show some overhead fiber installation it's going to show some underground fiber installation and

[01:14:23] cabinets which I'll go into a little bit on a later slide I see it on that

[01:14:31] screen okay perfect thank you working so that is actual footage just over the

[01:15:31] past six weeks the project began about six maybe seven weeks ago and we are very excited to have so much fiber going in as we speak so my clicker broke can I touch the screen will that work that's okay oh it actually did work some more updates so we do have the one home connected all points will be up here and just momentarily to provide you a little bit more of an in-depth update from

[01:16:10] themselves but they have told us that they're going to be blanketing about 1400 homes on the in the county for connections and they've reported i think it was several dozen homes that have already signed up and they're ready to go so as soon as all points has the team out there we're going to start making more and more home connections every week that goes by so we're really excited about that um there was a gentleman who spoke earlier about our updates we are adding more stuff to our webpage i know the dhcd website is is a little tough to navigate we try to navigate ourselves and sometimes it's hard to find the information and upload the information and search

[01:16:47] for the information so we figured we could probably do one better and add that information to our website so in the middle of the screen there you'll see bright speeds updates that they give to us every month what we had been doing was taking down their monthly report and just replacing it with the new monthly report as it came in we actually had a citizen who requested hey can we just keep all of them up there sure that's that's easy for us to do so we're just going to keep it cumulative so and another big item that had been asked at the last meeting was what is all points pricing so we do have that that button on the right there is actually a link to the connect hanover website it's right on the middle of the screen on the bottom right if you click on that that'll take

[01:17:24] you to the brochure that has all of all points broadband's pricing so we're happy to have that and i did also want to report and we just don't have it complete yet if the board recalls we did create a graphic and this was more to gentleman's earlier question about sort of the quarters which quarter we in quarter one quarter two kind of things we created a graphic it's a little bit older it was back in October we're on the process now of updating that now that we're moving through the county installing fiber those quarters need to be updated we're doing that as we speak and it should be completed before the end of this week and what we're gonna do once it's complete is we're gonna upload it to the connect handover if you were to go on that webpage right now connect handover comm you're gonna see just a map of the county with fiber service areas that's really it it's it's really

[01:18:04] basic. We're going to take that image down and upload it with the new quarter updates for each fiber service area. We haven't talked about the pricing on the project for a little while so just wanted to refresh your memory of the state, local, and internet service provider costs associated with the project, the amount of homes associated with the project, and mileage of fiber to be installed. We have received several questions and concerns from citizens about why is the county spending money on this project already when I haven't seen fiber in my area. So I just want to go on the record and state that no county funds have been used to date. Everything that's happened on this project so far has been fully carried by All Points Broadband. Now that homes are being

[01:18:43] connected, I would imagine we'll be receiving an invoice pretty soon, but just wanted to go on record that we have not spent any county funds on the project yet. With that, and this speaks to another comment that was made a little bit earlier, sort of where did we start, why did we start in certain areas, those kinds of things. I can tell you that one of the main reasons we started on east end of the county actually actually two reasons was as all points broadband was applying for dominion and rec permits for these these the the electric poles that they were going to hang their fiber on we noticed that a lot of time was going by between we were getting approvals

[01:19:22] over the past several quarter updates we had showed you a map actually all points that showed you a map that had different colors yellow meaning something's been submitted to dominion but hasn't been approved it would change to a green dot once once dominion or rec has approved it but that was a really slow process and if you recall at the last meeting that map had changed yes there were more green dots than yellow dots but it just hadn't changed all that much but the majority of the green dots were on the east end of the county that's the first reason that they started on the east end of the county the second one is that's where the sagra connection is um mr uh innis mentioned sagra at the last meeting all points just as an analogy all points is building the car

[01:20:01] sagra is the gas so they can install the fiber they want but they still need that main connection to get their fiber lit that was with sagra and that is on the east end of the county so there's really two main reasons why we started over there but they're moving really quick as a matter of fact there's seven cabinets going in the county three are fully complete the which is fiber service area one two and three which makes up the east side of 95. four five six and seven are the west side of 95. two of the cabinets are well under construction and the other two are beginning construction as we speak i think concrete's being poured for them so that's a huge piece of the the puzzle once those goes in go in then fiber can start to be installed the second piece is why

[01:20:38] hasn't there been any more applications to rec or dominion the reason is it goes back to what i said earlier was the make ready phase had been time consuming it's taken a significant amount of time the state recognized that so they awarded at and the board approved in the february meeting an additional five million dollars from the state that goes not to us it goes directly to all points for them to bury their fiber.

[01:21:01] Not hang on lines, bury it. That is a much, much faster... Well, the make-ready phase goes down significantly. Drilling takes a little bit longer than hanging the fiber from the poles, but they can actually start much faster. And that led to another question, which I was actually going to touch on, which is the right-of-way permits.

[01:21:20] So instead of, if you take the electric provider out of the way, that only leaves VDOT. We have an excellent relationship with our VDOT personnel. We got on a call with them just to make sure there was going to be no issues once this project moves from overhead to underground they confirm there are no issues as a matter of fact we are doing underground on the east in the county you saw that in those videos and vdot has been great to work with we meet with all points broadband on a weekly basis and one of the items we touch on on that call are have you had any permitting issues and if yes we're here to help and there have been no issues today so we're very very happy about that so as far as we know knock on wood everything should still continue to go

[01:21:56] smooth on the west side of 95 for our residents over there um we've talked about this for a while now that the bead funding is to basically fill in all the swiss cheese gaps that we have in the county for anyone who's either not served or underserved underserved meaning you have let's say a dsl line dsl line yes sure you have a connection but dsl is not very good we all know that it's starting to fail it's actually becoming more and more difficult every day that goes by for any provider who has DSL lines to find replacement parts for the DSL stuff.

[01:22:31] So even that's becoming more difficult. So moving to fiber is definitely the way to go. It's our understanding that DHCD has reached out. Well, let me take a step back. If you recall at the last meeting, the board supported letters to send to all points, Brightspeed, and Comcast to support their bead applications.

[01:22:50] And that was about 10% of their applications. so if you don't have a letter from the county you're automatically at a 10 10 deficit when comparing to other providers that may have a letter of support from the county so we have one for all points bright speed and comcast and um it's our understanding dhcd has reached out to all the providers that are going to receive the funding it is confidential so we don't even know who that is but we hope to find out in the next few months and there's a high possibility we may even find out in may but according to the website we're still in the june july time frame but we're hoping to hear something in the next few weeks that would be that would be a huge sigh of relief for us to know that the five percent of hanover homes and businesses will be served which would

[01:23:28] encompass everyone which is what we've been striving for this slide's important in that i want the board to know that all the concerns questions comments that come in from our citizens we are tracking now that's something that kevin and i were doing sort of in emails but with rook here now rook has created this this spreadsheet that is now tracking every call that comes in which is important for numerous reasons one is we're trying to quantify how many calls come in once all points broadband starts making those connections from the mainline fiber to people's homes there's going to be issues that we've had just like we've had with glow fiber somebody hit a bush they took down a bush they hit an irrigation pipe they hit an invisible dog

[01:24:07] fence underground something of that nature as they start to move through and connect these homes those calls will start to increase so it helps validate rook being here and helping us track all those and close the loops but also close the loops with you as the board and if you had any questions on any citizen that's called in we're happy to provide you with this information and we also encourage you to direct any citizen that has questions to either me or rook or they can just go to the connect handover handover dot gov email address so we are here for any citizen that comes in the one thing that that mr rogers has also been able to provide is something that kevin and i have done we just didn't do it as frequently as we would have liked and that's home visits when

[01:24:46] you actually go to somebody's home and talk to them face to face about the issue they're facing with their either a broadband issue or why did comcast do this or why did this not happen rook's there to answer those questions and we've turned a lot of frowns upside down by doing that so we're very proud of that the last slide i have before i might step down and and pass the baton over to mr chris dylan is we had also heard recently that firefly is in the county as well you may be hearing that for the first time miss dibble i know the majority of it is in the south ana district at this at the moment so we wanted to reach out to them to find out a little bit more about what they're doing and what their plans are they did tell us they have about 130 customers

[01:25:26] on the east end sorry the far west end of the county and they have no plans to expand further so just for informational purposes the reason that they have those customers in handover county is because they have some infrastructure well there's some roads that are going from louisa enter handover county and terminate and some roads in handover county that go into louisa and terminate their their responsibility was to connect anyone from louisa so they had to go along these roads and they made a business decision to go ahead and connect anyone along the way that was along those lines they have finished all their work so there are no plans to expand any further but i would just want you to be aware in case you heard that and with that um thank you for

[01:26:03] i will answer any questions if you have any and if not i'll mr chris dylan's here and mr tom minutes with all points is here but if you have any questions i'm happy to answer any questions specifically for mr killduff not the providers supervisor dibble i just wanted to follow up on a question from earlier the december 31st 2025 end date on our website what does that really mean in the big picture process that still stands so that that that date is still accurate thank you i did have that as a note all the main line fiber is still due to be installed by december of that

[01:26:40] by the end of this year and then every home connection as they make it through as soon as the home is is announced um and they solicit to the house they have 12 months from that point moving forward to go ahead and connect otherwise they would have to pay if if they have let's say a 1 000 foot long driveway 12 months has passed they would have to pay for the connection along the driveway as of today as long as they say they're going to sign up they're good to go in that 12 month window so in theory if there's one person that they pass at the very last day on the very last day of construction at the end of december they would have till december of 2026 to connect

[01:27:13] okay so um just to sort of follow up on that they have 326 miles of fiber would be installed by december 2025 and then from december to december of 2026 is the time frame for everyone to be connected that's correct i think it's being misinterpreted so um it was important to clarify

[01:27:44] that. Thank you for that. And I think they had, um, was there one more question? Oh, um, there's also some, um, miscommunication or understanding in who works for who, whom in this process. Could you sort of go over our role, your role in this whole big picture? Sure. Yes, ma'am. Thank you for that. Um, yeah. So all points broadband is our, hopefully this answers the question. Let me if i if i miss it all points broadband is our contractor we have a contract with them bright

[01:28:20] speed is also working in the county specifically on the west end of the county in the montpelier beaver dam area and they are not contracted with us we have a great relationship with them we have we talk to them frequently but their contract is directly with the state so we don't really have any control of them necessarily with all points we do have a little bit more control like i said we have a weekly meeting and want to thank mr hersberg for his leadership on attending those meetings with us but we have weekly meeting where we go over all the logistics of what they're working on so we have a little more control over that and and with the dhtd permit applications and those kinds of things but but hopefully that answers the question thank you sure thank you for

[01:28:58] your comments and questions any other mr podesky i see you raising your hand thanks mr chairman i think miss dibble actually covered one of the questions that i wanted to get clarified uh the question was twofold was is it december 31 and the answer is certainly yes can it be extended we are not working under any assumptions that it can be extended mr tom's going to tell us that they promised us they're going to get that done by december 31 today um and so we're working under the assumption that we're not looking to do any extensions we're going to get the work done and meet those rolling timelines just to clarify the rolling timeline starts from your notification so

[01:29:36] the area that was notified that started was eligible to begin and i know tom will clarify this as this week that started they have a year from this notification the last person to get that passing will have a year from that passing and certainly they can connect at any time the only other thing i wanted to clarify and while our application was just over 6100 those are passings that means there's 6100 eligible customers that does not mean all 6100 are going to sign up the provider understands that but so we're we're not looking at the take rate necessarily from

[01:30:12] yes we want as many connections as our residents want ours it's based on passings of homes and so the the mileage is passing of 6100 homes that's how that gets calculated and passed we think we have a higher than average take rate and interest here in hanover but overall you may not see uh you know some folks wait to see how how it's working for others before they choose to sign up you may see that take rate go up and down based on where it gets there but the entire infrastructure

[01:30:44] for the passings is contractually obligated to be done by the end of december any other questions from mr kilduff before we proceed seeing none thank you for your presentation sir is mr dylan with us we're going to hear from mr dylan then we're going to hear from mr innes uh at the conclusion of this agenda item we will be taking a 10-minute break before we start on the next presentation which will be the budget mr dylan the floor is yours sir thank you for being with us

[01:31:19] thank you mr chairman and supervisors i commend you on your boardroom update i haven't been since since you did it it's very very nice and that you're doing your budget in april that's amazing um just a quick update for bright speed um the number one question i get from hanover county Every day, just about all day, Rook's doing a great job, Todd's doing a great job, is when am I going to get service?

