Coraggio Consulting Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, FY25 Budget Work Session, Thursday, March 7, 2024 Date: Thursday, March 7, 2024 Place: Board Room, First Floor, Government Center, 1 Harrison Street SE, Leesburg, Virginia Length: 3h 34m (video) Official meeting video (county, Granicus): https://loudoun.granicus.com/player/clip/7619 Agenda (Granicus): https://loudoun.granicus.com/AgendaViewer.php?view_id=73&clip_id=7619 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 2026-10-19. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [00:13:58] - Well, good evening, Supervisors. Good evening, Staff. Good evening, Loudon. I'd like to call to order the March 7th, 2024, Board Supervisors Budget Work Session to order. Board members, I'd like to stress the importance of the budget work sessions as they are a time for us to offer changes, additions, and deletions to the budget. [00:14:15] Board members should try to offer all desired amendments and ask questions if you have any during the work session. Please only offer motions that you intend to support, I know you all will, so that we can be efficient for a limited time during each session. In addition, if you would like to offer motions on items that are not in the proposed budget, please, if you can, work with staff prior to the work session to ensure your motion is in accurate order and can accomplish your results. [00:14:42] When we get to the final vote on April 2nd, staff will not be able to make large scale changes to the budget during the meeting, and the vote on the budget could be delayed if there are substantive changes that were not discussed or voted on doing the work sessions. Would everyone please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance? [00:15:04] I pledge 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. Supervisors, Mr. Turner has called and apologized. He is running late. He would actually like to be here for the memorandum discussion on the PDR on the PDR memorandum on the PDR so we're going to go on and we're going to do the tote board transmittal and then we'll do the [00:15:42] departments and then when he gets in when he gets here we'll take a break in between the mental health substance abuse prevention services department and the building development department to do the PDR discussion at that type so we'll do the health and welfare health and welfare um count uh departments and then we'll do the pdr minimum and then we'll do the community development departments how's that sound that sounds great thank you okay then let's do the transmittal letter first please sure good evening um in your packet for this evening includes a summary of the actions or the straw votes that the board took on during monday's work session [00:16:22] we'll have the tote board displayed for you throughout the work session here you'll see we We remain at a real property tax rate of 87 and a half cents. The board took straw polls that reduced expenditures from the budget of about $478,000, which are available to reallocate at the same tax rate. [00:16:43] In order to reduce the real property tax rate by a half penny, $6.9 million needs to be removed in expenditures from the tote board. Also in your packet is the next installment of responses to questions submitted by board members, and I can answer any questions on those responses. [00:17:04] And then as the chair said, the only other additional item in the packet was just a cover memo on the PDR program and included as attachments were previous budget development items on the topic of what a purchase of development rights program would look like. [00:17:24] And Megan, just to make sure this, everything in this budget today also is, if someone doesn't want something, they have to remove it because everything is included in the budget already, correct? That's correct. Everything in the proposed budget is funded. [00:17:41] Okay. Yes. All right. Thank you, ma'am. Yep. And then finally, I just want to offer that departments are here to provide opening remarks. They've encouraged to keep their comments brief so that the board can facilitate the question and answer period. Okay. Thank you. Wonderful. Wonderful. Also because your stuff's already funded, so you don't want to talk too much. You may unfund yourself. [00:18:04] Okay. We're going to start with extension services. Extension services can be found in the description of resource request on page R61, the budget narrative 3-2. Good evening. Oh, I know you. [00:18:25] Good evening, Supervisors. My name is Stuart Vermack, and I am the Department Director of Virginia Corruptive Extension, Loudoun, known as Extension Services in the proposed budget. [00:18:42] The resource request from my department can be located on page R61 in the budget document. Our department is the local connection to Virginia's land-grant universities, Virginia Tech and Virginia State University. Our department helps the people of Loudoun County improve their lives through educational programs based on research and are developed with input from local stakeholders. [00:19:04] These programs focus on the nutrition and health of our families, promoting natural resources, conservation, and stewardship, improving our food system, increasing the sustainability of agricultural operations, and improving youth well-being by teaching life skills. [00:19:21] The resource request in the proposed FY25 budget is for a nutrition educator, which aligns with the expectations for the services of my department and the board's strategic initiatives. This position has the long-term goal of reducing chronic diseases such as obesity and diabetes for the residents of Loudoun through education and training. [00:19:43] Additionally, this position will enhance the services and programs of other county departments, included but not limited to the health department, family services, mental health, substance abuse and developmental services, and Loudoun County Public Libraries. Adding this position to our department will allow the increasing number of requests for nutrition education programming to be met. [00:20:06] And finally, it is only the second FTE requested by my department in 25 years. Thank you for considering this important position, and I'm happy to answer any questions that you may have. Okay, well, Stuart, it was nice to meet you. Thank you very much for coming in. You may leave now. [00:20:26] that was the most effective that was that was well we don't see you in here much but I think extension services does a great job so thank you thank you very much for coming in would anyone dare to have questions for Stuart right now if you do please put your light on Mr. Letourneau yeah so I'd like to remind Mr. Kirschner that in some years he makes a lot of motions that don't [00:21:02] get many seconds so that could get worse um all right so no on this program um is there any coordination with the health department specifically on the on the nutrition stuff because this this sort of seemed like the type of position i would expect from them honestly from you yeah well i'm glad you asked me a question i've been preparing for a number of years i do appreciate it i would have been a little disappointed if no one said anything um uh so so if this position was approved There would be a lot of partnering with the health department in programs such as the WIC program. [00:21:38] Women, infant, and children. Yeah, thank you. So currently, we're currently running a very small volunteer program to do what we're doing right now. We don't have the capacity to expand that to other departments such as the health department. [00:21:55] So this position. So which departments currently benefit from the volunteers that do this? Currently, there are no other departments that benefit from this for the exact reason that we don't have an FTE to administer the program. If funded, it would, as I mentioned, strategically partner with a number of programs in other departments and enhance this. [00:22:15] All right. Let me ask that differently. What do the volunteers do now exactly? It's not like this function is sort of being done now on a volunteer basis. It is to a small extent. Yeah, we have six volunteers who are going now. What exactly are they doing then? They're doing nutrition education programming in the community, so we're partnering with Loudoun County Public Libraries and some nonprofits on a very small basis to offer this programming to the public. [00:22:42] We aren't even able to proactively advertise this to other departments or other community members because we simply can't meet the requests for the programs we do now. Okay. All right. Thank you. Anybody else? No kidding. [00:22:59] I think nutrition in this country overall, but nutrition is probably the biggest prevention program we can do. If people could eat better, eat cleaner and eat better, so many of the issues that we deal with, especially inflammation in the body, which causes so many issues, could be prevented. [00:23:20] There's also a discussion from a Nova hospital with some of our farms to kind of partner. people who are coming out of um cancer treatment they really need to have healthy clean food um because because when you're in chemotherapy it lowers your um resistance and so correct eating and learning how to eat correctly is is key to preventing so many other issues and so at its base this this position will save untold amounts of money in the end so thank you for coming in And I'm fairly certain there's not a motion on this board right now. [00:23:59] Thank you very much. Nice to meet you, Stuart. Thank you all. All right, bye-bye. All right, our next department is Family Services, which description of resources can be on R62 to R64, Budget Narrative 3.8, 3-8. [00:24:19] Good evening. Good evening. [00:24:35] Good evening, Chair Randall and members of the board. My name is Ina Fernandez, and I'm the Director of the Department of Family Services. Our priorities may be found beginning on page R62 of your budget book. [00:24:51] As you are keenly aware, almost all the programs provided by the Department of Family Services are mandated by state and federal governments or support the work thereof. Caseloads continue to grow, are becoming more and more complex, and require greater system supports in order to provide the most basic programming. [00:25:09] Hence, our top three requests are associated with the Public Benefits Program, providing Medicaid, SNAP, or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, energy and other assistance to over 16% of Loudoun County's population. Child protective services assuring children are safe and free from abuse and neglect. And our quality data and compliance program which bolsters our agency support system thereby allowing frontline workers and management staff to focus on their mandated jobs instead of other duties as assigned. Our request our resource requests for fiscal year 2025 are a continuation of our attempt to stabilize right size and [00:25:46] professionalize our organization, making sure our responsibility to the county's infrastructure of care is solid, and strive to meet federally and state-imposed requirements while improving outcomes for the community's most vulnerable. Your unwavering support allows us to deliver the programs and services we are required to provide. I'm here to answer any questions you may have, as is staff associated with the programs if needed, and at the table with me are our Deputy Director, Dee Bolden, and our Assistant Director for Internal Operations, Elise Martin. [00:26:19] Wonderful. Wonderful. Thank you. Supervisors, do you have questions? Mr. Letourneau. Thank you. So what I would like to explore with you is there's seven public benefit specialist positions plus the supervisor's fraud investigator. It seems unlikely to me that you're going to be able to hire all seven of those in six months. So based on the pace of hiring that's occurred [00:26:54] in this and other departments, so is it possible that some of those positions could become eligible on January 1 instead of immediately? Thank you for the question. We did receive, as you know, public benefits program, another team last year, and they have all been either hired or in the very last or in actually in negotiations, salary negotiations. Our staff has done an incredible job in really trying to simplify the hiring process to get people on board much quicker so that I. But seven of the identical position in six months. Good. That to me, I am highly [00:27:33] skeptical that you're going to get all seven people on board at once. I'm just trying to find a way if we could do maybe four of them now and three of them later or something like that. Three of them later, as in January, like the 2nd, we'd be more than happy to do that. Okay. Yeah. [00:27:49] I'll make that motion later. Mr. Crony. Thank you, Chair Randall, and thank you for your presentation. What is the IO support requested for Child Protective Services, and how is that different for the five FTEs that you're asking for in the Internal Operations Division? [00:28:11] Okay, so that is for an appeals hearing officer. We are supposed to, anybody can appeal the finding. If there's a finding in Child Protective Services, anybody has a right to appeal that finding. The appeals are going up higher and higher every year, and if you need specifics, we have staff here that can answer that. [00:28:30] But that's really what that position is for. Okay, so it's really not part of your other request? It's not an investigator, no. Okay, not, okay. So how many FDs do you currently have in the Internal Operations Division? You know, I'm specifically focusing on your priority three. [00:28:50] How many people do you have in your, turn on your light? In the entire division, we have nine, I'm sorry, 21 in the entire division. [00:29:07] Okay. For quality data and compliance, though, which is where the majority of these positions sit. Right. There are 14. 14? Yes. Okay, so that was the question, but if you had to prioritize the five, what would be your priority? [00:29:34] They are inextricably linked because one is a supervisor. If we add positions, the current supervisor, the span of control will be too large. It would be 12, 14 people just for one person, so that's part of that request. [00:29:55] We are getting more and more contracts, projects. We have over 50 projects that really nobody is managing at this point. It's frontline staff that manage it. So your CPS, your public benefits, your managers are managing those projects. [00:30:13] And to be honest, things fall through the crack because that's not part of what they do on a day-to-day basis. Okay. So you're asking for one additional contract manager and one additional grant manager, right? you already have those those resources we have we have one contract manager okay we don't have a grant you don't have a grant manager okay okay thank you thank you mr kirschner thank you madam chair and thank you for being here um a couple of follow-up questions to supervisor triccone you said how many positions were for handling of the appeals or which position was that you were [00:30:49] referring to technically we don't have any one person that's what their job it's other duties is assigned to multiple people. So you're looking, how many positions, will this person, will this FTA, will you handle just appeals primarily? Well, appeals as also with CPS redactions of the appeal because that also takes a very long time of the redaction and not only just the appeals, but any time anybody asks for a record, that person will also be helping with that. [00:31:18] You said you're having increased, I've noticed that as well. I do a number of appeals with the department. My question is, why are we seeing an increase in appeals? That's a good question. Well, I think we make sure that people know that they can appeal. [00:31:36] It's in the letters that they receive. That's good. Staff are also telling them that that is their option. We are required to do so, and we do. Nobody wants a finding of abuse or neglect on their record, so folks are taking advantage of that appeal. [00:31:56] Is there any correlation to, and this is, I'm very, I'm truly curious, but is there any correlation as to the, I mean, is there a higher percentage of those being overturned? I know I've worked with a lot of different departments like yours across the country over the years. [00:32:13] Some are far more aggressive than others and often have a higher overturn on their appeal rate. So have you done any checking on that in terms of the, what your appeals overturn rate is? We can get, we can. I'd like to see those eventually. have that information we can get that for you um i know in terms of uh your your um service you want 11 new positions because of increased staffing you you highlighted a little bit or because of increased caseload you've highlighted a little bit can you elaborate a little bit on what you're seeing in terms of increased caseload is it including on english speakers or can you talk [00:32:52] to me a little bit more about that so is it across the board or just for the cps or the public benefits. Both. Okay. Absolutely. So with, I'll start with public benefits since it's our first request. With that, we are seeing the county, as you know, is, and this is both actually child protective services and public benefits. The county is becoming much more diverse. So those, those caseloads are going up, especially with benefits though. We are seeing a, in three years ago the the caseload was about almost 695 698 per per worker it is now close to [00:33:27] 13 1400 per worker and that mostly has to do with new policies regulations more people being eligible based on these policies and and laws for services as I stated you know about 16% of Loudoun County residents receive public benefits so that number just continues to to increase With Child Protective Services, with more and more trauma, with people, especially during COVID, losing their jobs, trying to get back on their feet, there's a lot of stress, and the cases are becoming much more complex. [00:34:08] Mental health, substance abuse, we're seeing a lot of domestic violence, and so not only when cases increase, but the complexity of cases makes it much more difficult to serve as well, and it takes longer to do so. Thank you. I'm out of time. Mr. Sains. Thank you, Madam Chair. On the same line of questioning as Supervisor Letourneau, he asked earlier about the public benefits team, and you said you could possibly do some now, some in January. So could you do the same for the child protective positions, or would that present an issue? [00:34:45] It's not an issue. Where the issue lies is if we only receive half a team. The team is there for a specific reason, and we can absolutely phase in. [00:35:00] We have no problem doing that. But when you only put one, if you have a supervisor or if you only have three workers, it's not providing the service that we need. Again, even with public benefits, we're asking for a whole team, And just because the cases continue to rise, it's actually just going