Coraggio Consulting
Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, Business Meeting, Tuesday, April 2, 2024

Date: Tuesday, April 2, 2024
Place: Board Room, First Floor, Government Center, 1 Harrison Street SE, Leesburg, Virginia
Length: 4h 56m (video)
Official meeting video (county, Granicus): https://loudoun.granicus.com/player/clip/7638
Agenda (Granicus): https://loudoun.granicus.com/AgendaViewer.php?view_id=73&clip_id=7638

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.

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[00:09:48] Hey, everybody, you may want to, I'm going to hit this gavel soon, so let's clear the dais, please. Thank you. There we go. Well, good evening, supervisors.

[00:10:11] Good evening, staff. Good evening, Loudon. I'd like to call to order the April 2nd, 2024 Loudon County Board of Supervisors Business Meeting. This room has a hearing loop. If you need hearing assistance, please switch your hearing aid to the telecom mode. If you need headsets, we have those available as well.

[00:10:27] Please see the clerk to request one. Supervisor DeCrony today is the person who will lead us with words of inspiration or a prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance. Supervisor DeCrony. Thank you, Chair Randall, and good evening, everyone. I'm going to read a verse from Psalm 24, 1 through 2, for April is Earth Day month.

[00:10:48] The earth is our Lord's and everything in it, the world and all who live in it, for he founded it on the seas and established it on the waters. We recognize that all created things belong to God and that we are accountable to him as sorts of the creation.

[00:11:05] Lord, grant us the wisdom to care for the earth. Help us to act now for the good of future generations and all your creatures. Amen. Amen. Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, liberty, and justice for all.

[00:11:32] I'm messing with you. All right. The proposed consent agenda is as follows. Item R1, proclamation to declare April 2nd through 8th as International Dark Skies Week in Loudoun County. That's put forth by Mr. Kirsten, but it's for approval only.

[00:11:58] R2, proclamation to recognize the 25th anniversary of the Senior Center at Cascades. That's put forward by Vice Chair Prickspin, also for approval only. Proclamation 3, to declare April 14th through 20th, 2024 is National Public Safety Telecommunications Week.

[00:12:14] I put that forward. Ms. Prickspin will join me down front, and that's for presentation. R4, proclamation 2, to declare April 21st through 27th is National Volunteer Week for approval and presentation. I put that forward as well. Item number five, which will actually be the first resolution we complete.

[00:12:32] We're going to do number five first, R5 first, because one of the recipients has to leave very quickly afterwards. So item number five, National Arab American Heritage Month. That is for approval and presentation, and Mr. Letourne will join me down front for that.

[00:12:50] Item R6, resolution to recognize Woodgrove High School girls basketball team as the state champions for 2024. That is for approval only. Mr. Kirshner put that forward. Item 1A, confirmations. Item 2, the AIR report for April 2nd, 2024.

[00:13:09] Item 4, fast track process for legislative affordable housing applications. Everybody jazz hands, yay. Item five, adoption of interim policy relating to proper expectations for attainable housing units. That is the consent agenda.

[00:13:25] By the way, everyone, I will say right now that Mr. Sains will not be here for the evening. He had a private matter that he had to deal with this evening. I will make a motion to accept the consent agenda. Is there a second on the motion? Second. Seconded by Vice Chair Bricksman. There's a discussion on the motion. Vice Chair Bricksman.

[00:13:41] Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a couple quick things. The Cascade Senior Center Resolution, thank you, colleagues, for supporting that. They're celebrating 25 years of the Senior Center. We will be presenting this to the Senior Center at their 25th anniversary luncheon event on April 26th.

[00:13:59] Fully supporting item four and five, the fast track for affordable units. I'm looking forward to the discussion to perhaps figure out a way we could fast track things that aren't totally 100%. and then item number five really excited about that and look forward to the conversation thank you madam chair thank you and I would just associate myself with your comments mr. Turner thank you madam chair on item number four if I'm correct staff correct me if I'm wrong but mr. Hart came to me with the Atlantic Boulevard application said this would be a good example of what I'm calling expedited review that if an application meets certain pretty

[00:14:39] stringent criteria that we can accelerate the approval process and their goal was to do it in six months and I said that sounds good to me out and talk with planning and zoning and they said let's give it a shot from what I understand the groups have been meeting on a regular basis they're on schedule and it's going very well and I think this is an offshoot of that and I'm very very pleased to see this develop I would like to keep an eye on the expedited review process and the criteria that might apply to other than nothing to non 100% attainable projects if we can't expand that out item number five is adoption of the interim policy the business community has been asking this

[00:15:16] for some time this formalizes and creates an interim policy whereby we don't the board will not ask for a capital intensity factor proffers regional transportation proffers or transit proffers for attainable units in projects that's in fact what we've been doing for the last year or two this simply formalizes that as an interim policy until the CPM comes out thank Thank you, Madam Chair.