[01:31:44] That's what homeowners want, residents want. And we do have a website, brightspeed.com, that you can go on and you put your address. And when you put your address, it'll say, hey, you're ready for service. And these are the options, the tiers that we have.

[01:32:00] And we are aggressively pricing in your market, I can assure you of that. And if not, it'll say, just hold on a little bit and we'll be in touch. So I've been through this slide with you many times, but I did want to point out one thing.

[01:32:18] Our broadband grants are now over $270 million as a company. We've gotten grants in our 20-state region, and we just recently completed our 2 millionth passing. So we have passed 2 million homes since we bought the company in October of 2022.

[01:32:39] So we're very proud of a company with 4,000 employees passing that many homes in our footprint. This was outdated now because this was at the beginning of the year. And since this point, we have passed our 2 millionth home.

[01:32:56] And I'm not sure if it's public, but we're shooting for 5 million homes in our next couple of years. So I did, this is an update. Highspeedinternet.com came out with their most reliable, well, they ranked all these providers. This is the slide for most reliable.

[01:33:13] As you see, some very large companies, AT&T, Google Fiber, and Brightspeed is the third largest fiber provider or high-speed internet provider in the country. But this is what we're really proud of. We were ranked by this, we did not pay for this, it's not advertisement, this independent body.

[01:33:32] as the fastest high-speed internet provider in the country, above Google, above Verizon, above Xfinity. And that's something for a company our size that we are singing accolades about our cell phone. So to your project, again, this is an RDOF build.

[01:33:51] This is a build that we bid on and we received from the federal government. This is our footprint. This is our current footprint of our copper network. And this is the RDOF build. So some current copper customers will be offered fiber.

[01:34:08] And then people outside of our footprint will be offered fiber. So in Beaverdam, we had 347 addresses. We've got all of our permits, all of our make ready. This week, we could be 100% complete in Beaverdam.

[01:34:26] And I think at this point, we've offered up sale to about 150, maybe 200 homes out of the total, 347 addresses we've we've lit service in beaver dam so that should be done gum trees larger second largest 752 addresses we've got 78 of all permits those are coming in if we don't have it it's because of redesign or probably because of the railroad we're probably at this point these were from last week we might be over 65 percent complete on our buried and probably around 60

[01:35:04] percent on our aerial placement. And for Gumtree I think we're up to about a hundred that we've offered open for sale. And for Montpelier which is our large build with the most interest, Supervisor Stoneman, Supervisor Deville, we're at the Ruhrton Club that I'd virtually presented there. Everybody was really excited about our coming into the market. That's our largest build here. That's 1,083 addresses. We've got 75% of our permits. We might be over that. It's about

[01:35:38] 31,000 feet left. Our make ready is complete with Rappahannock, and I've said it multiple times, and I'll say it again. Rappahannock has really stood up their operations and built out a team there. We're over 70% with our buried and probably about 60% with our aerial, and I think we have over 300 open for sale there. So right now in Montpelier, I think we've got seven crews digging right now that are underground, and I think we're bringing seven more drills in. So we're moving

[01:36:16] pretty steady there. These are some numbers that your residents and constituents need to know, ordering new services, the repair line number hasn't changed, and online services, they can go on and order through that. I did want to mention a couple things that is making me nervous about finishing this build, even though we're very close, is dealing with HOAs. We're having a tough time with people who claim to be the president or stopping us or having to get an agreement with some and they have to take a vote and then some don't want the vote or property owners who are

[01:36:55] stopping us on their you know it's our right well it's the state's right away and saying we can't build past them to get to other residents on the road so we've had some sheriffs called on us and some some legal issues where we have the right away we can document it and the county's helped but i will tell you that when we're starting to get in these smaller pockets from our large build we'll move on and those residents can you know they're fighting it out amongst themselves we'll come back and finish it if we get agreement. But if not, in the RDOF, in the federal code, it says if we can't get in there, those are unbuildable. And you

[01:37:34] will have people who are stuck that can't get serviced because their HOA wouldn't sign over legal right away. So that's just something that you'll be hearing about as we start to complete the bill. So with that, Mr. Chairman, I'd be glad to answer any questions. I think we're wrapping up very quickly and hopefully we'll have some happy customers out there. Thank you for your presentation, sir. Any questions or comments from board members? Supervisor Pritchard. Thank you

[01:38:06] for that presentation. When you get to those subdivisions with HOAs, are you going to let us know here at the county? Because sometimes supervisors will know the subdivision or at least have contacts and they can help with that. Yes, I've let the administrator's office know as well as Rook's office that, you know, we're having trouble with this one and they have helped facilitate getting us through a couple of those but a couple is just it is a board you know an HOA board issue you know I mean so we will let them know is that universe shrinks the bigger ones

[01:38:42] we've already talked to and we've the staff has been excellent facilitating some of that but I would just say you know that as we start to get to smaller and smaller pockets you're going to hear more about it and I just wanted to let you know that that that is that will be coming and you'll see it with your build as well i mean it's it's just natural thank you thank you any other questions or comments mr bedesky thank you mr chair chris i'm going to give you a loaded question but i think it's probably good to get it on the record there's a number of folks in western hanover that have been concerned about the legacy service that's been out there on the copper line

[01:39:20] so why should they have more confidence in in the new fiber service than they do in the current service i know we've had some cuts as things got installed and caused some some outages but how how will you help folks have more confidence moving forward with the fiber product well and and the cuts and the construction you're that's that's going to be occurring you know providers will cut each other and that's going to be an issue for the next few years as we build out with bead and with this i will say one is a hundred year old technology that has not been updated and supervisor

[01:39:56] Stoneman can say you know since the 80s maybe when fax lines came in and it has been a a legacy service that has done its job and it is its life cycle is over just as you I'm sure supervisors say something about when your IT department comes in and say we've got to upgrade this now well why it's working fine well it we're it's you know it's pieced together that's that service no matter where right now throughout our 20 states we are using nine percent of our copper network that we purchased i mean it's down to that customers and they're in areas that either

[01:40:35] they don't want to give it up or it is their only service but i will say it is our fiber once we get somebody on fiber i never hear from them again i mean that's just the reality of it and our copper service it has it has done its job we are maintaining it we we have to provide service those customers and it's our duty to provide customer service those customers but as soon as fiber is getting strung up people need people will be migrated over and that's just the reality of it but thank you any other questions or comments seeing none thank you for your presentation

[01:41:12] thank you so much next coming to the podium all points broadband mr tom innis vp of business development thank you for being with us sir good afternoon mr chairman uh thank you for this opportunity to provide an update to the board on our progress as well he's bringing that up i had an opportunity to speak with mr wilkins out in the lobby happy to talk to i believe mr hurst as well talk to him about his specific issues as well so todd covered a lot of details about

[01:41:48] our project we'll also see some similar issues with the bright speed build out when it comes to permitting but we have released two sales about 1400 locations i'll get into some details about our construction and the next steps and also touch on bead at the end. So I want to hit on three dependencies for our last mile fiber completion. Dominion has finished their middle mile fiber construction so in addition to the 40 miles that All Points has built, Dominion built 54 miles of new middle mile fiber in the county. Right now we're out currently splicing between the Dominion

[01:42:25] fiber and the All Points fiber and we have 15 splicers out in the field working on the connection between us and Dominion and internally on our own network that's all in Hanover 1, 2, and 3. We spent a significant amount of time and money and resources on the utility pole make-ready process with Dominion and Rappahannock Electric Cooperative. Through that, we have worked through about 3,000 poles for Dominion that we have attachment approvals for. That is why we are building our network first on the eastern side of the county. In the western area, we went back to

[01:43:03] the state broadband office uh applied for a new program to convert from aerial to underground we were awarded and what the county was awarded the virginia make ready initiative funds at the end of the year approved it earlier this year and that requires all points to front additional investment and then we get a partial reimbursement from those v80 funds so make ready process we scaled that down dramatically we have transitioned that focus to vdot land use permit approval Great working relationship with the VLOT office, some back and forth there, working on priorities in areas of the county where they want us to constructing.

[01:43:44] Right now, we are applying for permits in FSA 4, in addition to 1 through 3, where we have all of our permits in hand. Number 3 on here, and Todd mentioned this, is our upstream internet connectivity. That is with a company called Segra.

[01:44:00] They're a carrier provider. They provide the internet into our main cabinet. From there, we split the light out into the other areas of our network and eventually goes to an individual's home. So that primary cabinet, we finally made that active last week.

[01:44:16] A couple days later, we were on site at Mr. Tiffany's home on Monday, got his install up. So the light is going from the global internet down to Hanover 2 and then to his home. Like I mentioned earlier, we have 15 splicers out in the field connecting along the way from the cabinet in Hanover 2 to the cabinets in Hanover 1 and 3, which we'll be turning on later this month.

[01:44:43] The next bullet point, in the end of 24, DHCD, which is the State Broadband Office, approved supplemental funding to go underground. A lot of stakeholders in this project. We work with Dominion, REC, VDOT, the county, and the Office of Broadband on a various number of items related to our project.