to sort of flatline, and we're not going to be reducing caseloads with this request. [00:35:23] Hence, it'll be a multi-year request, as we've done with Child Protective Services. Okay, so with Child Protective Services, it sounds like your number one option would be all together. But say that you did have to split it, how would you do that? We'd probably have the supervisor first, so then that person can hire their staff. [00:35:44] So the supervisor, a senior worker, and a few of the frontline staff, and then the other frontline staff and the case aide afterwards. On the back end. Now, would that get to some of the issues with caseloads, or would that still not really? [00:36:05] Because, I mean, you've been very generous, and we have received, we have been able to reduce the caseload. We are almost at a caseload of 1 to 10, which is where we want to be. But I'll be honest with you, then you also get into, very similar to public safety, where minimum staffing. [00:36:25] These folks are on call 24 hours a day. And so to be able to then continue to do that, you're going to sort of need more than just having 1 to 10. So then, but how confident are you? You would be able to fill all those positions. Say if we were to go, okay, yep, July, you got all the positions in the child protective. [00:36:47] How confident are you filling those positions within the first few months of having them open? I think we, so especially with child protective services, we hired those pretty quickly. We're in a different space now than we were during COVID, especially with this team. [00:37:06] In fact, all the positions that, like I said, that we received last year, we're only three or four, and all of those are in negotiations right now as well. We've been doing a much better job getting folks in quickly so that the staff who are already, you know, on board, there's relief for them. [00:37:28] But even still, there's that training piece as well. So it takes time to get somebody on board and to be able to take cases. I'm fairly confident, especially with the procedures that we've put in place and some efficiencies, that we can staff up pretty quickly. [00:37:46] Do we have a pipeline? I'm sorry? Do we have a pipeline of candidates? A pipeline? Mr. Sainz, thank you very much. Your time is up. Good try, though. There I am. Ms. Brooksman? I'm sorry, Ms. Gleff. [00:38:02] Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you for your presentation. I really don't have any questions, but I just wanted to say that I went to the family services committee advisory board meeting a few months ago. [00:38:18] And Ms. Curry was there, and there were a few other people that were discussing what actually the committee does, what you all do as a department and how important it is. [00:38:34] And you also were talking about how many people that you have when boarded into your department and just all of the good things that you all are doing. I just want to say that I do support you. And I do believe that if you're saying that you need these folks now to help, you know, with the caseloads that you all have, that I do support that. [00:39:00] Thank you. Ms. Bricksman. Thank you, Madam Chair. I don't really know why it would matter if someone speaks another language when they're coming to your department for services, honestly. It sounds to me like you really would not like us to split up your priority three because that's a team, the quality data compliance team. [00:39:23] That team is actually there to serve the entire organization. Okay. When you say split up, are you talking about, again, hiring some now and some in new year? Right, and you were saying they're inextricably linked. Like, you wouldn't want that one to be split up. I meant they're inextricably linked because of the need that we have for them. [00:39:43] It's not just one and then not have the others. If the board so chooses to phase them in, we are more than happy to work with the board on that as well. Okay. On the priority three, the same team, would funding these positions, especially the grant manager, potentially increase the award amount from grants above the $4 million that's already existing? [00:40:10] Yes, and it will allow us to apply for more grants. Right now, again, it's staff applying for these grants, and this is not what they do. Right. I hear you, and I totally agree, having written grants in the past. How are we doing on Medicaid re-enrollment since the waiver for re-enrollment has expired? [00:40:29] Has that really increased your caseload? Absolutely. And, you know, as you know, we have until, what, December to get those done. Staff are diligently working, working overtime. We're getting funds from the state to do so. [00:40:46] But it is a huge, huge amount of work. And not only do we re – we're redetermining those cases, but if they end up not being eligible, then they're reapplying or they appeal those as well. [00:41:02] So it's not only the caseloads, but then all the appeals that are happening on top of that. And that's where the public benefits team would come into play. Okay. I am continually impressed by the presentations in our budget books. I mean, I think that the numbers that you laid out really makes the case for these positions. [00:41:21] I don't want anyone in our staff to be working 1,300 cases when the best practice is to be at 550 or 600 cases. I think that's a shame. And so it would have to be a really strong case for me to even split up allocating these positions for your department. [00:41:47] Supervisor Sains wanted me to ask his follow-up question, and that is, do you have folks in the pipeline that could maybe fill the 11 FTEs for CPS or the 10 for your public benefits team? One of the things that we implemented at the strong urging of Chair Randall was also having a clinical supervision and being able to, one of the things we've done is increase our clinical supervision. [00:42:14] We have increased our partnerships with colleges and universities as part of that pipeline. So when folks come and have internships with us or field placements, then they can see, oh, maybe this is one place that I really want to work. [00:42:33] And so increasing that opportunity is one of the ways that we are paying attention to that pipeline. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Brixman. So you did lay out an amazing case, and just to go to page R62, it talks about, and this is under the public benefits team, it says that you have obtained data from other places, including Prince William, Chesterfield, Henrico Bonassas, Bonassas Park, Virginia Beach. [00:43:03] These localities have caseloads ranging from 550 to 850, whereas Loudoun County is about 1,171 cases. We have some of the largest cases still in the Commonwealth of Virginia. In the Commonwealth of Virginia, we have some of the largest cases. That is just an enormous problem because, one, you're going to keep losing staff because you're going to burn people out. [00:43:26] Two, at some point, no person can do that, and there's going to be an issue with a case in the system, which is going to be a lot more expensive and give you a much harder time no matter what. Ms. Letourneau asked the right question in the right way because he didn't ask, are they all needed? [00:43:45] He asked, can you hire them all right now? And so that's a different question. Clearly, they are all needed. But sometimes it takes a while to hire people up. So what he's basically asking is, if we delay some of them to hire later and still give you the same amount, is that okay? [00:44:02] So just make sure we understand the difference in the questions. And then when it comes to the benefits team, that makes sense. That answer for the benefits team makes sense. When it comes to, like, the compliance team, that answer wouldn't make sense for these. Because it's a different team. [00:44:20] I also want to say that when you talk about the Child Protective Services, you're literally only asking for getting close to industry standard. You're not asking for it to go below industry standards. You're asking for almost 1 to 10, which is getting close to industry standard. So right now you've been working above and beyond what the industry says you did. [00:44:39] And these industry standards come from somewhere, right? They don't just come out the blue. They come from somewhere. And again, if you don't do industry standards besides burn out your staff, it becomes a more dangerous place for the clients to have to be part of because we're not working within the correct standards. [00:44:59] And you open yourself up to other issues when you don't work in industry standards. And so your descriptions, your narratives are excellent. Your rationale is absolutely excellent. And the fact that you guys have been working this far above what you should be doing, at one point we kind of had some of this a little more under control. [00:45:21] We had some of the success, especially the benefits team. We had got those numbers back down. We've seen a 15% increase because of a lot of reasons. The COVID question is much too simplistic of an answer to just go, oh, it's COVID. That's way too simplistic of an answer, but no matter what the reasons are, they can take all day to explain, it has still happened. And so we need to get the numbers back in line with what is safe and what is emotionally healthy for you and your staff. But thank you for all that you're doing. Mr. Terno's, I think, motion is going to be to delay some of these [00:45:54] on the, not the benefits team, but on the benefits team. Okay. He's going to make that motion right now yes i am okay um i will move that three public benefits specialists um the move to january 1st authorization i'll second that discussion on that uh no just so the rest of the team stays in place so there's four public benefits specialists plus supervisor program administrator fraud investigator all there now well i'm on my time here um asking going back to [00:46:33] the cps so what you were saying was you think in that case you actually could hire the seven family services specialists within the first six months i think like i said even with both we have been doing much better um and i could get you the data as to when the specific dates that we oh you know what i might have that right here actually because i have a very good if you think you can hire that one i won't make the same motion for that also given the you know obvious importance of the most of the positions that we hired from fy24 [00:47:11] were hired before december 21st okay all right so i won't make this is the only motion i'll make okay discussion on the motion miss umster so i'm a little reluctant to support the motion um i i heard ms fernandez said they could accommodate a delay i didn't say she embraced the idea of delay. I think this department does some of the most critical work in the county, [00:47:46] and if I were going to cut, I would not choose to cut in this department, so I don't think I can support the motion. Thank you. Ms. Brixman. Thank you, Madam Chair. Is staff able to tell us what the savings would be by moving three of those positions to January by any chance an estimate good evening supervisor Brisbane my name is Bobby Clancher I'm a management analyst at the office of management and budget I'm gonna defer that question to Coral related to the public benefit specialist and prorating [00:48:24] January yeah we just need a little bit of time for calculation if we could it's gonna be in the range of about a hundred thirty thousand dollars about 130,000? Okay. All right. Thank you. Okay. Sorry, Madam Chair, I'm sorry. We'll take a minute to calculate it. Okay, but that's okay. That's a rough estimate. I mean, to me, what I wanted to know was what the actual impact would have been, and it's very minimal impact in my opinion, so I probably won't support the motion. Thank you. So in the motion, do you have, whether you embrace it [00:48:58] or not, whatever words we use, do you have heartache about it? I would love to get them all as soon as possible, especially, to tell you the truth, especially with public benefits because of the caseloads that they are at right now, hence the first, that was our first priority. [00:49:20] Okay. All right. Thank you. All right. Mr. Latourna made the motion. I seconded it. All in paper, please say aye. Opposed? All in paper, please say aye. [00:49:36] Opposed? Okay. So that motion will fail, I think, 7-2. 7-2. Yeah, with Mr. Kirsten and Mr. Letourneau voting for the motion. Are there any other motions in the days? [00:49:52] Thank you all for all you do. Thank you very much. All right, we are now going to go to the Health Department, which is description of resources as pages R65 and R66. The budget narrative is 3-14. [00:50:11] Good evening, Dr. Goodfriend. [00:50:27] How are you? Doing well, thank you. Happy to be here. Happy to have you here. And with me tonight, I've got George Kahn, who probably many of you know. He's in charge of our Environmental Health Division. Allison Hubbard, who's in charge of our newly formed Clinical Services Division. And Bob Namalek, who's our recently hired business manager. [00:50:47] Good evening. And as you said, the health department's pages start on page R65. We have two resource requests. Both are to maintain level of services. The first request is within environmental health, again, for our newly formed consumer services division. [00:51:06] They're responsible for food establishment inspections, pool inspections, hotels, motels, migrant camps. And as the county grows and matures, the number of each of those establishments, potentially with the exception of migrant camps, continues to grow. [00:51:25] We have a regulatory requirement to inspect and permit those facilities. There are expectations for the number of inspections per facility, and that comes about mainly for safety reasons. So as those numbers continue to grow, we do need additional staff to maintain that caseload. [00:51:48] If not, then we have to cut back on the number of inspections per facility. And you do that enough, then eventually we start getting into safety issues. So that request is for four environmental health specialists to bring us closer to the recommended average, one supervisor of them to maintain span of control, a team leader to really facilitate our ability and technology with a landmark coming on board, And administrative support, because when we add an administrative person, it frees up a direct service person to go out and do that service. [00:52:25] The other request is for our clinical services division. Clinical services focuses on our safety net services. So as such, in Loudoun County, those are predominantly new folks to our country. [00:52:43] By far, the number one language spoken by those individuals is Spanish. other than potentially English. And as a call back to extension services, when I first got here in 2001, we had one medical interpreter. [00:53:00] Today we have one medical interpreter. So it's been 23 years without a request for an increase in interpretation services. It's a legal requirement to provide interpretation services. That could be done either through a native speaker who talks to individuals, we try to maximize that with our hires but there's only so far that the pool goes to to have native spanish speakers in other languages we do that through telephonic interpretation but that's not only much less efficient because you have to call in it takes a while to get the person but it's [00:53:35] also less effective because they're not there they don't know the situation so adding two additional interpreters allows us to have one spanish language interpreter for each of our major programs that serve our spanish language community and that will free up those other direct service folks to provide that care because now we're able to do it that much quicker we also have a request for a wick supervisor part of that is for spanish control and also part of that is increased capacity right now the estimate is about 50 of the folks who are eligible for the wick for wick actually [00:54:12] get that service. A large part of that is because we don't do any outreach to let people know the benefit that WIC provides because our wait lists have historically been so long that it doesn't really help to divert a focus to people to just increase our wait lists. [00:54:32] This will help bring down those wait times and also hopefully get to that point where we can use our outreach folks to actually let people know the benefit of the service. And For those who aren't familiar with Women, Infant, and Children, it is for pregnant women and children up to the age of five years who are at high risk of nutritional needs. [00:54:53] So it does provide some food security, but its main function is for healthy pregnancies and healthy children. And then the last position is an administrative position, in part to help with our span of control in our clinic, but also to help with our billing. [00:55:14] We do a lot of third-party billing for insurers, Medicaid, and others. And when our administrative staff are overwhelmed, one of the things that goes is billing. And so we wind up with a lot of accounts receivable at the back end. [00:55:33] So the goal of this, in addition to helping with span of control, is to take care of appropriate charges on the front end so we reduce what's owed to the county on the back end and we're happy to take any questions you all have i was going to ask you to explain wick so thank you for doing that in advance all right if you have questions for dr good friend please put your light on mr kirschner thank you madam chair dr good friend thanks for being here i remember seeing you a lot more a few years back so i guess under those circumstances i'm glad i'm seeing you less but appreciate all the work you're doing i know the new department under us without you do you [00:56:12] still have you have still have state employees or have we completely converted as of july 1st we're all we're all county employees we do have uh because we have some uh legacy grants from covid we do have some contract workers but no state employees at all and i'm very happy for that yes we are so i asked that question a little bit strategically just to kind of figure out um what on your first resource request and there's some questions i had about it there's a total of seven positions you're requesting. I think you break it down by one supervisor, four, and you [00:56:45] call them all inspectors. So how many actual new inspectors? So four people are 100% for inspectors. Supervisors are also working supervisors. Okay. So they have a caseload as well. So one of the things I noticed that was somewhat missing from this, because it seems like a lot, you know, we come from year to year, you make different resource requests. And from last year to this year, all of a sudden we need seven inspectors because what you say in this matter, it seems to me. I'm just reading through the lines here. We have four, and you say some specialists expected to complete over 400, which obviously are higher than what the