[00:15:41] Thank you. Anybody else? Okay. All in favor say aye. Any opposed? That motion passed 8-0-1. Supposed to have any additions or deletions to the agenda? I do not see any. Do I see any? I do not see any.

[00:15:56] All right. Wonderful. I'm going to go to the appropriations resolution, and I'm going to make that motion. So, actually, Mr. Le Turner, would you like to make the motion?

[00:16:12] It's kind of customary for the chair of finance to make this motion, so I'll be happy to second. Yeah, I'm trying to get it up. Is page three? I'm having a weird, my iPad is not cooperating, I'm sorry.

[00:16:36] Hold on, one second. I got it. There we go, just open. Okay. Okay, I move the Board of Supervisors to adopt the FY25 budget as presented by the county administrator on February 14, 2024, and amended by the Board of Supervisors as the March 4th, 7th, 11th, and 14th, 2024 budget work sessions as found in attachments one and six, adopt tax year 2024 property tax rates as found in attachment two, adopt the FY25 appropriations resolution as found

[00:17:13] in attachment three, adopt the FY2025 EMS transport reimbursement rates as found in attachment four, and adopt the FY2025 to 2030 capital improvement program as amended by the Board of Supervisors as the March 14, 2024 budget work session and shown in Attachment 5.

[00:17:30] I further move the Board of Supervisors, direct staff, to establish the RIVANA Community Development Authority Fund, effective July 1, 2024. Second. Discussion on the motion, Mr. Letourneau. Yep. I appreciate all the hard work from staff, not only in the budget office, who certainly did a lot of hard work, but in county administration and all of our departments.

[00:17:52] As you all know, the budget process really begins just a few days after we adopt a budget and continues pretty much the whole year. And there's a lot of work that goes into this for a lot of different people. This budget is, as always, a compromise document.

[00:18:12] I think if each of us individually were writing our own budgets, they all may look a little bit differently. But, you know, we try to do our best to find consensus. As I've kind of been saying, I think we do need to watch the rate of growth at the schools and here at the county as we look at our revenue in the future.

[00:18:32] And so that's a discussion that we can have in the finance committee during the budget development process. But this budget certainly, I think, is generous to our school system and to many of our departments. It takes care of a lot of needs and certainly also generous to our employees who work very hard here in the county.

[00:18:50] So I will support it. Thank you. Anybody else? Ms. Glass. Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to say that I'm very proud of this budget and believe we have demonstrated to our constituents that we heard their concerns.

[00:19:07] We lowered the real property tax rate by a full penny. We were able to do this while still making our housing funds a priority. I believe we have demonstrated to our constituents our support for our students, our teachers, and faculty of LCPS, and we showed our support for the employees of Loudoun County by including a 7% merit increase for all eligible and general workforce employees.

[00:19:30] And I'm also especially excited that the Eastern Loudoun Community Arts Center has been added to the county's capital improvement program. Thank you to my colleagues for supporting this, and thank you to all the people in the community that have worked with me thus far.

[00:19:45] I look forward to collaborating with my colleagues, staff, and community to work through the results of the feasibility study to determine exactly what size is needed and the flexibility of the space. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Mr. Kirshner. Thank you, Madam Chair.

[00:20:01] No surprise. I'm not going to vote yes on this, but I didn't vote to send it forward. I had a couple motions to reduce the amount sent to the school, but I do want to say, and I want to reiterate what Supervisor Letourneau has said. I do think our staff, everybody has worked really hard on this budget as we do every year, and for those who worked hard and commend it.

[00:20:21] But I really have the big two issues I have is I just don't think we're providing enough. We are definitely raising taxes, not enough tax relief, given the nature of our economy. And I also feel like our public schools, there has to be a level of accountability on the spending that's going on.

[00:20:37] I'll talk about that here in a second. I want to address what was kicked around a lot during the budget session, and that is, are we reducing taxes? It's not us reducing. the truth of the matter is we have the tool to be able to start or to be able to work off the equalized rate. We really haven't done that. I do think that when we compared it with our equalized rate, I think it was really helpful this year, but I think our process by which we went through, rather than starting at the equalized rate and building into the budget, we started several cents above the equalized rate because it's very difficult. And I say this really for next year's budget and how we work through it and how I'd like to see us work through it is to add items in rather than be forced to take items out of a base budget.