[01:45:04] A lot of strong communication. We meet weekly with county staff. We send them our street sheets every day. Good coordination with Mr. Rogers. if there are issues with constituents that comes to me, gets back to our vendors or construction management team that day so we can remediate any problems we see in the field. As Todd mentioned, this is a project where the private sector fronts all of the capital. And then upon certain milestones, we ask for partial reimbursement. The next time we get to ask for reimbursement is when the miles are built and delivered in Hanover County and people can sign up. And then at the

[01:45:42] end, I'll touch on the BEAD program. It's important, but the Beatty Project is our priority. So about 1,400 locations got a letter over the weekend saying to go to our website, apbfiber.com. They can go ahead and sign up for services now, whereas before they could just give us their contact information. And last time I checked earlier this morning, about 120 had already signed up. So Mr. Badesky mentioned the take rate. So we will see initial surge of 10-15% of folks will sign up initially. That'll level out, and then it'll rise again as,

[01:46:22] let's say, early termination fees for satellite service expire, or your neighborhood gets a little more confident about the service, or one particular homeowner takes advantage of the $50 referral credit, and you'll see some boosts and take rates after that. But we expect over the course of the next two or three years to hit about 65, 75% of take rate. So there's a jump at the beginning and then a slow climb. Our service by the end of the year will have broadband available to all locations,

[01:46:54] but that is not all installs made for the 6,100 locations. We are all very cost conscious these days. Our grant agreement allows us to increase prices based on inflation. We're not doing that. We're going the opposite way.

[01:47:10] We're cutting our installation fee in the grant agreement by 50%. If you sign up for service within 12 months of your fiber service area or fiber distribution area being active, you will receive a waiver on your long drop fee.

[01:47:26] So we strongly encourage people to go ahead and sign up right when it is available to you. You'll be receiving direct mailers and email campaign about once every week for the next several weeks in Hanover 1, 2, and 3. the best way to get out of the mailers is to give us your email address and the best way to get out of emails is to sign up for service but this will be hitting this this flyer here this is a postcard front side this will be hitting those homes later this week so project construction we have 54 miles of dominion middle mile is complete about 40 miles of all points broadband last mile is complete in

[01:48:05] hano one two and three we've started our cabinet construction in five and seven those are those are placed that was in the video that todd showed and then four and six are in the permitting process and they'll be pouring construction either this week or early next week our permits are submitted in the western western area starting in hannah four that's the far left hand side of the screen there and we are on track for completing construction in 2025 and we're not anticipating

[01:48:39] or planning on any kind of extension after december 31st of this year i did want to touch on a reason for construction in hannah one through three instead of four through seven as todd mentioned you know we went through a make ready construction process we switched from aerial to underground construction in the western portion got that approval the county signed for it in february and that is the main reason why hannah four through seven is delayed after one through

[01:49:11] three but still on track overall for construction to be done this year and one two and three uh we're we will wrap up construction in q2 service is beginning now in four through seven construction will happen in the second and third quarter and service starting in the end of q2 and five and seven the cabinets are under construction this is a picture of a cabinet being loaded on the inside of that will be all the electronics for a fiber service area and there's a power meter that's the

[01:49:46] only powered device in the network from there it's all passive to the home and again we're on track for completion in 2025. here's a map of dominion's middle mile construction this has been the same for several months now their fiber construction is complete the only work with dominion is splicing so their their fiber construction is done and their pull attachment and make ready construction is also complete we touch on the bead program because there are a number of locations in hanover

[01:50:21] that are bead eligible this happened for two reasons primarily one the definition of broadband changed between our application for the vady program and today it used to be if you had service of 25 down three up you were considered served by broadband and now magically you're no longer served and so folks who didn't have access to 100 by 20 were now eligible for the BEAD program and the second thing that happened is that broadband service used to be reported on a census block basis so if one location in your census block was considered served according to the feds the whole

[01:51:00] census block was served and now you're on a location by location basis and with that extra data they realized that there are a lot more unserved locations that were overlooked in the past so So here's some stats on the BEAD program timeline here in March.

[01:51:17] The State Broadband Office is evaluating applications on a zip code tabulationary basis. In April or May, they're going to wrap up a window for areas that did not receive a bid or if up to 5% in a zip code did not receive a bid that is active right now, they're going to end that in April and provisionally award that in May.

[01:51:42] At some point in June or July, they'll make the proposed awards public, and they will send them to NTIA. That's the Federal Broadband Office. There's a lot of TBDs with federal funding right now, but by the end of July, they will make that provisional awards announced to NTIA.

[01:52:02] Then they have to get federal approval and then contract with an ISP directly and start the projects for BEAD. So Hanover, for BED, is very well positioned to get 100% of your locations with fiber to the home, so hopefully this program stays on track.

[01:52:21] I did want to touch on a couple of things that Mr. Wilkins asked about tariffs and pricing for materials. I noticed that the most recent tariffs have been paused for 90 days, maybe setting aside China. But for the Bede program in particular, there was a Buy America, Build America Act and the Infrastructure Act that funded Bede several years ago.

[01:52:45] So broadband providers and manufacturers have been ramping up their American productivity and capacity for broadband specifically. So fortunately, a lot of the materials, a lot of the electronics are already manufactured in the U.S.

[01:53:01] So we're well positioned there. and we have master stocking agreements with major providers and distributors. Most of that is actually located in Ashland, so well-positioned on materials. Of course, something could change in the international markets, but we're well-positioned not only at all points broadband, but in the broadband industry overall.

[01:53:22] So with that, I'd be happy to answer any questions from the board. Any questions or comments for Mr. Ennis at all points? Seeing none, I have a couple questions, sir. Yes, sir. First of all, I'd like to thank you for being here today.

[01:53:38] and I'd like to thank you for all the time that you have been investing in the weekly meetings with myself and Mr. Kilduff, Mr. Badeski, and Mr. Rogers. And we've had some tough questions for you, and you've always been willing to participate and answer those.

[01:53:53] So thank you for that. Yes, sir. Thank you for being here today. So one question I have is you mentioned the waiver on the long drop fee. Can you tell us the policy for a long driveway which is less than 500 feet, which is less than 1,000 feet and which may be more than 1,000 feet.

[01:54:18] Yes. So the fine print, our standard installation, is 500 feet from the network terminal, which is a device on the wire that we're building today, to the outside of your home. That's a standard installation.

[01:54:35] Right now, for that, it would cost you $99 in Hanover County. The grant allows us to charge our cost plus 10% for anything after 500 feet. To make things simpler, we don't start charging a long-drop fee until it's 1,000 feet, and it's $2 a foot after 1,000 feet.

[01:55:01] That's what I thought, sir. So that's what we do in practice. If you sign up within the first 12 months, there's no long-drop fee. Okay, the next question I have for you is we've heard discussion about the VDOT permits, so that would be for state roads.

[01:55:18] So what is the case where there's a state road, and then off to the side, there's houses on a private road? Is that a separate process? Yes, sir. It's a separate process. I believe Mr. Dillon was alluding to some of those issues.

[01:55:35] When you're on a VDOT road and a VDOT right-of-way, they have the rights that they can transfer to you if they approve your land use permit application. When it comes to a private road, you need a private utility easement with the property owner. they don't provide that easement then we can't build through their yard. Sometimes there are neighbors that won't provide a private easement a utility easement. Our experience has been that if you tell them what you're doing and you're providing broadband to their neighbors down the

[01:56:11] road most people are cooperative and will provide an easement but we can't force a homeowner to give us an easement to put a utility in their ground. So along that line when the contractors went down the state road they just did the state road and they stopped to go into the subdivision on a private road let's say there's uh 20 houses back there all points would need some sort of easement

[01:56:44] agreement before the contractor could go down that private road yes would you wait for registrations to get that why would you do the work if there's no registrations yes if it's a smaller neighborhood or just a small cluster of homes we would wait for a registration because we wouldn't do that prospectively. Maybe for a larger neighborhood we would proactively ask for those easements and do construction in advance of having service available but for the most part that is a

[01:57:20] customer demand driven activity. So that that would explain the reason why there could be some locations where the conduit was installed down the private road into one subdivision and then not installed in another yes and if they so when they pass the entryway of a subdivision that doesn't have a private easement yet either on the pole or in a vault in the ground is a splice case so that when we do the construction down the private road we can easily tap into the fiber

[01:57:54] that's already been constructed makes sense sir uh cabinet fs fsa 2 is energized we know that one and three when will they be one and three we're expecting this week for those to be spliced from two out to one and three i think that concludes my questions and any other questions from board members just have a couple comments so don't go anywhere mr bedesky thank you tom i appreciate your update today the question uh we were asked just last night by a citizen

[01:58:28] was the bead applications you had shared possibly known here as soon as the end of this fiscal year and the priority is to get the vadi projects done do you anticipate that as soon as your work is done in the vadi areas you'll be able to begin the bead work well it depends on the timing of if we're fortunate to receive a bead award and we've already completed all the design for bead application areas one of the requirements there was to have a professional engineered

[01:59:03] stamp design for the applications if we can time it well we would do we would roll straight into bead construction my guess is that the contracting process for the bead will take longer than the end of this year so we will be wrapped up with our construction in hanover probably before the bead contracts are signed okay so there potentially could be a gap when we started this we knew and we shared with our public that there was about five percent of our residents some some which falls

[01:59:38] within your service territory there's some areas that you as a company we're also going to explore logical extensions and connections to that may or may not be being funded any feedback so there could be a case where we we're building down a road and let's say there's 10 homes on the road and for For whatever reason, two of them were BEAT eligible, eight of them were in the Beatty Project.

[02:00:02] Those two are already in our network design. All we have to do is a drop for them. So there are some cases where a BEAT eligible location is as simple as doing the customer drop. And those we would do right away without contractors.

[02:00:19] Does that also fall to what we would call the holes in the donuts, where you're actually surrounding service? There could be some clusters like that. just depends on the scale and how close our existing network is and i know our staff is sharing some of those with you as well yes yes we get uh county gis is a very useful map and customer inquiries that are outside of our boat area we track those as well thank you mr bedesky final comments from board members seeing none i just have a couple quick comments sir thank you

[02:00:56] very much i know this is this has been a long time coming it's been a lot of work we know that Through your group and Dominion, over 9,900 polls were measured and evaluated. We also know it's over 320 miles, and it is quite a bit of work.

[02:01:15] And to the citizens who are watching who may not understand, somebody has to be first and somebody has to be later on. And the important thing is that the first person has been connected by all points, and that has been tested, and it's functioning.

[02:01:34] So that allows all points and their contractors to move across the county with confidence that the system is working and operating. And in some cases, certain areas were chosen over others, maybe because the poles were ready by Dominion down 360 and Old Church Road.

[02:01:54] Big, tall poles in great shape. No work was really needed on many of those. So it's just going to take some more patience. But one of these days, we're going to look back, and we're going to look back on this and reflect back and say, yeah, it was tough for a while, but it really wasn't the end of the world to just wait a little longer. At the end, I believe our citizens will be happy and satisfied that they have another option for a high-speed Internet that they've never had before.

[02:02:18] So thank you very much. Yes, sir. Thank you. You're welcome. Okay. We are going to take a 10-minute recess. Let's go to 415. We'll pick up the agenda at 415. That will be on the budget.