recommended amount. So my question [00:57:20] is, was this request made last year? And two, if we added fewer, would you still be able to make that 280 to 320? Can you talk to me about that? So there are a couple of components to that. One is in order so for food there's a standardization process before they can inspect independently sometimes we get lucky and we will get a candidate who comes in standardized by the state if they're not then it's a 12-month process before they're able to act independently so our when we when we make our request we're looking out at least a year a year and a half with a recruitment process [00:57:59] before these folks are going to be able to be fully functional and add to our numbers. Rather than doing a resource request every year for ones and twos, we come back periodically when the numbers have started to get significantly above the caseload. [00:58:16] Why we're saying some are above that is, as I said, not all of them are focused on food. Some do more pools, some do other functions that we have, and those don't have a standard necessarily the pool code is a local pool code the food code is the one that really is standardized with best practices of how many per inspector for us it's in part easier to to go all at once because they can go through standardization together we can ideally recruit at one time which which is a much more efficient where we can go out [00:58:53] have one pool of applicants and if we have four qualified folks bring them all on board at the same time. Killing my desire to trim the budget down but okay. Because you want healthy food. [00:59:12] Yeah and we take that very seriously. We want everyone to have salmonella so Mr. Letourneau. Yeah I kind of wish you would just do them in dribs and drabs though instead of hitting us with seven in one year because um that's how we end up with this kind of situation where there's 270 new positions in one year um my one other kind of pet peeve is when we start talking about a job or a position that would help us with billing or something like that then i expect to see a revenue number associated with that because if you're going to say that we should be able to [00:59:49] collect better then there should be some kind of offset revenue plus offset to the position but there's none listed here. Yeah, and I apologize for not listing it, but, and I know this isn't a setup, but that's, so, Bhavna has our numbers, so she can tell you what our accounts receivable is. Well, at the end of Feb, our outstanding AR is $217,000. Sorry, your outstanding accounts receivable? Right, but what I'm saying is, though, for budgetary purposes, is one of these positions related to billing going to generate more revenue? And if it is, then that should be [01:00:29] assumed in the budget with an offset. Like this is what PRCS does all the time, right? So part of it, and I'll let Bodna speak to it, is as we're adjusting to life as a county department, part of what we're trying to figure out is how much of what's in our aged account will be written off and will be a loss and how much will just take longer to come in, which makes it a little more difficult. But I don't know if you could speak to it, Bhavna. Well, we're still waiting for guidance from finance to see how we treat our aged accounts. But to your question, supervisor, [01:01:05] would you please repeat that? What I'm wondering is, can we show any type of revenue increase as a result of adding a position, which would then offset the cost by whatever that amount is? And that's something that would show up on the tote board. Well, at this point, we're collecting a permit fees on the environmental health side. [01:01:28] On the food side, there is no revenue to offset that. But outside of that, on the health department side, there is revenue that comes in from clinical services. Right, but are we going to receive more revenue as a result of adding the position? Because that's what Dr. Goodfriend implied. Yeah, so we're not going to bill for more, but we'll collect more. [01:01:46] And I'm not sure how that is referenced. It's not a revenue offset position. It will just enable them to... - It's not a revenue offset position per se, but if it's going to result in more revenue, it's not gonna result in more revenue? [01:02:03] - It will allow us to collect more. Because this is new for us, we don't have a good estimate of how much that would be, and I wouldn't wanna oversell that to you. - So the number of patients that we see at the clinics, that's not going to change? - No, just the amount of revenue we're able to collect for what that they owe. [01:02:22] - All right, I'll wrap around to that one. Mr. Crony? Yeah, thank you, Chair Randall, and thank you, Dr. Goodfriend. So you mentioned this is new for you, so you've never had this environmental health specialist? You've never, I mean, is this a new position? [01:02:39] Because this is a new, this is a new, this is a new. So we've reorganized as part of becoming locally administered. Right. And so consumer services division used to be principally our food inspector. [01:02:55] So the name is different, and some of the responsibilities along the edges are a little different. The function is one that we've continued to do, with the exception of that team tech leader, which is brought on board to help us navigate Landmark and be more efficient with Landmark. [01:03:17] But all the other positions are, we have comparable positions within the health department right now doing those functions. Okay, so how many did you have in the Consumer Services Division? So currently we have 11 of those EHSs. [01:03:34] So the four that you're asking for, we have 11 of those existing currently. Okay, so it would be 15 in total. It would be 15 EHSs total if granted, correct. And we have two supervisor-level positions within Consumer Services, and this would be a third, again, to maintain that span of control. [01:03:50] Do you need three supervisors? It gives us a one-to-five ratio. So it's not necessary, but it maintains that ratio. Is that the ratio that is standard, a one-to-five ratio? Well, I don't know if there's a standard one for food improvement. [01:04:09] It's not standard, but currently, you know, we have an entire program with two supervisors, and if one of those supervisors is not available, you have an entire program with one supervisor. So it assists with span of control when folks are out, and it also assists with span of control because these folks function as small teams. [01:04:25] So right now we have two teams, and we would enlarge those teams. If we get a third supervisor, we would have three smaller, better-functioning teams. And in general, we try to keep a span of one to five to one to seven at the most, a supervisor to supervise staff. [01:04:41] So you could do one to seven? I think we can. So if the thought was that you wanted to remove one, then that's probably the position to remove the supervisor. Again, they are working supervisors, So there would be a caseload that would be attached to the supervisor that we wouldn't have the capacity for. [01:04:59] But you could do one. So that would be the one, not the, it looks like you're asking for an admin assistant and then a team. What's a team? Yeah, because that's a specialized skill that we want to recruit for to have a higher level of IT knowledge and capability than we would expect from a general environmental health specialist. [01:05:22] And for an administrative position, they're just more efficient because there's so much administrative work that our direct service folks do that if we bring on that dedicated admin assistant, then it allows the environmental health specialists to see more in the field. Okay. Mr. Turner. [01:05:41] Thank you, Madam Chair. So if I'm reading this chart correctly, I can't see the environmental health team as adding any revenue, but the clinical health services expansion with the four additional positions, requires $474,000 local tax funding, and if I go to your chart for proposed fiscal 25 revenue, I see the revenue jump $100-ish, $185,000 from 24 to the proposed 25, so I think it's reasonable to assume that if that care is coming from medical care, then that's probably distributed through the clinical health services, so you could say that $185,000 [01:06:20] offsets the 474.260 in in local tax funding costs am i reading that wrong because that sounds like that's a revenue offset to me supervisor turner i i think you are interpreting that incorrectly can you interpret it correctly for me that that is program revenue that is not related to the positions shown in the budget but clinical services is part of medical care isn't it yeah so So I don't think it's reflected here. [01:06:51] But as we look at it, if we add an interpreter position, it hypothetically allows us to see more clients in a day. Because now that nurse who may not be bilingual is able to get that client and the clinician to get that patient through that much quicker. [01:07:09] For WIC, it doesn't bring in revenue to us. It definitely brings in revenue to the community. But our WIC grant hypothetically might go up in the future, but not necessarily as a result of increasing our caseloads. [01:07:25] I think you're touching on my point. I take your point, Ms. Burke, that it may not be a one-to-one correlation between these positions and revenue generation. But if you enhance the delivery capacity of an organization by virtue of these four positions, and the medical care revenues from that specific organization go up $185,000, there's at least a presumption of a holistic correlation there that you've improved the capacity of the unit by adding four people and the revenue's gone up. [01:07:56] That may be a stretch. I accept that. But anyway, I made my point, I think. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Brixman? Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you for your presentation and the data that justifies what you're asking for. We have a couple of requests in the budget for positions that would help with Landmark. [01:08:19] And you also mentioned it here. So I'm just curious, how does the health department interact with that new system? And I know there's been kind of some glitches here and there, but how does the health department interact with that system? So the health department, we actually use Landmark for our on-site services. [01:08:36] So for instance, if you're trying to get a well, if you're trying to get a septic system, you would actually apply through Landmark. So when Landmark was rolled out, the health department was never using the state system. We actually used the local land management system. So for half of our program, our on-site services, we do use Landmark. [01:08:55] Oh, interesting. What this position would allow us to do would actually bring a lot of the other state services into the Landmark realm, where it's able to handle them, but we just don't have the capacity to build them into it. Okay. All right. Thank you. So I want to remind everyone how new we are in having our own health department at the county level. [01:09:15] We just got here. I mean, it's been like a year, maybe. Is it not even a year? Not even a year? It's July 1st. So we're asking questions like, you know, don't do it in drips and drafts because you've got to do it all at once. They weren't here before. They're new. [01:09:30] We just got a health department in Loudoun County. That's the first thing. Second thing is, you know, no county agency or no county part of the county ever wants to lose any revenue if you don't have to. But listen, it's the health department. They're not really here to make money, right? [01:09:46] They're here to make sure that people who otherwise wouldn't have these services have these services. They're here to make sure that the food we eat is edible. They're here to make sure that our wells are not going goody, and if they are, what we can do about that. [01:10:03] The money we keep by having a good health department is incalculable. It really is. I mean, all of us remember a couple of years back when one of our restaurants had a salmonella outbreak and what that was like and how much they got sued for. [01:10:21] They're the health department. We have other departments that the job is to make money. Their job is to keep us alive and doing a pretty good job at that. So good job and congratulations. I'm done. Are there any motions? [01:10:40] Very good. Thank you very much for being here. Thank you. All right. The person I never get to spend any time talking to is the inmate sats department. I'm joking. I talk to Margaret all the time. Would they come to the table, please? [01:11:06] Okay. You all start on your description on page R67 to R70, and the budget narrative is 3-20. Welcome. Good evening. Thank you for this opportunity to present the FY 2025 Mental Health, Substance Abuse, and Developmental Services Priorities. [01:11:25] I have with me today my deputy director, Cheryl Watson, and the senior manager of finance, Bina Chundavalel. The first priority that the department puts forward, that, as you said, starts on page R67, is to address the needs of developmental services case management. [01:11:44] The second addresses the internal supports required in the human resources and contract management. And the third priority addresses the support of the early intervention program serving infants and toddlers. In each of these service activities, there is a low-to-no turnover and low-to-no vacancies. [01:12:05] And the positions are not hard to fill. This prioritization of the request balances the mandates for services to the community with the requisite internal business supports. I'm happy to answer any questions. Yeah, you just swung right for the fences to start with, didn't you? [01:12:23] she did. Thank you very much, Mr. Letourneau. I actually wasn't planning on trying to do any of that. So there you go. I do have a question. I'm questioning a little bit Priority 3. Let me get to that in a sec. On Priority 1, though, huge waiting list still, 850 for services. Do you know how much this request, the Priority 1 request, would help get that waiting list down? So this priority one request will address the service needs of 100 individuals of the 850 on the [01:12:59] waiting list yes so uh and the priority one is is a it's a team-based request oh i see okay because um we've i do come almost every year but last year i did not ask for any support coordinators and anytime we get a waiver slot we are the only and mandated require um provider of support coordination um coming out of covid the budget year was a little wonky so we got some late [01:13:30] slots and then this year starting july and then again and most recently we got like 60 so we have some people with very high caseloads right now and there's about 40 people who buy uh attainment of 18 years and i have to cut you off in a sec because i'm gonna run out of time oh sorry sorry All right. So on the priority three, the early intervention case managers, it's always dangerous when we do math up here, but it says that the growth in demand is 8.7%. The increase in the [01:14:06] number of service coordinator positions is 50%. So by my math, you could more than address the growth in demand with one position instead of two and still have some capacity left over compared to where we are now. Am I understanding that wrong? So I'm going to say yes, only because we did not ask for any service coordinators in the last fiscal year. So there's a certain amount [01:14:37] of redistribution that is currently being absorbed across specialized providers that makes the service, we have to provide the service, but it makes the service much more expensive. So we would redistribute that to have physical therapists, occupational therapists, speech therapists, developmental services specialists, I'm forgetting social workers, once again, be very focused only on those services. And it's 8.7% between July 22 and July 23. So what you're saying is from 21 to 22, was there a similar increase or a larger increase? You didn't ask for that position last [01:15:16] year. I didn't ask for that position last year. Okay. Okay. I'm not sure I entirely understand it more because it's just complicated, I think, with the way that it works. So if somebody else asks a similar question, I'll listen, but thank you. Thank you. Mr. Sainz? Thank you, Madam Chair. [01:15:35] Just out of curiosity, for the early intervention case managers, you have it listed as a priority level three, but if I'm reading this right, it's supposed to be mandated as part of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act? Yes, sir. So why is it a priority three if it's a So my priority one and my priority two, there's absolutely no other way to do it. [01:15:58] In my priority three, if I did not get these positions, I would rely more heavily on contract providers of other services. I would increase caseloads distribution in a different way. And essentially, I would be less cost effective, but I still would deliver the service of service coordination. [01:16:20] Because you're at the contract. Because I'd have to contract, and I would have a physical therapist doing more case management or service coordination, but I could make it happen. And you can't do that with the other ones? No, sir. Okay, just out of curiosity, but thank you. I see. [01:16:36] Mr. Kirshner. Thank you, Madam Chair. I think my question is, by the way, welcome. Good to see you guys again, at least once a year. Quick question. What I understand from the four pages in here of your resource request, you're asking for a total of 15 positions. [01:16:52] Does that sound right? Yes, sir. And I don't know if this is something that staff can answer. I actually see, if you go back and look at the history of FTE by department, the book on E27 actually says the increase will be 20. [01:17:10] Is there an explanation to that? Am I missing something? And while they're finding that, it does appear as if this is a fairly modest growth. I believe that might be the mid-year five. [01:17:25] Oh, is that what that is? That I got for residential support professionals. That's the difference? Yes, sir. And that may make sense. Is that the answer as far as we know? Your question is the history of FTE by department. [01:17:42] Yeah, so we have the adopted 2024, which is 20 above, but they're only asking for 15. But that would be the explanation. It would be partway, halfway through. Okay. All right. I think that was really the only question. I mean, one of the things I always check to see how rapidly the department's growing. [01:18:01] Obviously, I think we had a big jump for you folks back during following the pandemic or during the pandemic. There were a number of different changes, but it seems like your resource request to me seems to be fairly reasonable. So thank you. Thank you, sir. Ms. Umstead. [01:18:18] Thank you, Madam Chair. I am going to make an assumption and tell me whether you agree or disagree and feel free to disagree. It seems to me that the damage done during the pandemic by shutdowns and isolation continues to cost us a lot of money because we need to beef up mental health services, family services. [01:18:48] Do you find that things are as difficult now as they were back in 2020, 2021? Do you see us getting out of this at any point in the next five years? [01:19:10] So that is a very complicated question on a lot of different levels. And for MHSADS, some of what we're seeing specific to mental health and substance use disorder treatment is the patient, the request for service, the volume of service requests is increasing again. [01:19:41] And for every person who comes across our threshold, there is an intensity factor that is different today than it was five years ago. And during the pandemic, we were able to do therapy through telehealth. [01:20:02] And now we have about 70% of the population coming back to in-person services by their choice. there is clinical discussion and review, but the individuals themselves are choosing to come back to in-person. So as far as there's an acuity factor, an intensity factor to this, that I don't know if it's just due to the impact of the years of COVID and the other things that were happening, [01:20:36] or if it's also that the socialization of mental health and mental illness and treatment is greater. And coming out of it, it's a hard thing to say because people used to not come forward for treatment, support, and care, and we want you to come forward and earlier, and we want access for crisis now, when you need it, how you need it. [01:21:08] Someone to talk to, someone to respond, and a place to go, and not just the emergency department of the hospital. Sorry for the snapping. I have to get my memory to go. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Rixman. Thank you, Madam Chair. I think that the resource requests are fairly well justified, given the growth and the complications. [01:21:30] I just wanted to dig in a little bit to priority two. I'm a little bit confused about it. It's the internal support, three FTEs, one HR program manager, and two contract managers. Is that HR within your department? Yes. Okay. [01:21:45] Yes. All right. I feel like some other departments might have less HR internally. So, I guess, can you talk to me a little bit about why you need that? So, my department does operate differently than many. [01:22:03] And I'm actually going to turn to Cheryl because you can probably explain it better. I do have a team that sorts for the credentials that we need in the applications, that does the credentialing and the review of the criteria for each position to make sure we're getting the right people. [01:22:28] And then because we have 24 service activities across, I can't tell you how many environments and a group of managers who do a lot of supervision work, we have a lot of employee relations work that happens. [01:22:44] What am I forgetting? There are currently eight FTEs on our HR team that includes folks specializing in recruitment, employee relations, payroll, and general HR kinds of functions. Recruiting for some of these very distinct and specialized licenses really is a specialization. [01:23:06] The training requirements, I think, exceed a lot of others. I also think that, I just lost my train of thought. Well, the 24-7 programs, but the, not just the credentialing, but the background checks, exceed that which is required in other places across the department. [01:23:28] So there are a number of specialized components to this team of eight. Okay. All right. Thank you. It would be great to be a team of nine. Thanks. Bye-bye. Thanks. So your answer to Ms. Umstead's question was one of the best answers I've ever heard. It was perfect. I wish that it was just the isolation we had during those two years. [01:23:46] If that was the case, four years later, we wouldn't be seeing the issues we're seeing. And I think COVID uncovered things that was already there, but it didn't create things that had not been there before. And that's such a simplistic view to think that that's true. There's also all these other things. [01:24:02] I mean, for young people at social media, it is the collective trauma we dealt with. It was the political environment that we dealt with. It was an economy. It's all of it. It's all of it. It's not one thing. So many of us wish it were one thing because that one thing is not that hard to adjust to. [01:24:21] But it's not one thing. And so your answer was wonderful because it's a complicated issue, and we have to approach it in that way. And the acuity is so much higher. It's so much higher than it used to be. [01:24:39] And when the acuity is higher, you're just going to need more services around that. So you all are actually doing a lot of this, you know, on a bit more of a shoestring than I actually think you should. But that's the request you had. [01:24:56] And so the request you have, I certainly will not make any motion to take anything out. I think you guys are doing an amazing job of what you're working with all the time. So I appreciate you. I appreciate the work you're doing. If I had any warning, I would warn you all against compassion fatigue because that's a very real thing. [01:25:13] and to just be always aware of that, especially during this time. So I got nothing but thanks for what you do and complete understanding and thanks for what you do. Thank you very much. Does anyone want to make any motions? Okay, wonderful. [01:25:28] Thank you so much. Thank you. Have a great evening. Have a great evening. Supervisors, before we go into building and development, let's go back and have the discussion on the purchase of right development memorandum, which is under the staff budget, budget staff updates in your, it's 41 pages. [01:25:54] Actually, did you want to do that with DPZ or did you want to do that separately? We were prepared to do it as part of DPZ's budget, but there is one position that is for the Department of Building and Development, so it would make sense to have it as a separate topic as well. [01:26:09] I thought, well, you put it down as a separate topic. That's where I assumed it was, actually. So I would just assume, since it's more than one department, I'd just assume do it now. Okay. Okay. Good evening. [01:26:38] Good evening. We're just doing PDR right now. We're just doing the PDR right now. Yeah. Because they put it separately because it's more than one. Yeah. Good evening, Chair Randall and members of the board. We are at the table at this moment for the purchase development rights board priority item that is within the budget. [01:26:56] Actually, let me grab my. The request itself can be found on R10 because it is multi-departmental. I have Jennifer Moore, senior planner with planning and zoning here, who has been the project manager for the work we've been doing thus far. There's also Kristen Brown from Office of Mapping and Geographic Information because stewardship is currently a responsibility of her staff. [01:27:19] And we also have Betsy Smith, director of building and development, because as you noted, one of these positions requested would be in her department. So it's three departments. It's three positions in two departments, but we would be transferring duties from Omagi to DPZ as part of all of this shuffling around. [01:27:37] Gotcha. Okay. Thank you. The three requests that we have are for a PDR manager. That would be the individual tasked with running the program, essentially, serving as liaison to the proposed PDR board. [01:27:56] There's also a stewardship manager. Both of those positions would be in DPZ. The stewardship manager would be in charge of the actual stewardship of the properties that would be under easement due to the PDR program. However, we also have 300 or more, and Kristen may be able to give an exact number, but at least 300 easements that the county is currently responsible for that we try to do our best to provide stewardship to. [01:28:20] But our workload has ended up a lot more into interpretation of easements and ensuring that as permits come through, what's being proposed is actually applicable and allowable under the easement. It's not going to the site and visiting them on the regular basis, as we should be doing. [01:28:36] The third position is a conservation program planner that would be within building development. And that would be a planner in their department that would be reviewing easements and helping do that work with as permits and site plans and subdivision plats are submitted to ensure again that those are complying with the terms of whatever easements the county is party to okay yes yes we're happy to answer any questions i think we have lots of questions up here about this one thank you so much miss umsup uh thank you madam chair um all right i'm in a quandary uh because i would like [01:29:15] to support this program. But I am more interested in seeing us reduce the tax rate to some lower level. And I don't want to have to gut the school board to school budget to do that. So for me, the question is, do we have any way of estimating what savings there may be to the taxpayers through PDR program by us preventing further development? Have we been able to calculate any numbers [01:29:52] to answer that question? I believe it's in your packet. The capital intensity factor per home that would be built on land is what we've used in the past. The savings, if the land, the development rights have been purchased and the right to build a home has been extinguished on that property, that's between $30,000 and $50,000 per dwelling unit that would not be impacting on capital intensity factor. [01:30:27] Do you have any way to project how many dwelling units this program would prevent from being built? We do have remaining development rights available per policy area. [01:30:45] I do not have that in front of me, but it is a significant amount of acreage that's available in each policy area that subtracts out constraints such as flood plain or easements already on the land and we do have pure data i just don't have in front of me however i would also note a lot of it's going to be dependent on the funding that the board would actually put into purchasing those rights if the board provides funding that allows less rice be purchased it's going to be less of an effect in the long term than if the board funds it for more it's as simple [01:31:19] is that? Sure. I know there's a proposal to fund it to the extent of about $6 million. I guess for me to be fully supportive of this, I would need to know that we were going to save at least that much money from the buildings, the homes not being built. So I don't expect any more answers tonight, but just for awareness, that's where I'll be coming from. I appreciate your work. [01:31:53] Thank you. Mr. Turner. Thank you, Madam Chair. The PDR program, as you envision, is a classic PDR program. So we set up our PDR program at the county, and then we purchased the development rights from eligible properties, and then we steward those properties to make sure they're in compliance with the conservation. Is that correct? That's correct. Okay. My concept for a different type of PDR program, I think would still fit within that framework. [01:32:22] My concept is instead of us acquiring the purchase of development rights and stewarding the conservation program, we would simply allow the current conservation easement program to go forward and we would use PDR funding to plus up the loss in market value when a person puts their land into conservation easement. [01:32:42] So when they go into, this is a big item in the cluster subdivision discussion right now so when you put your land in a conservation easement it's appraised at the current value and I know the item talked about whether we do I can't remember the term one of them was an appraisal method and most counties in the in the in the commonwealth do appraisal method you appraise the property and you appraise it at the developing the development ability of that property but when you put it in conservation easement then you the conservation easement is calculated on the reduced value because you're not going to develop the property. So there's a delta between the value they get from the conservation easement. They get a bunch of tax breaks, but there's also a [01:33:22] decrease in the value of the property if it can't be developed. I'm proposing that we use the PDR program to plus up that delta so that we don't have to administer the program. Virginia Open Space Foundation, whoever does the conservation easement, actually goes through the normal conservation easement process, and we use PDR funding to pay the administrative fees and to plus up the delta to the market value which creates a much much bigger incentive for people to go into a conservation easement program that we don't have to administer which reduces our stewardship stewardship requirements etc i still think feel very strongly that the three positions [01:33:57] you're requesting would still be needed to run a pdr program even of the kind that i'm talking about but that would dramatically reduce i think program costs this is not a money-saving program this is not intended to be a money-saving program it is a land preservation program My proposal would be to earmark future data center business personal property taxes that go over our operating budget amount and set it aside to fund the PDR program. [01:34:25] Yes, technically it's still taxpayer dollars, but you actually earmark additional revenue from data center business personal property tax to fund the PDR program. So I'm fully in support of these three positions. I think they make perfect sense to set up the PDR program. We've been talking about this now for a long time. [01:34:43] I think it's time to set it up I think it's an excellent tool to have in our toolbox it is not just to benefit Western properties it could easily be used to benefit Eastern properties albeit a much smaller amount but I have to believe there would be eligible properties in East that we could use as well for the PDR program thank you okay mr. saints thank you madam chair just out of cure when I read the description of the stewardship manager it sounds to me it's almost like a similar position or of the of a zoning enforcement officer What is the difference, or could they be, where do you see them as similar? [01:35:21] Because, like, with the stewardship manager, it looks like they're just going to be going to the different properties, wherever PDRs are, and making sure the owners are doing what they're supposed to do, which kind of is the same thing for zoning enforcement officer. So, Supervisor Sains, a big part of conservation easement stewardship is working in partnership with the property owner. [01:35:40] And so it is, there's an education component. There's, we are allowed under the state code to do site visits. But a lot of it is when they want to do something with their property. So typically, you do have some rights if you have a conservation easement. [01:35:58] And that's where the stewardship position comes into play. They would work with that person to make certain that what they want to do is allowed in the terms of the easement, all of which are a little bit different. That person would also work with the PDR manager and then with the conservation planner that would be planned for B&D to make sure that things are, that their requests are allowed under the terms of the easement, are allowed under the zoning regulations, and are allowed under natural resources policies. [01:36:30] Again, you literally define what a zoning enforcement officer does. They do site visits. They work with the property owner to make sure they're doing everything they're supposed to be doing. One key distinction is that since the county is party to the easement, we have an additional responsibility to ensure that those easement standards are being upheld the way that a zoning enforcement official does not we're insisting that the property owner do that but we don't have a invested interest in someone else's individual personal property in this case since we are holders of the easements we have an additional responsibility to ensure that that's being met right it's still similar i grant you but [01:37:09] because that's my thinking is like well why don't we just do create an uh do another ft for your zoning enforcement officer and have them go to the PDR locations and do exactly what you're saying the steward manager is supposed to do. It's literally almost the exact same thing for the most part. [01:37:26] So a stewardship is part of every, I believe, PDR program that is in surrounding jurisdictions. All of the land trusts have stewardship officers who do this. It is to help educate the owner in what they are doing before, to catch issues before they happen. [01:37:48] which is a bit of a different function than I think what the zoning officers do. I think a subtle difference is that in zoning enforcement, it is enforcement. It's after the fact when somebody has done something wrong, we go and work with them to right that wrong. [01:38:08] The stewardship program is to go ahead of mistakes and help that property owner understand the rights, the uses, the environmental constraints that they have agreed to as a part of that conservation agreement. [01:38:27] Okay. Mr. Kirshner. Thank you, Madam Chair. To me, this is incredibly time critical that we adopt some form of a PDR program. I heard what Supervisor Turner said, I could not agree with him more, and we actually get into the details of the program, which we're not really discussing today. [01:38:49] That's part of our work plan. I think having that discussion in TLUC, assuming we get this adopted, is really critical because I think we can actually take the funds that ultimately get put towards that and magnify them. And quite frankly, for any of those listening, my colleagues, you've all been to Fauquier, you've all been to Clark County, you've all been to Frederick County, Maryland, you've all been to Frederick County, Virginia. [01:39:12] You've also all been to Fairfax, and you've also all been to Prince William. And the difference between Prince William, which now has opened up their western policy area, and Fairfax and all those counties there versus the ones Falkir and Clark is because they had programs just like this. And we see how much pressure there is on development in the west. [01:39:30] This board may not open up western Loudoun County, but the next board is going to or the board after that. It's going to happen. So if you guys like what we see in western Loudoun County, we have to come up with tools. And this is just one small, simple tool. What's in the staff report is a very simplified, a very small aspect. [01:39:52] We still have conservation easements working. And quite frankly, we've had many farmers come here. This is one of the best things for farming in Western Loudoun. This is going to preserve more and more and more land and prime ag soils and all those things we've been talking about forever. It really is. [01:40:09] You see it in all the other counties. So a couple of things and then a little bit of less