[00:21:17] I think what has happened is over the last five years, we have raised the average tax rate $1,200 on the average house. That doesn't even include personal property tax. And that kind of builds up after a while. So I think there's a better and a more efficient way to do this that will provide more tax relief and more restraint for the way that we do it.

[00:21:38] In terms of the schools, Loudoun County Public Schools, I looked at the numbers, and it's a little bit alarming to me. Since 2019 to 24, our actual student population has fallen, and yet our proficiencies continue to fall significantly.

[00:21:57] I'll give you just a few statistics. Our middle schools, 14 out of 17 are below proficiency in writing. Six out of 17 are below proficiency in every single subject. Only three out of the 17 are above proficiency in every subject. And yet we transferred an additional, I think, $110 million, $120 million this year, which is significantly above what we've transferred even in the last four years.

[00:22:20] Now, I understand we've had inflation, but we really need and we have higher expectations for our schools to increase proficiency. And yet our student population, despite the last five years, that kind of increase, our student population has actually fallen slightly.

[00:22:38] And our enrollment has decreased, I think, 0.44%. Teachers have increased by 9%. And administrative positions have increased by 42.3%. So I think these are things that we really need to seriously look at. I weren't able to address them sufficiently this year.

[00:22:55] But as we go forward, hopefully the school doesn't come to us with such a large ask. But those are my thoughts. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, sir. Ms. Umstead. Thank you, Madam Chair. I will be supporting the budget, although I very much appreciate my colleague, Mr. Kirshner's comments.

[00:23:14] Some of the things that I think are critically important in this budget and are in it because of the hard work that the county administrator and the finance and budget staff did is the 9.4% salary scale increase for Fire and Rescue and the 9.4% salary scale increase for the Sheriff's Office grade and step pay plan.

[00:23:41] I think it's essential that we fully support our first responders, and I'm very proud that this board, with the support of county staff, has been able to do this, I think, now two years in a row.

[00:23:58] Having said that, I'm very pleased with the fact that the schools are going to be well supported through this budget, as well as our capital projects. And I would make a final statement related to what Supervisor Letourneau said.

[00:24:18] If we are to maintain a lower tax rate than our friends in Fairfax and the rest of the region, we need to have the strongest business community in the region.

[00:24:35] And right now, that's the data center industry. They provide almost our entire operating budget on the county side. Without them, our taxes would go up on our average homeowner in somewhere between 65% and 77%.

[00:24:55] So that sector is critically important to us being able to lower the tax rate by a full penny this year, as it has been for the last several years. and I just want to say I very much appreciate what the data center industry has done for the taxpayers of Loudoun County. Thank you. Ms. Brooksman. Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to make sure that folks have an understanding of the process we go through. As Supervisor Letourneau

[00:25:30] said, it starts probably next Finance Committee meeting, and the proposed budget and proposed tax rate are actually chosen uh through guidance from the board so the fact that we started at 86 and a half or 87 and a half cents um is is because this board the finance committee and this board said start at 87 and a half cents because we want certain things funded in this county

[00:26:01] including opening of facilities, opening of fire departments, fire stations, and providing the quality services that our county expects. So that's why it started at 87.5 cents, which was the same tax rate as last year.

[00:26:20] Just for perspective, I just want to make a note. When I came into office, the tax rate was $1.06. So to intimate that this board has not lowered the tax rate is simply false. We have lowered the tax rate over and over and over again.

[00:26:37] The reason folks may be paying a little bit more out of pocket is because the values of their homes went up. And for most people, I would think that's a good thing. Because for most people who own homes, that's their generational wealth. And I'm an average homeowner, and my taxes have not gone up $1,200 or $1,000.

[00:26:58] dollars. They just haven't since I've been in office. So I just wanted to, I just wanted to clarify that. I'm really happy that we did accomplish now having a full cent going into our housing, and we don't really want to call it housing trust fund anymore because that connotes a certain space that we're sending it. So I'll just say for our unmet housing needs, we accomplished that with hopefully fund balance at the end of the year, but we also made sure to have an amendment in that motion that says it will be part of the base budget moving forward, so I want our housing advocates to know that although it's fund balance this year, it is going to be in the base budget

[00:27:38] moving forward. I think we might be having another conversation about the schools. I'm happy to support and fully fund our schools because they are excellent. We have the highest GPAs. We have highest graduation rates. We have highest SOLs around the region, around the country, but we may be having another conversation if if mr. young can doesn't sign the budget as proposed because our schools are depending on 19 million dollars from the state so I think we may be having another conversation on the CIP I'm really excited that we now have ask a grins Park as a future project and

[00:28:14] hopefully I was able to accelerate a little bit the project planning for the renovation of the senior center and marketplace in cascades pending fund balanced discussion. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Ms. Brixman. I want to start where I already start when we talk about the budget, which is to thank county employees. Our county employees really are some of the best in the country. You just don't see this quality everywhere.