[02:02:32] are in recess okay the time is now 4 15 the board is back in session next on the agenda agenda item

[02:14:42] 8 is a presentation adoption and appropriation of the fiscal year 26 budget and associated ordinances resolutions tax rates and policies ms shelley wright budget division manager finance and management services thank you for being with us as i've presented in previous meetings the only amendment that staff is recommending to the fy26 proposed budget is the increase in our reserve

[02:15:22] for revenue capacity as a reminder this is the anticipation of outside funding primarily in the form of insurance recoveries or grants so there are no local dollars included in this amendment should the board choose to move forward with this budget including the amendment you will be adopting an all funds budget for fy 26 of 782 million two hundred nineteen thousand seventy one dollars in order to do so the following actions would be needed today mr chairman i have a slide for each one of the associated motions when you are

[02:15:59] ready to entertain that and at this time i'll be happy to to answer any questions any questions from board members mr davis thank you mr chairman uh mr chairman members of the board my esteemed colleagues and citizens of hanover i've often said that this is the uh the second priority of of government particularly local government first priority is to meet we're required to meet and handle people's business whatever that may be but budget and land

[02:16:38] use are extremely important and i want to address a few things um that i've heard through the cycle have come from citizens and I first want to say I'm grateful for all the input for those who support the budget those who wish there were changes those who don't support the budget I'm grateful for for all of the input you know last year when we did the did the real estate rebate it was about four million dollars and I pulled some numbers because some folks said hey look we just didn't get that

[02:17:11] much back. And that's true. You really didn't. So I asked Dr. Brown, there's Dr. Brown. I said, can you pull some numbers for me? And the average rebate when you exclude the top 10 non-commercial taxpayers was about $70.75. When you exclude the top 10 residential and commercial taxpayers, the average return to the citizens was $79.31. And of course, that's the average. But I think it hit home pretty well. Obviously, the more you pay in taxes,

[02:17:47] the more return. But with that, some folks said, well, why in the world did you give Memorial Regional $30,000 back? Covenant Woods, $19,000. King's Dominion, $13,000. I said, well, that was their proportional share. And so the trade-off for the $70,000 in most cases, or we'll go with the 79, the $80 was those larger numbers. We are duty bound to look at both sides, the revenue and the expenditures. I first want to address equalization by the state. That is absolutely

[02:18:25] true. I've told folks, they often say, well, y'all politicians say, I didn't raise your taxes because I kept your rate the same. I don't find that to be true only because I've never heard a local politicians say that. If your assessment goes up, your taxes go up, period. If the board decides to keep the rate the same, then yes, your tax burden will absolutely go up. If your tax burden goes up, that means your taxes went up. So I never hide behind the fact of the rate equalization. I do want to address the rate equalization. I find it interesting that the

[02:19:01] state likes to equalize the real estate rates in localities and then come out and do press conferences and talk about all the taxes they cut in which the revenues don't affect them. I've always wondered that when a Snickers bar, a TV, or a pair of tennis shoes goes up, why they don't equalize the state sales tax. Mr. Walters, our legislative liaison, would you care to address why the politicians in Richmond don't equalize any of their tax rates?

[02:19:33] That is, I think, an unanswerable question. It's an unanswerable question. And the reason is, and I said this last night to a friend and a constituent, it's just like me turning around to someone and saying, you really ought to give to that charity, and then that would make me very charitable if you would give to that charity.

[02:19:55] The reality is we are faced with some very, very tough decisions. we are required to employ our command here, county employees and the support staff for the citizenry in accordance with their capabilities. I heard someone testifying before Congress a couple of days ago, and they said, we don't ask for a lighter burden. We just ask for the resources to handle those burdens. My previous job, I said, we would often say, we don't pray for reduction in enemy forces. We just pray for more bullets. And I think that's the case.

[02:20:31] The sheriff has supported this budget. The fire chief has supported this budget. A number of citizens have supported this budget. But that's not what I want to address tonight. In Hanover County, we train all county employees and those who support what I call our joint constituency.

[02:20:48] Whether you're elected or not, we all have 110,000 bosses, and we report to them. And we need to make sound and timely decisions, and that's why we come here tonight to look at this budget, to talk about it, and then ultimately develop that strategic plan and either pass the budget or don't pass the budget.

[02:21:08] I have a good friend of mine in the audience. Don Ward and his family are great people, and I consider him a friend. But in this capacity, I have to consider him a constituent before a friend because he's the boss. And Don and I have shared emails from time to time, and sometimes he's just absolutely lit my ass up.

[02:21:26] And that's okay. That's his job, right? And sometimes we have, we do, we have different views and, and, uh, but I've always said this about Mr. Ward is he's never been hypocritical. He said, Hey, this is what I want you to spend it on. And I don't want you to spend it on this. And he says, this isn't important to me. This is important to me. And that's good feedback. Sometimes we have folks that say, you know, cut this, the tax rate, but don't cut any of any, any of my services or these services or whatever.

[02:21:57] And Don's always provided that cut my taxes. And then here's some things that you could cut out of budget and so i appreciate that and mr ward again first being a boss i appreciate it and i do appreciate your friendship but that's not the appropriate title here for this meeting today last year when we did the rebate in real estate that amounted to about four million dollars in reduction prior to that uh we reduced the personal property tax by about what was that 13 million dollars i believe 13 million dollars that's about six and a half cents on the rate on real estate

[02:22:35] rate right dr brown then we had uh wastewater treatment plant came in 10 million dollars over before we could even sign the contract that's five cent on the real estate if we took broadband expansion at let's just a whole number say 50 million that's 25 cents on the real estate we took a bunch of those things out we probably give everybody real estate tax rate about 20 cents one year i mean we really could the issue that we run into is how do we balance this budget and not only are we required to we should be required to have a balanced budget how do we increase our

[02:23:11] reserves to make sure we maintain our triple-a bond rating and it becomes extremely difficult assessments are up and that's because a lot of people want to live in Hanover County there's it's the only way to say that folks want to live where there's low crime there's low taxes there's good schools and they're willing to pay for that but this year the schools came to us and gave us the first round of numbers and uh just so you know everybody thinks that that we used to refer to things as a kumbaya session budget season is not a kumbaya session it's not folks come in and they say this is what we need and sometimes we come back and say do what and schools came back

[02:23:50] and said well we need to look at some some insurance numbers my response was absolutely you gotta look at those insurance numbers right and so there were some adjustments departments have adjustments sheriff's office uh no budget increase in court services although there's a lot lot more going on in court service. No budget increase. But the beans, bullets, and band-aids continue to go up. The costs continue to rise. I'm looking at broadband. There's an amount of money that we used here for ARPA funds that came from the federal government. Federal government has no money. It only has the money that they took from the taxpayer at the local level. But

[02:24:28] they took the money, and they came back and said, it's your money, but we're going to give it back to you with these stipulations. So we took that money, not just to completely fund broadband expansion, but to use it to leverage other government funds. When it comes to fire trucks, I am just amazed. There's great technology on it. I am just amazed at the increase of fire trucks every year. Personal protective equipment, PPE, it's just amazing. But we have to outfit these folks because we have to employ our units out here, sheriff's office, fire and EMS, public works, planning, in accordance with the resources that they have in accordance with their

[02:25:07] their capabilities so with that looking at the strategic plan it's not perfect i have never voted for a perfect budget but looking at the choices that i have to make at the time that i have to make them i believe this is a budget that i can support and i just want to end with this i'm very very grateful for the folks whether they support the budget or they find areas where they don't support and i've not had anybody tell me uh go back to mr ward real quick the email he just sent me said look i support sheriff's office firing ems the county employees getting raises and all of those things there are a lot of folks who want the services to continue at that level so i'm

[02:25:42] grateful for that um that said that doesn't always come in with a with a reduction my final comment is i spoke to mr badeski when we were initially talking about budget and the proposed budget that came from the county administrator which if adopted becomes hanover county's board budget which becomes hanover county's budget and i said john i said you're gonna have to find that sweet spot somewhere between 3.2 and three and a half revenue increase every year because things are not going to continue and that's going to get eaten up with inflation and uh i i think the number john probably settled on was was somewhere in that three two to three five and i asked him to

[02:26:20] do it for three budget cycles and he said mr davis he said respectfully i think i'm going to do it for five budget cycles we're going to prep for five years of of 3.2 to 3.5 revenue increase which means that we're going to have to pull back on some capital improvements we're going to have to really look at what we're doing with school improvements what we're doing with uh capital improvements throughout the county what that's going to mean to road funding we'll have to make you know some tough decisions so so with that i appreciate everyone's work those are my comments and i will be supporting this budget mr chairman thank you sir thank you for your comments mr davis

[02:26:56] any other comments from board members seeing none i have a few comments i'd like to make One thing I really appreciate about this budget is that it does prioritize public safety. And I've always said that public safety is the number one priority.

[02:27:18] For example, we have trained Hanover County Sheriff's Office deputies in our schools. I think that is a great investment of tax dollars. And I think it's difficult, or it would be difficult, to have good schools if we didn't have safe communities and safe schools.

[02:27:40] And I attend the drop-off line at Cold Harbor Elementary every morning, and I see that deputy there, and it's good. It's a good feeling, and that's a great way to spend tax dollars in keeping our schools and our teachers and our most vulnerable citizens safe.

[02:28:03] And I've said before, if there is a burglar or an incident, I want that deputy. And if there's a structure fire, I want the fire truck. There's an emergency, I want the paramedic, whatever the case is.

[02:28:22] And when those things occur, nobody really asks what's the tax rate. So what really is the priority? To me, it's public safety. And while we have our fire chief here, we have our sheriff here, thank you again for all you do to keep Hanover safe.

[02:28:41] I also would like to recognize our superintendent is with us. Welcome, ma'am. Thank you for being with us. There's some things in the budget that I'm very supportive of. One thing is the career technical education expansion. I know that's something that Mr. Eikenberry has mentioned in the past.

[02:29:00] He's on the school board representing the Cold Harbor District. He's mentioned the high demand for that in Hanover. He's mentioned the waiting list. And, you know, being a, you know, I went through Richmond Tech Center years ago back in, I don't know, 1991 or something. And, you know, there's good people who can earn a good living through career and technical education, whether it's electricians or HVAC or auto, whatever the case may be.

[02:29:28] So I'm very proud to support these things. I'm also very proud to support the merit increase because if we want the best communities and we want to live in a premier community, and I do, we need to support the best people.

[02:29:46] And sometimes that does cost a little more. Not that everybody in our county works just for dollars. There's people, I believe, who want to work in Hanover County who earn less than they could in a bigger locality somewhere. But it is good to send them a message that we do value your work and your service, and we're going to support this merit increase.

[02:30:09] Teacher pay is something I'm proud to support. Increase, you know, I've been in the classrooms just as a witness, whether it's the Christmas party or watchdog or whatever it is, and I see what our teachers go through. It's quite different than it was when I went to school.