time, and then I have one question. I heard a number of different things here. It's not going to be a cost. There will be some cost savings, obviously. It's not apples to apples. But obviously, we know that houses cost only pay for about 50% of what they do. [01:40:29] I think there'll be cost savings to our rural economy. The more housing developments that we have spring up, there'll be costs. There'll be a significant cost to our farming. We heard the farm ag statistics come out recently and how well we are doing, but how much land we have lost. [01:40:46] This, I think, suggests a very small amount, like 1% of the 35,000 remaining acres that we need to preserve. So it's just one simple minor tool in the toolbox. The one question I have, and a little bit of time that I have left, oh, and by the way, this is something when we had the discussion on the workbook, this is not a TDR program. [01:41:05] Just want to make sure that's right. Mr. Letourneau, when we had the discussion, misspoke. I'm sure it was an accident, but this is not a TDR program. We're not exchanging a density here for there. It's simply a purchase of development rights. That's all this is. And so my last question, I think this would be very helpful to some of the board members. [01:41:23] One of the equity priorities is to give those piece of property priority, if I understand it, for places to help fill the gaps in our 2019 general plan for parks and trails and stuff like that. Is that correct? Could you talk about that? That's correct. [01:41:38] There's a property ranking system, which is where applications get their points. One of the largest, actually the largest chunk of points is if the property has prime ag soil on it. One of the other large points that you can get, the largest points, is if it's proximal to an existing easement. [01:41:57] And if it's a neighboring property to a park to further the linear parks and trails effort. Also, one of the larger pieces of points you can receive is proximity or affiliation with an African-American community. [01:42:13] or providing a green buffer around some of our rural historic villages. So it can be prioritizing 2019 general plan priorities like the linear parks and trails and equity initiatives, open space initiatives. I hope that answers your question. [01:42:32] Mr. Crony. Okay, thank you, Chair Randall. You're welcome. And thank you, Jennifer, for that answer, and thank you, staff. I agree with Supervisor Kirshner that we've been waiting for this for a long time. It's been since 2019, and this is one tool in the toolbox, and it's extinguishing the development rights of a property, and I agree that, you know, this can be for both east and west. [01:43:00] That's what's nice about it is that, you know, the linear parks and trails, there's a lot of trails that we're prioritizing in the east, so this can help us meet that goal, And public access is not a requirement, but it's an opportunity. [01:43:16] And I think that, you know, we can work it out with property owners potentially to get public access for the public. One thing I wanted to talk about was the fact that there are a lot of grants out there that will allow us to leverage money for this program. [01:43:34] So maybe you can go through some of the grants. Like, I know we talked about a VDAC grant for startup. That's potentially in November that we could leverage to start up this program. Yes, and just as reference, our neighboring jurisdictions, Clark, over the years has, and that's over 20 years, has received $4.3 million in grants. [01:43:56] Fauquier receives $50,000 a year just for stewardship from the Virginia Land Conservation Fund. Fall CARE also receives VDAC's funding, which is Virginia Department of Ag and Consumer Services. In fiscal year 24, it was $165,000. [01:44:13] So there is a sort of startup grant that is through the Virginia Farmland Preservation Fund. And the literal statement is that it provides a dollar-for-dollar match to any local government that wishes to use funding to conserve farmland via a conservation easement. [01:44:35] So there is that available, and there is the ALE, which is Agricultural Land Easements, which is federal funding, through the NRCS, Natural Resource Conservation. In fiscal year 23, they awarded $3.2 million. [01:44:51] So there's federal and state funding that is available, and it's a substantial amount, we are told, and that there is a longstanding history of successful grant applications for localities in Virginia. [01:45:07] Awesome. Yeah, thank you for that. You have the ordinance all ready to go, right? Staff, the ordinance, and potentially the forms. So we could stand up this program pretty quickly. Correct. It's been sort of sitting for a while, as we've mentioned, so it wouldn't hurt to have a second review. [01:45:23] But we do have the ordinance and the program drafted and ready. Okay, and there's $30,000 for marketing that we can use that I think was approved years ago by the board. So this program is ready to go. And I think three is a great start. [01:45:40] Mr. Cohen, your time is up. Oh, darn it. Thank you. Mr. Leterano. Thank you. So how much money do you think is going to be actually needed in the budget to fund the PDR program for it to be effective in the eyes of some? [01:45:56] Millions? Millions, yes. Millions. So the budget request tonight is just the positions, but then there will be an additional $6 million. Roughly half a penny that would need to be used, potentially out of fund balance. [01:46:14] But it's not as if that's not an ongoing cost. We have no way of knowing whether an individual who's taking PDR money actually would have developed, right? Correct. So it's really just hypothetical. Is it truly more profitable for somebody to take the PDR money than it is to develop? [01:46:35] More profitable? No. No, it's not. So I believe, anyway, that someone who wants to develop is going to develop, regardless. It's not about whether or not that's good or bad in this discussion. It's about who's actually choosing. [01:46:52] Those who aren't going to develop now have an opportunity to get more money for it. You mentioned across policy areas. So this is not just, at least as envisioned right now, it's not just a Western Loudoun program, right? Correct. This is also PDR eligibility in Eastern Loudoun. [01:47:10] Yes. Yes. how exactly does that does the board have the opportunity to change that or so the board would have the opportunity to definitely to change the scorecard that would be proposed as part of the program to fine-tune some of those details but right you want to speak about the old program the previous program over half of the funding went to eastern loudon to east of 15 so it depends on the applications that are received right it was really used to prevent suburban policy area development. So I continue to get massive whiplash when I hear about housing availability issues [01:47:46] and the desire for more housing, and then I hear us seriously contemplating a program that could actually buy out development rights in places that our comprehensive plan actually wants them. Ms. Brixman. I think we're really getting ahead of ourselves trying to design a program on the dais this evening. That program has been put on TBD, and we will have a robust discussion, I believe, when it is actually put on the calendar in the DPZ work plan. [01:48:22] To the items tonight that we're discussing this evening, the one position that we need to actually manage the 300 properties in easement right now is the stewardship position, correct? [01:48:38] Correct. Okay. And that position would go in the Department of Planning and Zoning? Yes. Okay. And in that position description, will there be anything that refers to a PDR program? It might be referenced as sort of ancillary, but it's the focus of what would end up being in the job description, I would assume, would focus on easements themselves. [01:49:00] It may mention where the easements come from, but it's not, I don't think there'd be a reason to specifically mention a PDR program. Okay. And also, just to add a little bit to the discussion, we have support funding right now for those who want to put in applications for conservation easements, right? [01:49:18] We have grants that people can apply for to do that. Yes. Okay, thank you. It's almost $7 million to our next lower half penny, correct? All right, so, listen, I appreciate that, and I'm both making motions and voting for taking things out of the budget. [01:49:40] The likelihood we're going to get to another $6 million off of this, or $7 million, is pretty, pretty low, to be honest. I mean, it just is. So not approving something because you want to get to the next half penny is probably not very realistic, to be honest. And for anyone that talks in the past about the fact that houses cost money, well, this actually would prevent the houses from costing money. [01:50:02] So I don't need to say what somebody else has said. I will associate myself, Mr. Kirshner's comments, to a large degree, to Mr. Crony's comments to a large degree. I only followed about one half of what Mr. Turner says, so I can't associate myself with those comments, but we'll just go through that again later. [01:50:24] Thank you very much. And, you know, it's not that we're creating a program or not creating a program. It's that we're doing the budget, and these positions are in the budget. And so that's why we're having this discussion tonight, not because we're trying to explain a program. It's because we have to decide in positions in two departments, three positions in two departments in the budget. [01:50:46] So this discussion really is a budget discussion, not a how-would-the-program-work discussion. So thank you very much. I think that's all for questions. Do we have a motion? I have a motion. I have a motion. You have a motion. I'll go Mr. Eternal first for your motion. [01:51:02] I move the Board of Supervisors remove one program manager and one conservation program planner from the purchase of development rights requests in the FY25 budget. Motion is made by Mr. Turner, second by Supervisor Bricksman. Discussion on the motion. Yeah, so I mean, we really are kind of having a bit of a proxy discussion about whether to have the program because if we don't have the positions, we're not going to have the program. [01:51:22] Hence my motion. And it's not a surprise or a secret where I'm coming from on this topic. I completely agree about the value of Western Loudoun, the value of keeping it as it is. To me, that's not really what this is about. There is not, to me, solid evidence that this program is actually going to prevent much development from occurring, number one. [01:51:46] Number two, this program, again, applies countywide, and we are limited in our ability to restrict it. Yes, there's some things we can do with the scoring and all that, but we can't just make it a Western Loudoun program exclusively. So we're gonna be in a position where people could be trying to get this in Eastern Loudoun, which I think runs contrary to what the board's goals are on housing in general. [01:52:09] um third um it is a little bit um there's an expression i could use and i won't use it because it contains a word that's not as nice but it's a little bit backwards to be adding the positions before we actually have the program and and we've decided what it would be and what we would need you know for instance mr turner has an alternative theory of the what the program is which may very well be valid i i don't know but that would potentially present a different staffing need than what is in front of us if we did it that way maybe even less of one I don't know so I'm not going to put money in the budget for something when a I don't probably support the underlying [01:52:47] program and I've been pretty clear about that I don't think it's going to achieve what the proponents wish it to and b we haven't actually decided to do it and what it looks like it's just very all hypothetical finally I understand there's a lot of money left to the next tax rate but first of all we've been told to vote with intention and not to try to engineer the tax rate with all these different votes so that's number one number two these positions carry over from year to year so if they're in this budget this year they're going to be in the budget next year and that's an additional cost that we carry from year to year to year and who knows what the tax rate discussion will be then and then third given what the state discussion is on lcps funding we actually [01:53:26] may have the opportunity to cover that with state money and that will affect this and we will potentially be able to get this rate down. And so I've been clear from the jump that I've been trying to do that in my case, because I do think that the tax rate's high. So for all those reasons, I think we should take this out tonight. Thank you, Mr. Turner. Mr. Turner, to your credit, you've been clear about this issue since I've known you, because I put this up in 2018 or something. I put this forward and it didn't pass then. And so you've been clear for many, many years about this. It's not new for you. I say that that's a good thing. You're consistent is what I'm trying to say. [01:54:06] Ms. Umstead? Since Mr. Letourneau's motion is before us, I'll just comment on that. I will support that. My motion would have been to remove all three positions, but I'm comfortable with supporting Supervisor Letourneau. [01:54:23] For me to be convinced that a PDR program is is worth it is worth the cost i would have to be assured that the proposed six million would cover about 1200 homes because on average every 200 new homes have cost us about a million dollars in school costs so that's uh supervisor turner has said this is not about saving money but when I look at the interests of the taxpayers I think we have to take actions that [01:54:58] save money and if this truly does not save any money for the taxpayers then I really cannot support it thank you mr. crony thank you chair Randall just to clarify supervisor Turner it's that you were cutting the stewardship and what were the two that you were trying to cut I'm not cutting the one that staff said they needed regardless of whether we have the PDR program. I'm cutting program manager and conservation program planner, but not the stewardship. Okay. So I won't be supporting [01:55:36] this. I think we need the PDR program manager to really start up the program at least. It sounds like we're going to push forward the ordinance that's already ready, and we have $30,000, and I think we need a program manager to start writing grants and to start meeting, you know, start setting up the PDR board and potentially meeting with some interested property owners. So I won't be supporting the stewardship manager as someone we need now in staff and, you know, for the 300 easements that we have. So that's someone we need now. It's not someone who [01:56:14] can stand up the PDR program. So I think having a PDR program manager is desperately needed to do what we've been trying to do since 2019, which is stand up a PDR program as a tool to start conserving properties in both the East and the West. I do think that there are some properties in the east that aren't suitable for development that have environmental or historic or other features that we want to preserve so not all properties in the east I think should be for [01:56:53] development I mean I do think having a ranking system will help us prioritize properties that we want to preserve I know the east wants more open space they want more green space so this will provide another way to get that done and to help also get the linear parks and trails done which is largely happening in the east and it'll help us get the easements that we desperately need so I won't be supporting this because it's only for the stewardship manager which I know we already need for mapping it [01:57:31] won't help us get the PDR program started what we really need is a PDR program manager. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Turner. Thank you, Madam Chair. I do, I would like to just throw out some numbers that I have floating around in my head from reading about the cluster ordinance and having worked on a TDR and PDR program concepts for quite some time now. [01:57:55] There's about 331,000 acres of land in Loudoun County. I believe we currently have about 25,000 acres under conservation easement. Can you confirm that? Is that number about right? 83,000. $23,000? $83,000. $83,000 currently under conservation easement. [01:58:13] The new capital intensity factor establishes a CIF of over $100,000 for single-family dwellings. Most of the houses, there are potentially $11,000 and change homes that can be built in Loudoun County, I believe. [01:58:31] So $100,000 per home times $11,000 homes, if theoretically all of them went into conservation easement. Obviously, not all of them are going to do that. but I think there could be a substantial savings. Again, I don't think that's the intent of the program, but given the new capital intensity factor, the fact that the predominant number of homes that are built in clusters out in the West are single-family detached homes, that's a fairly substantial savings to offset the cost of administering the program. [01:58:56] Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Kirshner. Thank you, Madam Chair. So I'm going to correct the record here a little bit from a few things that were said. One of the things that Mr. Letourneau mentioned is that we're having a proxy discussion. [01:59:11] That is correct. We are kind of having a proxy discussion. We don't know exactly how the program would work. But we, I think it's really important that we be deliberate about this process. And if we recall just a few weeks ago, Mr. Letourneau said, well, we're getting the cart before the horse here. [01:59:29] Well, he was the one that put forward the motion that put the process of this at the bottom of the plan. So to say, well, we're getting the cart before the horse is a little bit disingenuous, quite frankly, because he doesn't want the program at all. So let's just be really straight and upfront and honest about what's going on here. [01:59:50] So if you put it at the bottom of the plan when it was supposed to be worked on in the spring and then come and turn around and have the argument that says, oh, we're getting this cart before the horse, well, that was the motion that was put forward. So let's just really be honest here. This doesn't have to be funded in this particular budget session. [02:00:06] We can visit the funding at the end of the year as we get into the excess money that we have. When we look at the fund balance, when you look at the totality of the fund, I spoke with Mr. Hemstreet. He certainly doesn't feel like it would be a problem to look at funding it that way. [02:00:26] And by that time, we would have the program put together. These particular positions will not be put into place until at least July. And so between now and July, we can continue to work through the specific details of the program. [02:00:43] And then there was a statement, I think, and this is a kind of a question I have for staff within this motion, if it's okay, Madam Chair. Yeah, of course. I know that the talk is to allow this both in the east and the west, but can it technically be applied to a particular policy areas if we as a board decided to do that when we flesh out the final details of the plan? [02:01:06] Who is that question? I think that question is going to miss too. It doesn't have to necessarily be countywide, correct? It could be, or we could have criteria that would make it more desirable in certain places we could definitely do the latter i'd have to to talk with the county attorney's office to see if it can truly be limited completely geographically as a hard rule but we could definitely set up the the scoring rubric in a way that would greatly emphasize it in one area over another great and so that answers another question the last question is well people are not going to do this they're going to develop their land that is absolutely false you can look at any of those counties that i've laid out and compare it to the counties that have not had these programs and see the visual [02:01:45] incredible visual difference that is just flat out wrong. Thanks. - Thank you, Mr. Sainz. - Thank you, Madam Chair. Just out of curiosity, say if we approve three, two, or one of the positions today, and they take effect in July, but we have not gone through the process of setting up the guardrails for the PDR program, will we move forward and hire for these positions? [02:02:11] And then if we do move forward and hire, what would they be doing? Or will you guys be waiting until we are actually done setting up the guardrails for the program and enact a program and then hire. So walk me through what that looks like. - So since we have an ongoing need for the stewardship manager position anyway, I think we'd be safe to hire that one. [02:02:29] For the PDR and the conservation program planner, I think we, and I looked at Betsy for this too, I think we'd be comfortable waiting to get those hired until we have the board's agreement on what the ordinance contains, the scoring rubric and things of that nature, just in case the board ends up making a decision not to put that in place ultimately because we don't we don't want to hire staff that then doesn't have a job to do last time this program was in action here in the county and then it was defunded we had to lay off the staff that was working on it we do not want to do that right okay and then you said for [02:03:03] the steward of stewardship position you need that now so highlight for walk us through what they're what they would be doing do the stewardship for existing PDRs? Yes. Well, for existing easements, and I'll let Kristen speak a little bit. And who's doing that now currently if we don't have somebody doing, if we don't have this position? Right now we're doing very little of it. So, I imagine I was directed to develop a stewardship program several years ago. [02:03:22] Since that time we have had a big increase in the need to do determinations. So when someone comes in and they put in a permit on a property that has an easement on it, we, a natural resources team forwards that to us, we review it, we write a determination. I think we're on track right now to hit about 100 of those, so it's a significant amount of time. So we are not currently performing routine stewardship on the easements we solely [02:04:00] hold. There are about 300 easements, but that represents around 3,000 parcels. Do you feel there's any violations in any of those? Yes. We are aware of a few that we have had to coordinate my natural resources team with the omaji team to address for instance a grading permit was issued that complied but they went outside their limits of disturbance that did more work then so it's both a natural resources grading violation as well as an easement violation which makes it a little bit more complicated to work our way through and restore it generally in my [02:04:39] experience if people have the information up front they they they want to do but right by the easement But because we're in this loop of putting all of our time towards the determinations, we're not doing the stewardship, and so we're not getting that education. Before my time runs, we might need to get a zoning enforcement officer out there for those violations. [02:04:57] Actually, it generally is more of a natural resources or a grading violation than a zoning enforcement, but same thing. Thank you. Thank you. I love it when you guys ask questions with, like, 1.2 seconds left to go. [02:05:18] thank you madam chair well this doesn't happen very often but I'm going to associate myself with supervisor Letourneau's comments I am not interested in putting staff hiring staff for a program that doesn't exist yet I think we have a long way to go before we figure out what that program wants to look like and even if we want that program I'm not convinced this board as it is composed right now actually does want that program. I, for one, can think of, I think you said $6 million initially to start it up, and I, for one, can think of a lot more things to do [02:05:56] with $6 million that would be a true public benefit. The thing that keeps getting stuck in my craw when we talk about this is, as far as I've seen, properties in PDR and properties that have easements and conservation easements are not open to the public and we're talking about using public funds public tax dollars to buy development rights on land that the public may never be able to access so that that's one of the things that really really just sticks in my craw i will say [02:06:33] though um we have in fact funded positions partway through the year right like we've done that before We just saw some of them come in front of us, two positions, I believe, or four, I can't remember, in MSADs, where they were funded partway through the year because we really desperately needed them. [02:06:53] And I think we may have funded them with fund balance, and then they just get rolled into the budget. But right now, I'm supporting this. I do believe that we can start shaving off some of our tax dollars and maybe get that tax rate by a half cent. [02:07:12] I have a motion coming where we're going to take care of $4 million of it if it's supported. And additionally, if the Senate budget comes through, that's, I think, $30 or $33 million that we would be able to fully fund the schools without that $10 million gap and potentially be able to lower the tax rate there as well. [02:07:34] So I will be supporting the motion. Thank you. So many of us are sitting here right now wearing purple. We're wearing purple because the union vote went through last night. The union vote went through last night. We hired people for the union staff four years ago. [02:07:51] The union vote went through last night. So do not tell me you don't believe in hiring staff before something happens, because we would not be sitting here wearing purple if we had the vote funded those four years ago. That is absolutely just not true. We actually just had the health department sit here. Before we actually knew if the general assembly was going to give us a health department, We put positions in place to have a health department on our own. [02:08:12] So we routinely do that. We routinely plan for the future with staff before a program's in place. That is just not, it's just absolutely not a true statement, just not. Now, for everything else that might be going on up here, let's not sit here and just start rewriting history wholesale, because that doesn't make any sense. [02:08:33] Listen, I put just as long as Mr. Letourneau has been against this program, I have been for this program. I put a motion forward for this in 2019. I imagine where we would be right now if that actually motion had passed in 2019. [02:08:49] And truthfully, I loved Mr. Kirshner's question to see if we can craft it so it actually is more about some parts of our county and not as much other parts of our county. But there is no evidence that I know of, and I am more than open to hearing evidence if somebody else has it. [02:09:08] I love evidence that sent it to me. There is no evidence that people who would not otherwise want to sell their land for homes wouldn't use this program. I just have never seen it before. I just never have seen it before. And for anyone who is concerned about if we build more homes, it's going to cost more money because schools are going to be there, then this is one of the tools we can have so we're not building those homes. [02:09:34] That's what we're doing. If anyone is wanting to keep that rural economy and those open spaces for whatever reason, and no, you can't go, but there's a lot of things that can happen on PDR land. You can farm on it, which actually is of an economic benefit to the county. [02:09:51] There's a lot of things that can happen that will generate money for the county. So it's not like nothing can happen there. So listen, I'm not going to support this motion. I think this has been a great discussion. Thank you very much. [02:10:08] Mr. Letourneau. Yep. I'm going to take the closing on this one. I know, no, I know. Well, usually I kind of defer because it's a session, but in this one, good discussion. I always enjoy during the election seasons when people always try to put the board of supervisors in the traditional partisan political box. They've obviously never watched the meeting in which myself and Mr. Kirshner, the only two Republicans on the board, are going at each other over a difference we have. So yeah, well, I could say the same for my colleagues just sitting right next to me. And that's, and that's because, you know, that's not what this is about all the time. And this is one of those issues. And there's a lot [02:10:47] of those issues where it's not what it's about. It's, it's, we all have different perspectives up here. Um, yeah, look, I, I don't think I've been shy about my feelings on PDRs. Um, that particular discussion was about the DPZ work plan, not about establishing, you know, the program per se. Um, But yeah, I obviously didn't prioritize it, and it was TBD because the board has not indicated a clear majority support for it. [02:11:11] We're going to get some indication in here in a second, but to Chair Randall's point, we didn't add collective bargaining positions four years ago. We didn't have the ability at that point to do collective bargaining. We did add them in advance of the board majority's decision to write an ordinance. And so, yes, we could potentially do that here and add positions if we're going to create the program, except as previously discussed, I don't want the program. So therefore, I don't want to add those positions. And that's why this is kind of a proxy vote. But in those situations, certainly we do do that. It's impossible to prove a negative, right? So you can't say somebody would [02:11:49] have developed if they hadn't had PDR. And you can't say definitively either way. I guess my argument here is that if somebody is intent on developing their property, and that's just where they are philosophically, it's more lucrative for them to develop their property than to take the PDR. If somebody is not, then yeah, they're going to take the PDR, just like they're probably taking conservation easements and other things that are available to them. So the evidence on this, to me, what is put forward as evidence that this works is not evidence that it works. It's just [02:12:27] evidence that there's x amount of land that hasn't been developed in certain places that have it versus those that don't but the individual circumstances around that all vary and you don't know what the intent is of the landowner what i do know is it's kind of galling to ask people in eastern loudon if this actually is only a western loudon thing to fund all of this happening in western loudon when we don't know what that intent is and if it isn't just in western loudon then as I said it runs contrary to the board's goals and we heard from one supervisor tonight that they do want it to apply to Eastern Loudoun and they do want to prevent development in Eastern Loudoun with [02:13:04] this which again I don't know you know I get whiplash sometimes from the discussions up here so please vote yes. Okay the motion was made by Supervisor Letourneau and second I'm pretty sure by Mr. Bricksman. All in favor please say aye. Opposed. Okay that motion will pass I believe 5-4. Mr. Sanford, how'd you vote? [02:13:32] That motion would pass 5-4. I'm sorry? With Supervisors Turner, Tocroni, Randall, and Kirshner voting against the motion. Yep. Thank you. That was so much fun. Supervisors and everybody, I actually need a little bit of a break. I know you guys want to get through and I am sorry, but I need 15 minutes. Thanks so much. [02:13:59] Let's take a 15-minute break. [02:43:17] Sylvia's left on a church thing. [02:43:32] I have enough left. I just ate 420. [02:44:56] Oh, I am on. Okay, we are back in session, and we're going to go to Building and Development, which starts the description of resources, starts on R79 to R81, Budget Narrative 5-2. [02:45:13] Good evening, everyone. Good evening, Chair Randall and members of the board. Building and Development has identified three resources which we believe will benefit both the department and align with the Board of Supervisors and the Environmental Commission's goals and initiatives. [02:45:31] The positions include a permit technician for grading and VSMP permits, which can be found on page 79, a team lead and engineer three in our natural resources division, which can be found on page 80, and a business analyst two to oversee the financial team, which can be found on page 81. [02:45:52] Mr. Hemstreet has included these three resources in his recommended budget, and I'd be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you very much. Supervisors, if you have questions, please put your lights on. They told me to keep it under two minutes. [02:46:10] I was going to do the do-do-do-do-do. Do you have a question? You have a question? Mr. Crony. Thank you, Chair Randall. And thank you. I look forward to meeting you. I haven't met you yet. I look forward to meeting you as well. Yeah, yeah. So do you have more than one arborist? [02:46:27] No, we have one arborist on staff. So that's what's going to help with the Environmental Commission. right? Correct. The trees. Reserving union trees, mature trees. How many FTEs do you have in the natural resources division? Well, the natural resources division includes our erosion and sediment control program, which is the yeoman share of that staff. And then it also includes our VSMP program and our natural resources team, which oversees all the zoning and [02:47:02] more directly environmental features that you would be considering so if you're looking at the whole division it's 41 employees 42 and if you're looking at that natural resources team which includes our floodplain management and the natural resources program it's 12 13 Okay. And then I see that you're looking for a permit technician. Does Landmark help automate the process of payments? I see that that's mainly for payments, right? Landmark [02:47:41] help automate that or? So the permit technician is not as it is about the entire accepting of grading and the permits. Oh, okay. That's not it. Okay. Right. There is also a business analyst that is about the financial and invoicing and payment so there are two separate positions okay doesn't everything in building and development relate to landmark right now at least it feels that way for many of us okay so that positions more for the processing right correct okay and it should help automate it though right processing so with the automation [02:48:21] there is a heavier administrative lift i think we're finding that throughout the department but the benefit is that the data resources that are available the information that's directly available to the public and some of the other benefits that come from that administrative lift are significant customer service tools but they do have that administrative need and that's why requesting this position. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Crony. Mr. Kirchner. Thank you Madam Chair just a couple real quick questions so we basically have one [02:48:58] arborist and one team lead the team lead being an arborist as well is that fair to say? The team lead does not need to be an arborist but we're looking for somebody with experience in the area of trees. Okay. Could be an engineer, could environmentalist. How many arborists do we have right now? One. Just one. And that one is currently overworked? Is he outworking right now? He might be. I don't know. We try not to burn him out, but how many plans did you get in January? In January, there were 92 plans he needed [02:49:36] to review. Okay. Those are both legislative and administrative applications. All right. This is obviously an enhanced service level request, so obviously that's one of the things is, you know, trying to maintain, you know, going on these budgets is the same we look at. [02:49:56] Is there kind of an industry, for lack of a better, organizational standard and other organizations? What are our surrounding counties doing, et cetera? How many do they have per plans, et cetera? Do we have a service level? So we did do some of that research in putting together this request, and I don't know if you have that information in front of you. [02:50:16] I don't. I know most recently, like I think Prince William, they had one and they added another position, I think, in their last year's budget. Fairfax, I mean, Arlington, Alexandra, they probably have, you know, four to seven positions depending. Fairfax, much more. [02:50:32] So will the team lead be the team of these three or a team lead of something aside? I wasn't quite sure I understood that. So we currently have two teams in the natural resources group. One is our floodplain management, and one is our natural resources. [02:50:49] And similar to the conversation I think you had with Dr. Goodfriend, by adding a position and potentially a PDR position in the future. You're not allowed to say PDR. I'm sorry. Another position in the future. [02:51:10] We believe that we need additional leadership, so we'll split that team into two, but we'll put the forest conservation, arborist, urban forestry, or just forestry, both agricultural, residential, urban, suburban, in one group, but they will also support the other team in areas of mountainside. [02:51:34] You have one team that you're leading all of them right now, and you would break it into two groups? Correct. Okay. How big are those teams? Right now, they have five underneath them, so an arborist and four other natural resource engineers. [02:51:52] All right, thanks. I'm out of time. Thank you. Mr. Turner. Thank you, Madam Chair. There's nothing in here about the landmark system, so I'm assuming that the perturbation in the landmark system, you feel like it's under control and you