[02:30:24] There's a lot more little kiddos moving around, and it's quite challenging, and I appreciate all the work that they do for our future. And another thing to be proud of I'd like to mention again is that Hanover County is one of 54 localities in the entire country that has a AAA bond rating, and that is something to be proud of.

[02:30:47] And our county has been recently recognized as one of the best counties to work in. These are all great things, and I'm proud to support these things. The one thing that I'll mention that I said in the board workshop is I do have concerns that the budget is growing too fast.

[02:31:05] You know, we hear from citizens, why this, why that, our bills this, our bills going up. And I understand what they're saying when you look at their assessments. I explain it. It's market rate and inflation. And it's true that every cost we have in the county has gone up.

[02:31:24] Construction costs, road improvement costs have gone up. But I do believe that we should be sensitive in listening to our taxpayers. And I've already said it, so it's really repeating it. I do believe that the budget has been growing too fast. I do plan to support this budget.

[02:31:41] I plan to support it because of all the great things that I fully support. I'll just go on the record again because I'm providing notice to our deputy county administrator. He's right there in the front row. He's looking at me right now, providing notice to our county administrator. come November, I'm going to be looking very closely at some of the large capital expenditures that I've seen. 45 million here, 40 million there, 45 million here. And these are concerns that I have. I'm going to support the budget, but these are concerns that I have going into the next

[02:32:18] budget. And one of the concerns I have, and we have our school partners here, I'll say it as nicely and as politely as I can, is the plan for the existing original Battlefield Park. That is sensitive to a lot of taxpayers, the people that work there, the people that have lived here for 40, 50, 60 years, grandmas and grandpas that went there. And I don't believe that the plan is complete right now. It's easy to say, oh yeah, we're going to fund these new schools,

[02:32:52] we're going to put them here, but we've already identified that there was no concrete plan on what's going to happen to the rest of it. And there was a huge development, has nothing to do with schools. Four years ago, Mr. Davis was here, and we had this huge redevelopment case. And I said, I can't support this because I don't see this as a complete plan. And I am so glad I said that on the record. Four years ago, maybe five years ago, I said that. And I'm glad I said that.

[02:33:32] And I said that for a reason. And I just want to make sure we have a community process with our citizens and a good collaborative effort with our school partners. We do a lot of great work together. That memorandum of understanding between our school division, our sheriff's office, and our superintendent, every two years that memorandum of understanding comes up, right? Keep those deputies in the schools. Keep them in there. We had a shortage where they were sharing, and I had

[02:34:07] some moms concerned, called the sheriff one day. I know what the challenge is, sir. I know it's tough. keep them in there the best you can. He said, we're going to keep them in there as much as we reasonably can. I said, thank you. I trust you. And now I believe we have deputies assigned to all our schools. That is something to be proud of. So that concludes my comments. Anyone else?

[02:34:36] Supervisor Floyd. Thank you. I can also support this budget. There's a lot of good things in it to support. And I realize that this is not our money to spend, but a collection of the citizens money meant to be spent wisely and for the benefit of the county. All of our citizens have a vested interest in this budget. I think everyone should know where the revenue comes from and what they pay for, what services and amenities are offered here in Hanover because of those revenues.

[02:35:13] The one thing I was happy to not see in the budget was an expensive lease payment for learning cottages at Cool Spring instead our school board was able to purchase those learning cottages saving a large amount of money I know it seemed a little bumpy when we went through that last year but it was for a good reason we ended up being able to help the kids have more space but not make any foolish financial decisions at that time so I was just wanted to get that on the record that I was happy um for that and that i i hope that the citizens because they do have a vested interest

[02:35:53] will um want to see all the details of the budget and and what's being offered to our county because of the taxes that come in that's all thank you thank you for those comments any other comments from board members okay seeing none that concludes our question and comment time we will next move into motions and I believe miss right you've indicated that you have motions prepared since that you will need to work through today to fully adopt and

[02:36:31] appropriate the budget and I have a slide for each one okay so we will need a motion and a second before voting on each individual motion and I will now recognize vice chair mr. Davis thank you mr. chairman mr. chairman I move that the board of supervisors adopt by resolution the county administrators proposed budget presented on february 19 2025 with the proposed amendments as presented on april 9th 2025 second there is an emotion and a second all in favor please indicate by saying aye aye

[02:37:03] any opposed next motion ma'am mr chairman i move that the board of supervisors appropriate by resolution the funds included in the adopted fy26 budget by fund category as reflected in the budget adoption resolution second there is a motion and a second all in favor please indicate by saying aye aye any opposed hearing none motion number three mr chairman i move that the board adopt by resolution the property taxes and fees for calendar year 2025 real estate 0.81 personal

[02:37:42] property 3.57 qualified volunteer fire and rescue vehicle personal property 1.78 qualified disabled veteran vehicle personal property zero machine and tool machinery and tools 3.57 aircraft personal property 0.50 merchants capital 1.90 mobile home 0.81 generating equipment 0.81 data center equipment 0.45 recycling service distribution 46 dollars and atley manor sewer service district for those that it affects 780 dollars second there is a motion and second all in favor please

[02:38:19] indicate by saying aye aye any opposed motion number four mr. chairman i move that the board adopted adopt by resolution the county administrators propose five-year capital improvement programs plan for fy26 through fy30 as presented on february 19 2025 with the proposed amendments as presented april 9th 2025 second there is a motion and a second all in favor please indicate by saying aye all right any opposed motion number five mr chairman i move that the

[02:38:54] board adopt by resolution the county administrators proposed five year general fund financial plan for fy 26 through fy 30 as presented on february 19 20 25 with the proposed amendments as presented on april 9th of 2025 second there is a motion and a second all in favor please indicate by saying aye aye any opposed motion number six mr chairman i move that the board of supervisors adopt the resolution of the board of supervisors declaring its intention to reimburse cost of certain

[02:39:28] expenditures in the maximum principal amount of 60 million dollars second there is a motion and a second all in favor please indicate by saying aye aye any opposed motion seven mr chairman i I move that the Board of Supervisors adopt Ordinance 2501 as it relates to solid waste disposal fees.

[02:39:50] Second. There is a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion 8. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Board of Supervisors adopt Ordinance 2503, increase in erosion and settlement control fees and charges.

[02:40:08] Second. There is a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Any opposed? motion 9 mr. chairman i move that the board of supervisors adopt ordinance 2504 increase fees for water and sewer capacity and user fees and various other changes second there is a motion and a second all in favor please indicate by saying i'm important discussion there is discussion amongst board members mr davis thank you mr chairman this is uh water and sewer capacity fees

[02:40:43] uh the increase is related to citizens desire not to have what is commonly referred to as rate shot. So while the fees may go up, it's the desire of the citizenry in overwhelming support to have these increased systematically instead of having them increased in accordance with the actual cost. And so therefore, I will support this. But the fee increases are due to a smoothing or an easing of fees as, again, not to create rate shock as desired by the citizens. We have no discussion further, Mr. Chairman.

[02:41:17] Any other comments or discussion from board members? Seeing none, there is a motion and a second on the floor. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Any opposed? Passes. Thank you, sir. Thank you, ma'am. Mr. Chairman, I had a general comment with regard to this specific topic.

[02:41:37] Supervisor Dibble. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just wanted to say, as the chair of the Finance Committee, although we have just approved these large categories, large buckets of money in these 10 categories, the Finance Committee is continuing to work with Dr. Brown and also with Mr. Badesky and their staff to do what I would call some some tweaks possibly look at some specific line items that we may tweak in the next coming weeks and I would invite all of our board members in addition to all

[02:42:16] of the public we do have a finance committee meeting at 11 a.m. on April the 16th where we will address this thank you sir thank you for those comments and that invitation any other comments from board members so we are still in agenda item 8 and i'd like to make some comments on additional efforts to provide some additional compensation and benefits for employees we really

[02:42:55] do value our employees and we're working we have been working the county administrator has been working to find ways to provide additional compensation in the form of one-time payment and additional days off and this is to show appreciation and to show value for our employees that we do care and that we do understand what you go through every day when you work whether

[02:43:30] it's cutting grass or painting something or fixing something or teaching kids or in some cases putting your lives on the line to run to a burning building whatever it is these next agenda items are ways that we are showing appreciation for each and every one of you county side school side all the way across the budget we are working to take care of our employees so the following agenda item

[02:44:04] presentation uh we've already adopted the um appropriation of the budget and the ordinances and the tax rates next i will mr davis i will recognize mr davis thank you mr chairman mr chairman i have a brief comment as well this is an extremely competitive environment sheriff hines and i have spoken numerous times we always want what's best for our employees

[02:44:40] for two reasons one they're important number two is i've told employees no matter where you are in hanover county we have a dual role and that is a joint constituency we serve the people of hanover county and we want to hire the best and we want to retain the best that said there are oftentimes opportunities and the sheriff's office has seen this where highly trained employees move on to what they believe to be greener pastures and i certainly hope that they are i've heard the the comment that people say, you know, the grass may be greener on the other side, but it's just

[02:45:15] as tough to mow. And I agree with that. There was a comment made a number of years ago by the CEO of Virgin Airlines. They asked him, he said, how do you feel about training your employees at such a high level? They're known for their training and their engagement with their employees. He said, how do you feel about training your employees? And then they leave and go somewhere else. He said, I'd rather have that than have untrained employees stay with me. Recognizing that those who serve in the public sector are cut from a different cloth. They generally are very community-minded, very, very responsive to other people's needs, but they also understand that they go into a government job

[02:45:54] where they don't have a lot of pay increases that come as the market sometimes increases in the private sector. We cannot, and I want to be very clear for any employees that are listening, We are not in a competitive situation with other localities.

[02:46:11] We're just not. There are other localities that have different revenue streams. They have different tax bases. A citizen brought up to me the other night, and he was 100% right. We have to increase our businesses in Hanover County to remove the burden from those who are the residents here in Hanover County.

[02:46:30] But with that, I do not want the lowest paid employee being a frontline connector with our constituents. So while these numbers may not seem as great as you might find in the private sector, I do think it's highly appropriate that we find a way to incorporate in the budget some compensatory benefits to our employees.