can project out when you're going to be back on an even keel. [02:52:11] When it settles into a sustainable process, we don't need any extra bodies to help stamp man that. So over the last almost seven months since Landmark has launched, we have hired four temporary permit tech positions that are in the process of interviewing for four more in anticipation of really getting through the backlog because it is hard to understand what the demands of that permit issuance staff will be when we are in status quo. [02:52:56] The objective was to get those eight positions to get us caught up, to get us making the process improvements that we know need to be made now that we've been in landmark for seven months, and to identify in the FY26 budget what of those temporary positions we believe that we'd like to ask you to consider making permanent positions. [02:53:13] Okay, thank you. Mr. Letourneau. So, well, the last position, the business analyst 3-2-1, it really seems like it is a landmark-related position, but I was kind of confused by it. It is my observation that every time we go to a new system, we end up having to add a whole lot of staff, and it costs us a lot of money, time, and pain. [02:53:34] So thank you for everything you've done to try to work us through that. It says that in addition to executing their primary responsibilities, oh no, that the financial analyst, so you currently have a financial analyst who is performing duties of financial processing within Landmark, and this position will allow that financial analyst to return to performing their primary tasks on a full-time basis. [02:53:59] What are their primary tasks that they would be returning to? So their primary tasks include to research and resolve payment issues if there's a question if a proper payment was made, to ensure the proper closeout for building and development. [02:54:19] With this business analyst, we are looking at across departments because with the implementation of Landmark, we've increased our customer service, and customers can pay for any permit at any counter. or online um they uh have generate all the financial reports for the department related to permits paying the two percent levy that we're required to pay to the department of housing and community development um but is that stuff not happening now because they're doing both okay [02:54:58] they're doing both exactly what are they doing related to landmark then so the landmark invoicing process is more complex um the coordination because again payments now can be made anywhere it used to be that building and development addressed their fee payments um planning and zoning address their fee payments there's an end of the day closeout that all has to go to the [02:55:36] treasurer at the same time the um administrative lift the complexity of the close is there any chance that's going to improve no that is that is just part of um credit cards and and because of the input because we have added automation and technology automation creates the need to add more people okay counterintuitive um there's also really the audit risk was another big piece we have one receiver and one purchaser and so if one of them is out unfortunately one of that staff broke [02:56:15] their hip a month or so ago. And so we scrambled to find the way to make sure we are not putting ourselves at risk of audit when you're dealing with finances. It's very important that we have the redundancy to ensure. Okay. Anybody have anything? Gwen, are you ready to give your ledger update? No. Are you good up here? Yeah. All right. Thank you very much. Thank you. All right. [02:56:52] We have economic development coming up next. Yay. It's R82 through R84 and description of resources, and the budget narrative is 5.8. Good evening. [02:57:16] Good evening. Buddy Reiser with Shannon Wilson, our operations manager. As you said, Chair Randall, we're on page R82. Our top priority is for a data analyst to support our business development efforts. [02:57:32] Data has always been important to our strategy. Over the years, we've shared much of our analysis with the board on different occasions. But I really think there's a lot more we can do, particularly in the area of lead generation. What we're dealing with right now is a constantly evolving and fractured competitive market. [02:57:50] And we think that using some of the great data tools that are available now will help us be much more efficient in identifying and capturing leads. Second priority is deputy director to help lead our organization. Since 2010, DED has doubled in size, and we've kept the same executive structure during that time. [02:58:10] The board has supported us with 13 new positions to initiate lots of new programs over the years to support the business growth, which has been 151% of new businesses since I joined the department 17 years ago. [02:58:27] Finally, we've requested a second resource for international business development. Since the program's formal inception in FY16, we've had one FTE covering our international program. The program has accounted for 98 wins, and we have doubled our pipeline over the last few years. [02:58:43] And I would say we are definitely at capacity. With over 50 active leads in India alone, growing opportunities in South Korea, Asia alone is a very heavy lift, and we think there's real opportunity in Europe, particularly in Germany, the U.K., Ireland, and France. [02:58:59] That position is funded by the restricted transit occupancy tax, and I'm happy to take any questions. Excuse me, excuse me. Mr. Letourneau. Yeah, can you talk a little bit about how you foresee the kind of management responsibilities shifting if you got the deputy director position and how that might free you up to do other things? [02:59:21] Yeah, I think that there's a lot that, you know, our department has grown, and I've kept most of those top-line management opportunities while still trying to balance being the lead salesman for the county, being involved in special projects. And I just believe that we're in a place where we need somebody to take some of that heavy stuff off of me so that I can focus on strategic priorities of the board and move forward with, you know, big initiatives around Metro and helping develop that land [02:59:54] and dealing with the challenges that we're having with diversifying the economy in an economy that's been really, really tough. So I think that allowing then the assistant director and the deputy director to manage two different sides, one business development, one with strategic initiatives and marketing, and handling a lot of the other more administrative duties would be really beneficial to our department. [03:00:23] Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Crony. Thank you, Chair Randall. Hey, buddy. So my question is, with the executive or with the deputy director position, it looks like you would have four senior-level executives. [03:00:40] Could more junior-level positions help with some of the advisory groups and day-to-day operations? Would it be a possibility to bring on a more junior-level person rather than a deputy director? Well, I think there are a lot of reasons why that wouldn't work for what I'm looking for. [03:01:01] And part of that is to relieve some of the executive management off of me so that I can continue to do the other things that I think are better use of my time. Everybody in our department is at full capacity. I mean, there's really no, I mean, we did $10 billion in new business last year and, you know, nearly 1,000 business visits. [03:01:23] And, you know, I mean, the metrics that you see in your budget book, we've exceeded all those metrics for going on eight straight years now. So there's not there's not any fluff in our department. I can I can assure you of that. [03:01:38] Thank you. No, there's not. Ms. Bricksman. Thank you, Madam Chair. So the I feel as if you've been traveling a lot lately and maybe that's just the way the normal was before COVID. [03:01:53] um but uh i'm just wondering with this deputy director position does that mean you'd get to travel less or like that person would handle more of the stuff on the ground here so that you could actually be out as you said being the salesperson well i think a lot of it would depend on who we end up hiring for that position but the vision is that i would continue to be the chief salesperson i have traveled more than normal recently but that's been due to some internal um you know internal challenges inside our department some personnel issues and things like that normally i wouldn't travel as much internationally as i have recently oh okay some other people [03:02:33] weren't able to go so you yeah i got you um and the only other thing that makes me a little uncomfortable about about this deputy director position is i see something about enhanced succession plan i think it's incumbent upon every leader to make sure that in in case there's an inevitable change down the road that you want to have an identified succession plan. [03:02:57] Don't worry. As long as I'm having fun, I'm still coming to work. Are we going to get a better buddy? No, there's no better buddy. I think we should get rid of that position so that buddy can't leave. If we get rid of that position, buddy can't leave. Thank you. [03:03:14] I'm not going back, Mr. Sains. Sorry. I'm not going back, Mr. Sains. First of all, Buddy, in all seriousness, I think you are phenomenal. [03:03:34] I mean, and yes, all of our objective measures show that just by knowing what we've done in business development over the past years, there's no question. But I've watched you. I've watched your work. I've watched your work ethic. I've watched you work through a very, very tough situation not very long ago. [03:03:53] I've watched you maybe needing to go home sometime and do a little bit more self-care. We are so lucky to have you. You are so valuable to this organization in every way. And I appreciate you very, very much in ways that I should probably say more. [03:04:12] 98 wins in our international development program, in our international program. That's pretty amazing. And you believe that the ones, just because of some staffing issues, this position is needed. I actually suggested this position to you probably some three years ago because I realized how much we were doing in the international arena and what a heavy lift that is and how hard that is. [03:04:36] So I really do appreciate that. What else do you think things would be expanded more in the international area? Or is this just to take some pressure off the staff that's there already or both? I think it expands our opportunity. I think my vision would be to have one person focused mostly on Asia and one person focused on Europe. [03:04:58] You know, I think the impression is that these are travel programs, and they're really not. These are positions to prepare ourselves for when we do travel to make sure that we're fully engaged in lead generation, in lead capture, and in pipeline development. [03:05:15] So, I mean, they will travel a couple of times a year. Well, there's so much more work that goes in before a travel ever happens. Meetings and meetings and meetings and plans before travel ever happens. And finally, Shannon, I realized today who your daughter was. I did not know that. [03:05:32] I'm pretty proud of her. Yeah, and you should be, and she should be very proud of you. What a wonderful family you have. Thank you. It's fantastic. Well, you both are. You really are. You both are. So, supervisors, are there any motions on this dais? [03:05:49] Great. Wonderful. Thank you for everything, buddy. Thank you very much, all of you. Planning and zoning. We start on R86 through R88. Undescription of resource requests. And the budget narrative is 5-18. [03:06:06] Getting there for the night, guys. Getting there for the night. [03:06:20] Dan, I think we should see you more. We don't see you nearly enough. I've got a cot in the back room. I don't advertise it. Okay, good evening again, Chair Randall and Board of Supervisors. [03:06:37] I'm Dan Galindo, Director of the Department of Planning and Zoning. I have Deputy Director Judy Burkett here with me tonight as well. Our department info can be found on 518 through 521 of the budget document, and our requests are found on R86 through R88. [03:06:52] We are requesting eight positions, one of which is a proffer manager planner. That would be a planner two-level position, and that would be to allow some of our more senior staff in that division to focus on more intensive projects also hoping to speed up things like bond releases some of our checks of bond calculations ahead of time which we're now assisting B&D with and things of that nature. Second request is for a zoning admin planner focused on housing the housing needs strategic plan if you recall a couple of years ago there was a bundled package that was put in for the board some positions were approved some were [03:07:30] not. This was one that was not. We have similar positions in community planning and in proffer management already. And then our last but not least request is for a special projects division that would consist of a program manager and five senior planners. And that division would be completely separated on any sort of regular basis from day-to-day operations of reviewing legislative applications, of doing zoning correspondence research and letters, and focusing purely on our comprehensive plan amendments, zoning ordinance amendments, and any other type of important internal project that DPZ may be tasked with. [03:08:10] So we've had a lot on our plate. The most recent work plan that was approved had the highest number of projects ever contained. We've added the Gloucester Parkway CPAM since then and we've got a lot of ongoing things. I know many of you have other ideas of projects that you'd like to see added to the work plan in the future. [03:08:29] No, no one's going to add anything to the work plan. We're good. We're hoping to increase our capacity to handle those and potentially move them faster. Wonderful, wonderful. Supervisors, if you have questions, please put your light on. Excuse me. [03:08:44] Mr. Letourneau. So glad to see the profit management position here. It's really needed. So I'm going to do a little bit of this again on the special project division stuff. So one of the reoccurring themes has been how hard it is to hire planners. [03:09:01] people that have that background. They just don't exist. So again, is it really realistic to hire five senior planners before January? Isn't there already a backlog from previous year? You've done a good job trying to get caught up. I would think that out of all the positions we would have, this would be one that would attract the most interest. Essentially, all of our positions are crossed between project management and day-to-day referral kinds of things. There are a number of people who believe it or not don't enjoy arguing with applicants whether a setback [03:09:38] should be 15 feet or 12 feet. So if we have positions that do not have to deal with that, I think it will draw some additional interest. Is it likely based on what we've seen from the applicant pool in the past couple of years? Probably not. I'd be hopeful, but I definitely couldn't guarantee it. If I were to try to phase this one, I assume you want the division manager, you know, three planners in July and two in January. Is there a reason that wouldn't work? [03:10:06] No, that should work. I mean, once we bring them on, they'll be learning our processes, our project management style, and things of that nature to start with. So I have no objection if the board chooses to do that. Okay, thank you. Okay, anybody else? [03:10:22] Mr. Turner. Thank you, Madam Chair. We've talked briefly and been involved with an application that's going through what I'll call expedite review right now process. It's kind of a pilot. It's kind of informal. but one of the key pieces of feedback I'm getting from the development community, we've talked about this, is the assignment of a project manager to an application at the start, and that project manager is really in charge of moving that application through and coordinating the referrals in a more collective way. [03:10:55] I don't know where we are in that, and I defer to your judgment on that. My question is, first of all, default position, anything DPZS, as far as I'm concerned, you get. I mean, that's my default position. Would hiring these people facilitate that expedited process to where you have the latitude now to assign one person to kind of shepherd an application all the way through? [03:11:21] And maybe a stupid question. Well, we should probably talk offline because, from my perspective, that's what we do now. So I'm curious what they're seeing that we're not seeing in our internal process. It would have the potential to free up some capacity with the other senior planners who would be handling project management. [03:11:39] Not that I would expect to completely remove that responsibility from staff in community planning or zoning administration, but the hope would be that by focusing most of those responsibilities in this division, those other senior planners would have more availability to handle legislative applications and things of that nature. [03:11:54] So it could be something that gets used towards that purpose. - Yeah, let's talk offline really quick, Dan, 'cause I understand exactly what you're saying. I know there's a project manager assigned applications that they follow it through. The feedback I got from the development community they understand that process but there's a their perception is there's a siloed process going on at the same time we'll talk some more and and see if we can figure that out but i'd really like to see if if these extra bodies can really kind of streamline that process but we'll talk about it thank you mr crony thank you chair randall and i just want to thank the department i know you guys [03:12:31] work really hard i'm like mike whatever you guys want and i plan to support all of your resource requests um one question i have is with um some of the data center applications you know i think it was brought up where we might need some help with energy planning um and you know just getting some of that information regarding the grid and and what's planned i don't know if that it can be handled with a consultant or if you think you need somebody uh in-house so county administration has been working towards obtaining a consultant to serve that purpose at least largely depending on specifics you're thinking of. So that's the method we're pursuing at the moment to see if that meets [03:13:10] our needs. Okay, and you can come back if need be. If need be for an FTE. Thank you. Ms. Brixman. Thank you, Madam Chair. The proffer management planner, is that someone that's like actually helping applicants with their proffers, or is it somebody that manages proffers after? [03:13:29] It's a combination of both. The proffer management team will review proffers as they're going through the process for consistency, the