[02:46:54] And with that, Mr. Chairman, I move that the Board of Supervisors direct the county administrator to grant employee bonuses during calendar year 2025 using savings from the fiscal year 2025 budget. And the bonuses will be as follows. for full-time eligible employees one thousand two hundred dollars for part-time eligible employees six hundred dollars second there is a motion and the second any discussion or comments from board members seeing none we will call for the vote all in favor of the motion please indicate

[02:47:29] by saying aye aye any opposed motion passes mr davis thank you mr chairman mr chairman i move for the following to add these holidays to the county operating schedule one wednesday november 26 2025 the day before thanksgiving two friday december 26 2025 the day after christmas three friday january 2nd 2026 the day after new year and further direct the county administrator to include additional holidays as appropriate in january of each calendar year second there is a

[02:48:08] motion and a second any comments or discussion amongst board members seeing none we will call for the vote all in favor please indicate by saying aye aye any opposed seeing none motion passes thank you ladies and gentlemen i'll now recognize our county administrator mr john bedeski thank you mr chair members of the board i want to one thank you on behalf of the employees for your support of the just adopted motions and and the work that you have done collectively over the past

[02:48:42] few months of diving into this budget um it's no short order to dive into a just shy of an 800 million dollar budget uh at the level that you do each year and thank you for for the efforts that you put into that not only what folks see here in this room but the time and effort at the committee levels and the day-to-day questions and efforts and the constituent work it certainly is a difficult balance making sure that we're reducing or limiting the burden on our residents as much as possible but also making sure we're meeting the service demands that our residents have also

[02:49:18] expected these budgets are not done without a lot of effort i do want to thank uh out of my office dr brown for his leadership on this uh out of finance uh lauren you've been interim director for for longer than you probably have preferred but thank you but shelley wright mark the whole team of analysts thank you i really have tremendous respect for the work that you do and the bridges you make with our departments and offices uh and and really are the heart and soul of the budget work each year and so thank you for all you do i know we have a number of

[02:49:53] constitutional officers with us at least the sheriff's still with us here today and others watching the partnership we have with our constitutional offices here in hanover shouldn't be taken for granted it's not always as cooperative as it is uh and maybe in it's cooperative here more so than it is in some other jurisdictions and i think our residents benefit from that so thank you and your team i see our superintendent with us here today and terry and other school staff we do a lot of work together starting in november october but really year round as it relates to the budget just thank you for that partnership look forward to continuing

[02:50:32] that hopefully mutually all of our employees benefit from this work and certainly from the capital infrastructure that we're going to collectively deliver for our residents uh county wide uh moving forward with this adopted budget so i just want to thank all the team's efforts that have gone into doing this we will begin next year's budget tomorrow um give everyone the night off um i i think it was said earlier there is not a perfect budget when a budget doesn't provide additional relief or many more services that we're asked for there's always a middle ground and we

[02:51:10] hope that the budget that we introduced is the best middle ground that we can do it is a clear demonstration of our priorities where we fund is where we look to accomplish and and while our first priority may be to meet and certainly hear and listen from our residents it's also to meet those expectations and just want to thank all the staff for the work and effort that went into this and the board for all of your efforts on behalf of the residents but certainly on behalf of our employees so thank you very much thank you mr bedesky for your comments and thanks again to

[02:51:46] everyone who worked on the budget dr brown it's a big thick book 200 pages of a lot of numbers i don't know how you do it all but i know you worked on it really hard and our finance director in our finance department and just thank you to each and every one of you okay with that we will now move on the agenda item eight is now closed we will move on to agenda item nine which is closed session mr. Davis thank you mr. chairman share I just have one comment as related to the days off captain Sullivan was sheriff's office made numerous disparaging comments about the United States Marine Corps but I chose not to exclude him from those days off in the motion and I hope the

[02:52:24] sheriff will convey that to captain Sullivan and send my my love and endearment to him with that mr. chairman I move that the board of supervisors move this meeting into closed session pursuant to the Virginia Code 2.2-3711A1. Discussion of benefits with county administrator. Second. There is a motion and a second. Any discussion? Call for the vote. All in favor of entering into closed session, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Any

[02:52:52] opposed? None. We're in closed session. Board is back in session. Chair recognizes Vice Chair

[02:53:30] Davis. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Board of Supervisors certified that during the closed session only public business matters lawfully exempted from the open meeting requirements of the freedom of information act and only such public business matters as were identified in the motion of closed session were discussed second there is a motion and a second any discussion all in favor please indicate by saying aye aye any opposed we are now back in open session mr davis mr chairman i move that the county administrator's employment contract be amended

[02:54:06] to provide for the additional retirement benefits and options in the event that his compensation exceeds the limits established by the Virginia Retirement System and the amendment apply to the compensation approved by the board effective July 1, 2024. Second. There is a motion and a second.

[02:54:25] Any discussion? All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Okay, next on the agenda, item 10 is recess. We will be in recess until 6 p.m.

[02:54:41] Time is now 6 o'clock, and the board is back in session.

[02:55:22] Next on the agenda is citizen's time. Is there anyone here who wishes to address the board at citizen's time? This is not the public hearing for the school board appointments. This is citizen's time. Please raise your hand. I see one, two.

[02:55:41] Okay, citizen's time is an opportunity for members of the public to present comments and information to the board regarding any matter within the scope of the board's authority that is not on today's agenda for a public hearing there are cards available in the back of the room you are not required to fill out a card however it does make it easier easier for our board clerk to get the spelling of your name correct and it gives us your contact information in case we need to follow up with you after your comments speakers who wish to address the board are requested

[02:56:16] to follow these guidelines each speaker is asked to give your name and the magisterial district in which you live speakers will have up to five minutes to address the board and the time will be kept by mr vice chair davis speakers are asked to address their comments to the board and not to the audience the board does not permit the use of slideshows or other projected materials during citizens time however speakers are invited to provide printed copies of any mural materials

[02:56:49] that they have to the board the board requests the audience refrain from interrupting speakers during their recognized time the board appreciates the public input and cooperation during citizens time okay we will now open citizens time please approach please state your name the district in which you live and you will have up to five minutes. Kristen Stevens in Mechanicsville. Good

[02:57:26] evening. Mr. May asked if I would be here today to sing the praises of the school board, so here I am. I promise y'all don't want to hear me sing, so instead I'll hand out some thank yous this evening. First, to the school board, thank you for upping the ante on wasteful spending of taxpayer dollars. Instead of running out the federal club for a few meetings, y'all spent $30,000 on a superintendent search that resulted in a DEI hire.

[02:57:52] Now, I thought DEI was dead and hiring was to be merit-based only. Hopefully, this won't affect the federal tax dollars our school system is supposed to receive. I'd like to thank the 35-ish candidates that took the time and applied for the job. An even bigger thank you to the final three that went through the interview process not knowing there was no chance they would be considered.

[02:58:13] Thank you to the Hanover GOP and Jack Dyer for demonstrating that there are actually politics weighing in on our school board decisions. you guys are only making it easier for the elected school board committee to make its case for the next referendum thank you to miss Lynn for having a spine and a healthy set of ovaries she was willing to acknowledge that dr.

[02:58:31] Penny cuff is not the best person for this job it's unfortunate that the other school board members who were rumored to be interested in another candidate chose instead to go along to get along thank you to all of the community members present tonight willing to serve our teachers and students by seeking the appointment to the open school board seats in closing thank you to this board for your careful consideration of your school board appointments while I have asked at the previous three or four rounds of school board appointments for you to consider the qualifications of the appointees I fully expect the qualified persons to be overlooked and the most malleable person to be

[02:59:08] appointed please save your personal privilege comments and gaslighting for someone else I may be one of the few people willing to stand up and speak out but I am not alone in my observations of the actions of both this board and the school board. Until Hanover is able to vote for their school board representative, we will be coming here with our concerns, as you all are responsible for their decisions. I'd be remiss if I did not congratulate Mr. Eikenberry on his reappointment to the Cold Harbor seat, because anything other than that happening would go against every other decision this board has made

[02:59:39] as relates to school board appointments. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Next, anyone else? Please approach, state your name, the district in which you live.

[02:59:59] You will have up to five minutes. My name is Kristen Holti of the Cold Harbor District. I'm kind of flying off the cuff here. I am very proud of how the school board reacted to the vetting for the interim superintendent.

[03:00:19] Dr. Penny Cuff is qualified. She's the whole package, and she was properly vetted. And she knows the ins and outs of the school board and how Hanover County works.

[03:00:35] Let me just say I'm just proud. She's very efficient. She knows what's going on in the county. And I'm just very proud that she was properly vetted and she went through all of the documentation. And all the accusations were proven false that were thrown at her.

[03:00:52] Thank you very much. Thank you for your comments. Anyone else who wishes to speak during Citizens' Time? okay seeing no one else we will now close citizens time next on the agenda is public hearing to receive nominations for school board members cold harbor and south anna magisterial districts since cold harbor is in the alphabet before south anna we will receive those nominations first both sets

[03:01:26] of nominations can take place in the same public hearing after those nominations have been completed we will open up the floor to other citizens who wish to speak during the public hearing okay so next we will now call call anyone who wishes to place a name into nomination for the cold harbor district please approach you will have up to five minutes to address the board although you don't

[03:01:58] have to address the board please approach cold harbor nominations thank you ma'am please state your name and the district in which you live you will have up to five minutes here tonight to to nominate on the behalf of Dr. Sean Dandridge, a Cold Harbor resident. Dr. Sean Dandridge is a lifelong resident of Hanover, Virginia. He is a married father of four children and has four stepchildren. All four of his children have been schooled in the Hanover County school system.

[03:02:30] He is a firm believer in education, having attended Averitt University and graduated with a degree in business administration. He's earned a Master of Divinity from Liberty University. Furthering his education, he graduated with a second master's degree from Virginia Commonwealth University, earning a Master of Science, along with four units of continuing professional education.

[03:02:48] While interning, he is a hospital chaplain at VCU Hospital. He has completed his doctoral of ministry program at Asbury's Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky, and is currently pursuing a master's degree at Regent University. He is an adjunct professor for a small college in Spotsylvania, Virginia, and he pastors a rural church in Montrose.

[03:03:05] He serves as a representative for the Cold Harbor District on the Council of Aging, and is an educator, author, and preacher, and serves on various boards in the community. He has a passion for education and firmly believes that a quality education is essential for all children in Dr. Sean Dandridge's own words I aim to bring positive energy to the school board and ensure that Hanover continues to educate all students to be well-equipped and ready for college or other Opportunities upon completion of their academic journey in the county It will be my goal to enforce best practices and bring new ideas that will ensure our kids have the best pathway forward I appreciate your consideration. Dr. Sean Dandridge. Thank you for your time. Thank you very much for your comments, ma'am

[03:03:43] Next, please state your name, the district in which you live. You will have up to five minutes. I'm Steve Eikenberry. I live in the Coal Harbor District, and Mr. Chair and Mr. Oh, where did he go? Members of the board, Mr. Podusky, Ms. McGee, Mr. Walter.

[03:04:01] I am currently on the school board, and I've served full term. And prior to being on the school board, I'm a Virginia Military Institute graduate of 1980, combat veteran of two tours and 31 years of teaching in the classroom, 28 in Hanover County, and all of it at Lee Davis High School as a social studies teacher. And I think the only course in social studies I did not teach was psychology. So all the other histories,

[03:04:35] government, personal finance, et cetera. Just wanted to mention that as having been on the board for the last four years I've gained a lot of insight about the workings of our school board as Miss Dibble who's on this board can attest with her time on the school board that it is a work in progress I think every day you gain greater insight and in my insight through this superintendent search since this has been brought up that I believe we did she choose the right

[03:05:15] candidate with Dr. Penicuff. She gives a very clear vision for this school division to move forward. This year, as the approved budget can attest, that we helped or you guys helped out with teacher salaries. Next year, we probably would like to add to that. And if I guess I will leak a trial balloon to try to help teachers have more uninterrupted planning in the future, which time happens to be the most important four-letter word of a teacher, having a little

[03:05:54] bit of extra time in order not to have to take work home and interrupt their family time with their education time. Other things that we happen to be working on, again, is the fact that in my four years I've seen that we have a much smoother camaraderie with your board our board and your board and that's to me a testament to the appointed board of choosing people that are again more

[03:06:26] willing to work with you instead of being consumed by a campaign and taking our attention away from the schools so I still have the passion and I still have the commitment for another term and again these last two years as vice chair I think sets me up well for another term thank you Mr. Chair thank you sir for your comments next please state your name the district in which you live you will have up to five minutes good evening my name is William Shroff I live in the Cold Harbor

[03:07:02] District Mr. Chair Vice Chair members of the board I am a an educator I've been a retired superintendent i retired from colonial heights in 2023 and i was a superintendent in patrick county virginia as well for six years i'm a veteran of desert storm and operation provide comfort and spent time there at inserlic turkey i'm married to a 29-year veteran teacher here in hanover teaches at liberty middle school and my oldest daughter is a fourth grade teacher but she

[03:07:37] teaches in fairfax so i come from a family of educators i too know the ins and outs of an education system i have built or remodeled schools i have built budgets i have addressed teacher salaries infrastructure almost anything you can throw at a superintendent and or a board i've addressed so i'd like for my name to be considered and thank you for your time thank you sir for your comments next please state your name the district in which you live you will have up to

[03:08:12] five minutes good evening mr chairman and the board my name is julia crowder and i'm a resident of the cold harbor district i'm here to nominate myself for the school board seat for cold harbor i'm not here because i am disgruntled or upset with our current leadership i'm simply here to share my experience and for you all to determine whether or not that may be an asset moving forward I graduated from Atlee and after college we purposely I purposely moved back to Hanover purposely bought property in Old Church

[03:08:50] so that my children could be educated in Hanover County I'm active at my church in Hanover did in various youth sports programs as well I'm also an educator have been for about 20 years I completed my undergraduate internship at Hanover High School the first year it was opened in Spanish I completed my admin internship at Chickahominy prior to getting my master's degree from VCU I

[03:09:24] have taught at the elementary the middle and the high school levels I've served as a school-based administrator and as a central office administrator for the past seven years after my son was born I decided to take a step back from full-time work and I've been working part-time for University of Virginia to supervise pre-service teachers so I have worked at all levels that our school division served as well as working for the future workforce that hopefully we can recruit and retain teachers to our county so have a little bit of insight

[03:10:01] into that now that my boys are all in school we have a kindergartener a first grader and a third grader at Battlefield I've been able to start substituting again so and actually tomorrow is my last day substituting at Battlefield in a long-term position which has been really insightful because what I realized in the past few years as a university supervisor is that my absence from the classroom created a disconnect my absence from being in a school created a disconnect with what happened in schools five years ago versus

[03:10:36] where schools are now and I think there's some really contemporary unique challenges that are different from when I was working full-time in the school division so being a long-term substitute has helped me get back into a building and see firsthand what our students are experiencing what our teachers are experiencing what our administrators are experiencing and I'm a parent so I'm also experiencing all of these things through the lens of a mom of three boys who are going to be in Hanover County schools for the next 12 years hopefully no longer than that so as a

[03:11:11] parent I am keenly aware the gravity of every single decision that the school board makes although the board members as you all do represent their district they are also responsible for making decisions for every child educator administrator community member every stakeholder are in our county is affected by the decisions that our school board makes.

[03:11:39] So I think it's very important for someone who has experience as an educator, as a community member, and as a parent to serve on the school board. As a graduate of ATLI, I know that Hanover's motto of a tradition of excellence was ingrained in me and has been for about 25 years.

[03:12:02] And I do love the traditions of our division. I do believe that we have a responsibility not only to uphold the traditions of Hanover County Public Schools, but also to actively seek innovative opportunities and to create a future of excellence to continue our traditions.

[03:12:24] I believe my recent experience at all levels of public education, higher ed, as a parent and a resident, have prepared me to serve as a school board member. I trust that you all will make the decision that you feel is best for my children, for your children, for our teachers, and for our county as a whole.

[03:12:42] Thank you so much for your time. Thank you very much for your comments. Next, please state your name, the district in which you live. You will have up to five minutes. Good evening, Mr. Chairman, members of the board, senior staff, fellow citizens.

[03:13:01] Charlie Waddell, I'm living in the Historic Henry District, and I'd like to offer my recommendation for nomination for the ideal person to represent the Cold Harbor District on the school board. But first, I'd like to share a few comments on the selection process.

[03:13:19] Having been a former elected official in another jurisdiction, I have found that there are offices that are elected offices that people, the electorate, do not fully vet. And I found that school boards are, school board members are some of those.

[03:13:39] So the selection process that we've got, whereas the supervisor of the district and the entire board do vet the applicants to the best of their ability, you know the community, you know the community values, and you know what the community expects, this is the best process and the proof is in the pudding.

[03:14:01] Look at the county's students' scores, the awards that the county is getting, and look at the grades and the graduation rate. The process is working, and thank you for putting it in play. Now, going on to my recommendation, the citizens of the county, as you're aware, expect and deserve the best candidate. In the next several years, the school board will face unique and complex challenges. The two new buildings that they're putting into place and redistricting, this will

[03:14:36] take a couple of years it's an ongoing process and many challenges and also new school buildings after the replacement of the initial the these two coming up this is not the time for replacing a journeyman representative one with experience in these matters with a new apprentice we have an excellent representative who has years of service he began his career as a teacher adding coaching to his service to the community to the community and after graduation oops I mean after his retirement he continues his service on

[03:15:12] the school board this man brings a unique perspective to the community from two different ways as an administrator and as somebody who has been in the trenches he currently serves the Cold Harbor District and the county as vice chairman of the of the school board he has institutional knowledge that is valuable on two levels as a former teacher and coach and as an administrator i attend school board meetings on a regular basis and as a result i'm impressed with his mastery of the issues

[03:15:47] that he and the board addresses he's always prepared and engaged and he does his homework as any former school teacher would do speaking of engaged as a substitute teacher me i frequently see him at school during school hours and after school hours at events during the school day.

[03:16:09] A school board member is required to be at each of the schools in the district one time per quarter. This man is there more often. I'm impressed with his commitment and his involvement.

[03:16:27] And his reputation amongst the faculty that I interact with is stellar. They know him well and respect his commitment and service. He's very involved and committed. And if I may employ a sports analogy, not only is Coach Ike a key player on Team Hanover, he is an all-star.

[03:16:49] The logical choice for extending his season on the Hanover School Board. Thank you for consideration in this matter. Thank you for your comments, sir. Next, for Cold Harbor. Please state your name, the district in which you live.

[03:17:09] You will have up to five minutes. I don't have a chance to come here very often. Good evening, Chair, Vice Chair, and Board of Supervisors. My name is Kristen Holti of the Cold Harbor District. I will be respectful, and I just wanted to say that I am so proud of both my Cold Harbor Board of Supervisors Chair Michael Harrisburg and School Board Representative Vice Chair Steve Eikenberry. I fully support the renewal of Steve Eikenberry's appointment. He has been polite, civil, and balanced in all

[03:17:48] viewpoints. He is the backbone and strength to the school board. He genuinely puts the children first. Being an appointed school board, the school board has to work hand in hand with the board of supervisors to get the work done, get the budget accomplished, and to put the children first with no distractions. There are groups out there that are very deceptive and have a very dark side and don't really care about the children. They just want to put their dark agenda in front and hurt

[03:18:24] the children. I believe our appointed school board is exemplary and should be a template for the entire country. Hanover County schools have won so many awards regarding merit and doing so much better than the other counties when it comes to math etc and steve eikenberry has been the backbone once again to the school board and he just he is an important part in the school board and i really wish want you to appoint him again thank you very much thank you very much for your comments

[03:19:04] next for cold harbor any other nominations for the cold harbor district seeing none we will now move on to the south anna district any nominations to be placed for the south anna district please approach please state your name the district in which you live and you will have up to five minutes good evening chair vice chair miss dibble my name is alasia coney i'm in the south i'm a resident of south anna district good evening my name is alasia coney and i am nominating myself

[03:19:42] for the south anna district school board seat first i would like to thank bob may for his service he's not in here right now but thank you for your service not only to south and a district but to our country miss dibble i want to speak to you personally because you inspired me to pta and to be part of this community you were a pta president and now you're our south ana supervisor so you're such an inspiration especially to us women now tonight i just want to paint a picture of who i am and my love for hanover county i've been a substitute teacher for about three years now for hanover i've been involved with ptas in the south ana district for five years. I started all the way at the bottom as just a member all the way to

[03:20:22] president. Now I am focusing on advocating at the General Assembly and throughout the year for school policy changes. I sit on the Hanover Special Education Advisory Committee particularly for curriculum and accessibility. I have my own nonprofit that has supported the South Anna District with teacher breakfasts, donated school supplies, provided free tutoring, and so much more. I'm an executive leader with the Hanover NAACP. I oversee all of veterans in hanover county but my most proud achievement is being a mom to 10 beautiful children that attend south anna liberty and patrick henry all of whom i've adopted through foster care

[03:20:57] minus one that i did work a long hard nine months on so i have watched every school board stream when what i saw over and over was issues within the special education community bullying and discrimination these will be some of the main priorities for me if appointed this seat i encourage all to come forward i promise to answer every email meet with anyone in person be a voice to the voiceless because we are all hanover strong and i say this to everyone that asked me my mission in hanover county and it is to make sure that we all receive every student every staff member a safe

[03:21:34] nurturing and effective learning environment thank you thank you very much for your comments south anna next please state your name the district in which you live you will have up to five minutes thank you i'm jane flowers and i'm a resident of the south anna district and thank you mr chair mr vice chair and members of the board for this opportunity to place myself in nomination for the school board in the south anna district i also like to thank ms dibble for the time she

[03:22:10] spent on the phone with me as i was considering do i really want to do this and what would be the responsibilities exactly and how to proceed and i appreciate that time that she spent with me i did bring some packets with me could i approach to give these to you while i am here speaking on my own behalf i in the package you will find 10 letters of recommendation from members of the

[03:22:48] hanover community supporting my nomination for this position you will also find a more complete resume than what i put on the online application process and you will find some information about what it means to be a certified public manager as I realize that many people are not familiar with that designation that is a 300 clock hour program it requires that's supported by the national CPM consortium including coursework required coursework elective coursework and two projects one group project and one

[03:23:25] individual project it focuses on seven core competencies and two of those CPM competencies really jumped out at me when I was thinking about school board membership one is personal and organizational integrity and how important it is that our entire community really sees the integrity of the school board and of its members as well as a public service focus that basically is an organization that exudes trust and stewardship and is shows those things by contributing to the common good through accountability and transparency for myself

[03:24:02] and other education I have an undergraduate degree from James Madison University and I did receive a minor along with that degree in special education it's still an interest of mine and I have my master's degree from Old Dominion University my career has focused it was focused on child and family well-being in many different ways that included serving as at the Virginia Department of Health as the tobacco control program manager serving as a sexual and domestic violence prevention program specialist, including focusing on teen dating violence,

[03:24:39] and serving as the teen pregnancy prevention coordinator for the Virginia Department of Health. In these responsibilities, I handled things such as budget development and management, strategic planning, and policy development. I prepared legislative action statements.