ability to actually be administered after the fact, things of that nature. We also have some proffer management staff that works on bond releases, so they go out and ensure that what was proffered to is actually what gets built at the very end of projects. [03:13:51] Oh, okay. And at times, especially if there are complaints about properties, they will do the research to check and see if we had one just this week where there's a proffer for something to occur, but that zoning permit that would trigger it has not occurred yet but they had to look through the research of all of that to determine that okay um and then the um the unmet housing strategic plan i i fully support that of course um the the five uh special product in the special projects division the five senior planners let me just clarify i i would get really nervous um trimming anything [03:14:27] that you're asking for because we've heard so much about the process being too slow and it just you know and that you guys have had difficulty hiring folks but these planners would not necessarily be managing applications correct for for legislative applications submitted by private industry no they would not that would be still held by um still still land use review would still be responsible for that okay and the five senior planners you're asking for would they would they be able to speed up our CPAMs and zoams that we're trying to get done so that's the hope [03:15:04] but in some ways they may speed things up by allowing us to increase capacity so there's more ongoing at one time instead of shortening a lot of a lot of the timelines we have in front of you are limited by for one what the board and planning commission choose to do also we're kind of bound by things like VDOT is given by state code 90 days to respond to certain kinds of amendments and things of that nature that we really can't compress further there's some we can do especially on the front end with outreach and some research that additional bodies may help depending on the project okay okay um there's been a lot of discussion about energy expertise um given that you know the power line issue and and it was a little bit answered that we would be getting [03:15:44] energy expertise expertise into the county system kind of by hiring a consultant but um In energy, there's an energy and environmental services division being proposed by General Services as their priority one. [03:16:01] Would we be able to lean on them at all for talking about power and those sorts of things as it relates to applications? Unfortunately, I couldn't really speak to that. You'd have to ask General Services. Okay. All right. Thank you. So just to be clear, because Mr. Letourneau, I'm not hearing Mr. Letourneau say, and correct me if I'm wrong, that he's going to take any positions out. [03:16:27] I think what the question is, yeah, it's not the same. And I think from what I'm understanding, and again, if I'm wrong, correct me, is that it's a delay because if you can't hire them that fast anyway, we might as well save that half year of money. [03:16:45] That's all. But they will be coming on. Yeah, okay, all right. And, Dan, you have people here saying you can get anything you want. Do you want to adjust anything up here, ask for something more? I don't think Mr. Hemshree would take home with that, so I'll just hold that for next year. Hopefully we're doing just as good as we can. [03:17:01] Yeah, no, but it's just a delay. And I think it's reasonable. I mean, listen, what we've learned is you all feel it's just so specialized, and it's hard to find people, and so you really want to make sure you find the right person that's going to be here for a while that you can take time and teach and those types of things. [03:17:20] And so however long that might take, and it might be, it may not be able to happen before the next six months. So I understand that goal, and that's fine. All right, so Tony, you want to make that motion? Yeah, I will move that we defer two of the senior planner positions to January. [03:17:39] I'll second that. Discussion on that? Yeah, and I know it's not going to be a huge savings, but, you know, in the interest of good budgeting, On this one, I really am pretty confident that all five of these positions would not be able to be hired. Within that time frame, there's a lot of churn and stuff going on in that particular department. [03:17:57] I don't think it would really impact the impact of the positions. And it might be nice to kind of be throughout the year bringing in additional resources to help with these things as they come along. But it still would allow for one division manager and three new planners to support the boards, CPAMs and ZOAMs and all those things. [03:18:18] up front. So I think that, yeah, I think that's a pretty sizable amount of capacity we're adding, and this is a pretty reasonable motion. Yeah, yeah. Ms. Brixman? May I ask a question? Maybe Ms. Bork needs to answer, but what would the savings be for those two positions? It would be approximately $148,700. [03:18:41] $148,700, thank you. He was ready this time. One other question, if I might. I'm probably going to support the motion, but when you give us the forecast, the DPZ forecast for CPAMs and Zoams, are you using the assumption of existing staff and not calculating what you're asking for? [03:19:05] Yes, absolutely, because we haven't been grateful yet. Okay. All right. Thank you. Okay. Yeah. I'm happy to support the motion. It's kind of a one-time motion because by this time next year it will be wrote into the budget. So, all right. Mr. Letourneau made the motion. I second it. All in favor, please say aye. [03:19:20] Any opposed? That motion will pass 7-1-1 with Ms. Tocroni voting against the motion and Ms. Glass having left. [03:19:37] Okay, I think we're done. Thank you very much. And we have one more department. Yes. [03:19:54] I'll say it. And some other stuff, too. I'll say that and some other stuff, too. Hello, hello. Good evening. How are you? Sorry you had to go wait to last. Not a problem. Good evening. [03:20:09] Chair Randall and members of the board. You guys are on page R89 to R91, description of resource requests. The budget narrative is 5-22. Thank you. I'll explain that later. So I'm Nancy Boyd. [03:20:26] With me is Scott Wurst, Deputy Director of the Department of Transportation and Capital Infrastructure, or DTCI. As I'm sure everyone's aware, we manage planning, design, and construction of capital projects for the county, including roads, sidewalks, trails, parks, fire stations, and other county facilities. [03:20:42] What not everyone is fully aware of is that DATCI has been experiencing an unprecedented growth over the past several years. And by way of example, and I can just help illustrate that, with just in the period of time that I've been with the department, I joined as deputy director two and a half years ago, we were managing 129 capital projects. [03:21:03] In fiscal year 25, we will be managing 189 capital projects, which is a roughly 50% increase in project workload. In addition to the project workload, we are seeing other evolving support needs. Examples of some of these non-direct CIP support needs include things like unplanned projects, things like DGS projects that come to us because there are newly discovered needs, like structural improvements that need to happen as part of something, or some of these projects or some of these potential land acquisitions where we do site evaluations, and that requires some of our technical staff to do kind of short turnaround feasibility studies. [03:21:44] And we are seeing an increasing interest from the board in master planning and other planning studies related to capital facilities. An example of that is Eastern Loudoun Community Arts Center, things like that, that we're seeing increased interest in. [03:22:02] And so we have been examining ways to optimize our staff and really come up with what our needs would be to meet these increasing needs. But first and foremost, I feel like it's our first priority to make sure that we're using what we have efficiently. [03:22:19] And so we've been making strategic decisions to optimize our staffing and our existing resources. We've had a focus in improved project and program management systems and processes over the past year so that we can more efficiently and transparently manage projects. [03:22:39] And so one of the first things that we have also done is in lieu of requesting any base increases in our operating costs for fiscal year 25, we have identified and reallocated approximately $300,000 in existing O&M to areas of emerging demand. So that's even before we get to resource requests. [03:22:58] Second, prior to asking for additional positions, the DTCI leadership team evaluated critical department needs and existing vacancies and identified opportunities for consultant work. Through this effort, we identified and reclassed three existing positions to address more critical staffing needs. [03:23:15] And for example, one is an assistant program. So we took several field tech positions, which are more easily staffed by consultants, and we're able to work with our human resources department to reclassify those positions into more critical positions. [03:23:31] So the assistant program manager for our transportation planning group that reviews developer applications, A new grants program manager for DTCI that would help administer, apply for, and then manage and report on federal and state grant opportunities. [03:23:49] And then a new transportation data analysis manager that would help with the data and analysis side of analyzing our transportation system to help inform priorities and boards of discussions about priorities from the capital improvement program in the future. [03:24:05] So those are three positions that we felt were key to supporting our emerging needs into the future before asking for these additional positions. So to get to our resource requests, the new Office of Real Property Asset Management and Planning will be comprised of our existing DTCI land acquisition staff and other vacant positions in DTCI. [03:24:29] This new office will focus on the county's land strategy and continue to manage the acquisition and disposition of lands. By consolidating the function into county admin, county administration, the office will be better positioned to coordinate the complex work across the organization, including with the board supervisors, senior staff, DTCI, the county's attorney's office, and other program departments. [03:24:52] The implementation of this new office will occur over the next few months, and we are requesting one additional position to augment this new team and support new strategic land initiatives. Second, we have identified the need for two additional utility manager positions. [03:25:11] Utility relocations for our CIP projects are projected to increase from approximately 280 in fiscal year 23 to 525 in fiscal year 2025. Utilities are going in everywhere every day, and we need these two positions to help us keep up with project demand and minimize delays. [03:25:30] We are also seeing an increasing demand, as I mentioned before, for strategic planning around capital facilities. This includes increasing interest in master planning efforts, as I mentioned, and conducting site evaluations of potential land acquisitions. This type of work involves extensive and broad technical experience, as well as excellent planning, collaboration, and project management skills. [03:25:53] Our workload forecasting projects the need for three additional positions to support these needs. And we are available to answer any questions you might have. Nancy, what is your first priority? Our first prior, so we have facilities development. The facilities development is our one and only operations budget support. [03:26:13] The others are COP support positions. Oh, okay. All right. We just have the one. All right. We're the three within that one category. Okay, that's just a little different in the book for some reason. Okay, wonderful. Thank you. [03:26:28] Supervisors, if you have questions, put your lights on. Mr. Letourneau. So facilities development priority, I struggle a little bit to understand how, like, what's changing. Like, you know, we have a process, we have a CNA process, we move the, like, the staff planning function to DGS. [03:26:52] When I kind of read the overview here, I was sort of thinking to myself, don't we already do all this? And maybe we don't, but I struggled a little bit to understand the narrative behind this. So I think we are evolving from what was originally more of a, you have a project, you go, you design a project, and you build a project, to having an expectation of doing more strategic planning around that. [03:27:19] So a good example would be, you know, around some of our existing facilities, maybe the Eastern or the Southern Services Center, where, you know, there may be a number of different program needs. And then even prior to actually having an actual construction project that you're designing and building, there needs to be a lot of planning work. [03:27:39] And that planning work involves a slightly different skill set or a more comprehensive skill set than some of a more straightforward, you know, go out and design a fire station and build a fire station. Because of the collaborative and planning nature and sometimes even strategic nature of working with different departments to find the right solutions there. [03:27:58] And one of the things we've been challenged with, and Scott may add to this if you think of anything else, but some of the things we've been challenged with is it's a little bit different mindset when we have such a high delivery need to deliver, deliver, deliver projects. [03:28:16] We have to be able to have a little bit of more room and a broad enough skill set for people to be able to know and recognize and then have the ability to have those collaborative discussions, which may not be so focused on sort of the technical design, architecture, construction side of things. [03:28:36] Okay. I think I get where you're going a little bit. I think if we could get to that kind of place, and my only worry would be the funding side is so difficult on these things. And it's like so far out that we kind of go through the planning exercise and we get a facility and we know what we're doing. [03:28:53] And then we got to wait six years when all the codes change and we have to redesign it. But, you know, I guess I'm probably willing to take a leap here and kind of let you execute this. It sounds like it's sort of it's a little bit more of an initiative than it is just a bunch of positions. [03:29:10] And really trying to meet an unmet need, recognizing one of the things that we've done is try to assess some of the areas where we feel like we're falling short and not just not having the resources to be able to apply to do the job. I think this is one to be interesting to kind of keep track of as it's happening and sort of see how it's working. [03:29:28] And maybe we do that in finance committee or something just just to understand kind of how we can work with it. But thank you. Thank you, Ms. Brooksman. Thank you, Madam Chair. I am super excited about the utility management positions. [03:29:47] I'm such a geek now, Madam Chair. You are. Welcome to the club. But I know the number of times we've had delays because the utilities haven't been able to be moved and the sidewalks and the cross. Yes. So, yay. [03:30:02] Yay. I'm so excited about that. On the facilities development positions, would these positions also help speed up the process or add resources to the process of, say, renovating facilities that the county owns? [03:30:19] Because when we started talking about Cascades Library and Senior Center, staff was like, actually, we've never had to really renovate a facility such as this, and it's going to be one of the first ones that kind of comes on, that has come online and then needs to be renovated. [03:30:37] So is that what we're thinking with that? Exactly. That's another great example that, you know, we realize that it's more of a, it's almost an information fact-finding, consensus-building process that needs to occur, much less transactional than like building a brand-new facility. [03:30:54] It's a little bit more involved to be able to kind of come in once you've already had that facility. And I feel as if the schools kind of got to that place faster, right? They have a renovation program in their CIP and all that, but they also, I think, had a lot more facilities, and some of them maybe were built earlier, and so they're kind of ahead of us a little bit on that part. [03:31:17] But, yeah, I remember Aaron McClellan said to me at one point, oh, we may need to hire a consultant to figure out how we're going to revitalize and renovate the Cascades Marketplace and Senior Center. So I will also be interested to see how the positions and sort of like the new initiative works out, but I'm happy to support it. [03:31:35] Thank you. Wonderful. Anybody else? All right. Are there any motions on the dais? Seeing none, thank you very much, and thank you for all your all's hard work. You do a great job. So, guys, there's a couple of things. If you noticed tonight, what was not on the agenda was our Housing and Community Services Department, And that is because I recently received a very detailed and very helpful briefing from the housing department of like the different kind of pots of revenue, where they sit and how they're used. [03:32:11] It was a good deal more complicated than I thought it would be. And I asked a question earlier to Mr. Hall, and he answered, to his credit, the exact question I asked. But actually, because I asked it in a kind of clumsy way, the answer actually didn't reflect the reality. [03:32:33] And so I moved that department until next week because I wanted housing and community development to present first, you know, the briefing I saw during the finance committee meeting. And so Ms. Letourneau was gracious enough to add that to the finance committee agenda. [03:32:53] You know, as many of us, as many of you who are not on finance that can join us or watch that night from home would be really helpful because when we get to that department next week, it's going to be really helpful that you've actually seen this, you know, and it was not at all what I expected. [03:33:10] So if you can't make it to the finance meeting, please watch the finance meeting. Secondly, we always, when we're doing the budget, have a Saturday meeting that we plan just in case we need it. I do not believe we're going to need it, so I'm going to now formally cancel the Saturday's meeting because we're not going to need that unless somebody feels the burning desire to be here on Saturday. [03:33:31] I think so. Not burning, just a tiny desire, but not a burning desire. And I think, is there anything else, Mr. Hemstreet, Ms. Burke, anything else? Okay, I think that's it. We are adjourned. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Coraggio Consulting · aguyonx.com