[03:24:55] Those are reports prepared for the governor's office where I'd be assigned as a subject matter expert to analyze legislation and talk with constituents to get pros and cons, opinions about the legislation.

[03:25:11] And I also was responsible sometimes for drafting legislation, a piece I'm particularly proud of. I drafted a bill for the governor's office. It did become a governor's bill in 2019 for the tobacco-free schools legislation. It did pass that year.

[03:25:27] So I was very proud that we were able to get that passed in Virginia. have served hanover county in many ways since i became a resident here i did serve on the school health advisory board from 2014 until 2021 so that was a really excellent opportunity for me to learn more details about how the school system here in hanover works i also serve as an officer of election i've served in that position since 2016 and i am currently also a court appointed a special advocate. As a CASA, I'm very dedicated to the advocating for and the well-being of

[03:26:05] children that are in the foster care system and advocating for them and writing court reports for the juvenile and domestic relations courts in Hanover. My resume will certainly provide you with more details, but I would like to read a portion of a letter from one of the letters that is in there. This is from Rebecca Oder. Ma'am, you have 30 seconds. Okay, I'll try to read fast.

[03:26:28] She says, I'm writing to offer my enthusiastic support for Jane Flowers as a candidate for the Hanover County School Board. As a certified public manager, Ms. Flowers has completed a rigorous program specifically designed to prepare individuals for leadership roles in federal, state, and local government.

[03:26:44] This training has equipped her with a strong understanding of public administration, budget management, and strategic planning. I wholeheartedly recommend Ms. Flowers for this important role, and I'm confident she will be an outstanding member of the Hanover County School Board. that's just a very short piece of her letter but i do appreciate your consideration of me for this position and i look forward to interviewing and learning more about each of you as well as how i can support handover in this position thank you thank you for your comments south anna district

[03:27:14] next please state your name the district in which you live you will have up to five minutes good evening mr chair mr vice chair members of the board staff thank you all for your service My name is Todd VanderPole and I'm honored to be here tonight to nominate Dr. Frank Shelf to serve as the South Anna District Representative on the Hanover County School Board.

[03:27:43] Unfortunately, Dr. Shelf could not be here tonight. He's currently in Mexico City speaking at a convention that had been scheduled previously. Dr. Shelf has been a resident of Hanover County for 31 years. Having originally come to Virginia for college and medical school, he is an active and engaged member of our community, a supporter of Hanover County Public Schools, and has served with distinction on the School Board Library Review Committee for the past two years.

[03:28:12] His reputation as a thoughtful communicator and committed citizen precedes him. Frank's career path has been anything but typical. Before attending college, he was a small business owner, running a bookstore, a bicycle shop, and even managing a 6,000-bird chicken farm.

[03:28:30] He also gained experience working for a civil engineer, a land surveyor, and a U.S. senator. During high school and college, he tutored math and science, and later served as a faculty member at Duke University Medical Center. As a physician, Dr. Self has served in nearly every setting imaginable, from academia and public health to private practice, prisons, corporate health care, and state government.

[03:28:56] Notably, he was the inaugural commissioner of George's Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities. There, Dr. Shelf successfully resolved litigation by the U.S. Justice Department in a civil settlement and began the transition of the state from a facility-based custodial care model to a community-based active treatment and recovery model.

[03:29:24] Today, Dr. Self continues to serve our commonwealth. He is an assistant chief officer of elections in Hanover County. He is the psychiatrist for a remote clinic with the Dickinson County Behavioral Health Services, an Appalachian Community Service Board in far southwestern Virginia, and he practices geriatric psychiatry at a large retirement community in Richmond.

[03:29:51] He holds medical licenses in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Ohio, and Kentucky. He is a diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, a distinguished fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, and a fellow of the American College of Psychiatrists, where he served on the Policy and Long-Term Planning Committee.

[03:30:18] He is also a charter member of the Medical Directors Institute of the National Council for Behavioral Health. Dr. Shelf is a proven leader, one who seeks out community input, identifies core problems, and works collaboratively toward thoughtful, effective solutions.

[03:30:39] Most importantly, he has both the time and the desire to serve on the school board with dedication and purpose. At his request, I'd like to share the following statement from Dr. Self. I quote, Nothing has come easily for me in life, but struggling through challenges has taught me both resilience and connection.

[03:30:59] Life is lived in tension, and every day we confront challenges, big and small. Happiness often stems from the satisfaction of overcoming them. The founders of our republic believed it could only be sustained by an educated populace. Every individual is endowed with unique potential and success in life is measured by what we do with that potential. I've worked with people of all abilities, from special needs to gifted and everyone in between. The most important lesson I've learned is that one size does not fit all.

[03:31:33] Our task is to equip every child with the tools and encouragement they need to reach their full potential. Yet over the past 30 to 40 years, we've witnessed a decline in our educational outcomes. Over half of our nation's children struggle with basic literacy and math, despite ever-increasing education spending.

[03:31:53] I believe education is a blend of perspiration and inspiration. My goal in serving on the school board is to bring my experience to help strike the right balance for our students, parents, teachers, administrators, and community. Our children's future depends on us working together, and our country depends on our children.

[03:32:14] frank shelf is exactly the kind of thoughtful principled leader this school board needs i am proud to recommend him as the next south anna district representative on the hanover county school board thank you all and thank you for your service thank you for your comments sir next for the south anna district please state your name the district in which you live you will have up to five minutes yes uh chairman herdsburg vice chairman days members of the board my name is john gill i am in the south anna district and i am here to nominate myself

[03:32:54] i miss mcgee has provided you with a resume and kind of my philosophy on education but i will say that unlike several of the other folks i'm actually new to hanover so i can't tell you that i graduated from one of your esteemed high schools but i'm here by choice and relocating my business to mechanicsville and we just moved in a few months ago in the montpelier

[03:33:28] area my background really is as a career consultant and and executive i worked at Capital One at Fannie Mae. I've worked at Price Waterhouse Coopers and IBM. I think my experience in consulting allows me to be collaborative and come in with some hypotheses but not coming and rushing to judgment. Earlier in my career I served school board at the city of Newport News. A little

[03:34:03] bit different school system. I've been an adjunct professor at Christopher Newport University, and the thing that really excites me is I'm the father of five children, all of whom are now adults and in their chosen field of study. So I like to think that I've been a bit of a mentor, and one of them is a school teacher. Started in Fairfax County and then moved down here to Richmond.

[03:34:35] worked in a different school district. Really, really bright lady that graduated from James Madison. She was put up for being in principal's track early and got disillusioned. So I come from an educational background of seeing the disillusionment of our educators and what it takes to inspire great educators. I'm a CPA. I have an MBA from William & Mary.

[03:35:06] I understand organizational leadership, and I understand finance. I read over the budget that was presented. I suppose it's a fine budget, but the thing that was missing to me is an understanding of who the customer is.

[03:35:22] There was a lot of talk of 3% raises and 3.8% steps, but missing was the concept of our customers are our students and the parents, and what is the mission of the school district, and what is going to be accomplished in FY26, and what are the funds needed to accomplish that mission.

[03:35:48] And as I say, I come with no preconceived notions, but I think it's really, really important to keep the customer of the children and the parents paramount as we look to develop the children.

[03:36:06] And I think two things are in front of us right now that I happen to be in front of in both areas. One of them is artificial intelligence. I'm a little bit of a pioneer in that space in my business with AI. I'd like to see what are we doing in education with AI.

[03:36:25] I want to see as we develop our future workforce in Hanover, how are we developing our students to understand AI and understand that the job that they may be thinking about may be taken away by AI.

[03:36:42] I, as a business owner, part of my business is actually manufacturing. We use AI in the manufacturing space and also in e-commerce. But, and I see that there's a great technical program that Hanover Schools has invested in.

[03:37:00] But I would like to see more of how we support the middle 80% of children. Every school district praises themselves on the 10% that needs special assistance and the 10% that are the talented and gifted.

[03:37:18] But how do we support that-- - There's 30 seconds remaining, sir. - I got it. How do we support that middle 80% to be ready for the jobs, to understand that technical background so that we're offering our students and our graduates the skills that they have that are much different they were four years ago to uh to invest for the future and i look forward to being collaborative and keeping an open mind i hope you consider me i look forward to um to meeting with you thank you

[03:37:48] very much thank you for your comments next nomination for the south anna district anyone else for the south anna district okay seeing none i will provide one more opportunity for anyone to speak during the public hearing on the cold harbor district or the southanta district okay seeing

[03:38:23] none we will now close the public hearing we'll now open the floor for board member comments first i would recognize supervisor dibble thank you mr chair um i want to give a big shout out to all of you for attending today whether you were here to nominate just share your thoughts or whatever i appreciate you taking the time and especially want to thank those that not just from the South Anna district, but also from the Cold Harbor district that are willing to put their name in the hat and willing to put in the time to do this job.

[03:39:01] It's sometimes seems like a thankless job, but it's an important job. And I have said for 13 years now that I believe that our children are our best assets and they are certainly the ones that we need to protect, and the one way that we protect them is to give them a good education.

[03:39:21] So thank you all for being good parents. Thank you for your willingness to serve, and I will be reaching out to all of the South Anna reps. We already have your information sheet, so I will be reaching out to set up some times to sit down with each one of you and to chat about what it is you see your mission the civil board so uh thank you again and i will defer my time now to mr hersberg with the cold

[03:39:51] harbor well thank you supervisor dibble any other comments from other board members okay i'll make my closing comments thank you all to everyone who's willing to serve thank you for your willingness to take the time to come out uh your time and your willingness is certainly appreciated at 6 45 we are almost complete with our board member uh sorry our board meeting for this evening if any of the nominees who are here would like a few minutes to meet with me i would like to meet with you

[03:40:28] while we're here in the building and it's only currently 6 45. not necessary so if you have to leave that's understandable we can catch up later i do plan to reach out for each nominee for private Interviews and discussions any other comments from board members? Okay, seeing none We will now move on to the remainder of our agenda next on the agenda is announcements and the Announcements from board members and the announcements from anyone seeing none

[03:41:06] We will now adjourn the meeting to 6:00 p.m. On Wednesday April the 23rd 2025 for a regular board meeting to be held here in the boardroom of the county administration building 516 County Complex Road, Hanover, Virginia. We are adjourned. Thank you

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