[00:28:37] And our county employees are public servants, and many of them can take their expertise and their licensures and their certifications and go into the private sector and make a good deal more money than they make here. But they do this because they are public servants. And so I never forget that and I never take them for granted as far as our schools you know with what our schools our education system had to endure the past five years and I'm not saying that there were not issues because obviously there were issues that needed to be addressed and have been addressed but for all the attacks the lies the threats that they've had to endure the fact that any

[00:29:13] educator stayed at all is a miracle and I want to say thank you to every educator in our school system for standing up to the lies, to the disinformation, to the threats, and serving our students the way that you have. It is true that the student population failed, but it's also true that it failed during COVID and it is going back up. And so those things need to be said.

[00:29:42] It is true that we have some proficiencies, but it's also true that our deficiencies or some of our proficiency numbers are still higher than anybody else in the Commonwealth. And I think that needs to be said. It is true that we have a graduation rate of 96%, greater than 96%. And that needs to be said. It is true that we're in the top 5% of all school systems in the country. And that needs to be said. And so as we talk about things that are an issue, we should also talk about the things that are a huge, huge, huge success. I am not one that believes that throwing money at

[00:30:17] something is the way you fix it. I don't think that is true at all. And I would be more than willing to sit with the schools and see if they want to have any something that they want to show us. But just accusing them of not being transparent enough is not the same thing as sitting down and talking to them and trying to figure things out. That is a talking point, and talking points don't really help. I appreciate Ms. Bricksman actually saying the facts about the tax rate, because those are the facts about the tax rate. And finally, I want to say that if we had not done on our tax rate what we did, we would be at risk of losing employees because we would have

[00:30:55] new employees coming in and making close to the same amount of employees who have been here, and that is a good way to lose employees. When you lose employees, especially first responders, it costs a lot more to retrain people than it does to maintain the people who are there to maintain their expertise and maintain their excellence.

[00:31:14] We did a very, very good job in the budget this year, and so much of that credit goes to Mr. Hemstreet, Ms. McCullen, Ms. Morgan, and our county staff. So thank you very much. Mr. Latourne, would you like to have a closing, please? Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I'll give you one statistic, and folks can check my math, but I go back to 2012.

[00:31:36] Since 2012, the average home value in Loudoun is up 83%, and the tax bill is up about 23%. So if you track that 23% since 2012 and you look at inflation, it's actually under the rate of inflation.

[00:31:54] So if you adjusted the tax bill to that point for today and then looked at what inflation adjusted would be, it would be higher than what the tax bill is. And I say, Supervisor M says, right, there's a lot of reasons for that, and data centers are a very big one, the amount of money that they're contributing to that. And so as we go forward, we do have to be mindful of what that conversation is like and where our revenue is going. But, you know, it's a complicated picture when you look at taxes. And we do have the lowest tax rate in Northern Virginia, and we should be mindful of how we got there and then be managing what that transition looks like in the future, which is why I'm saying I think we will have to

[00:32:32] have some more difficult conversations as things evolve, because we're just going to have less new revenue coming in that helps offset our expenditures. And on the expenditure side, labor costs are a big part of that. And certainly, we're in a very competitive environment. So I appreciate all the comments and all the work everyone did. And we'll look forward to beginning the process again very soon. Do you look forward to it, though? Do you look forward to it?

[00:33:01] All right. Mr. LeTernal made the motion. I seconded that motion. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? That motion will pass 7-1-1. Mr. Kirshner opposing the motion. Mr. Sainz being off today is for the motion. Okay, supervisors. During the last meeting and this meeting, my chair's comments, I will try to keep them brief. I want to remind people that the chair's comments are some factual statements, some statements of facts. I will expand on these comments later and put more context around the comments when we do the board comments later on, but I do want to just share some of the things with you that happened over the past two weeks.

[00:33:41] I attend, oh wow, everybody's just leaving. Wow, that's just messed up. I said good things about you all, and you all just, you're just out of here. That's fine. No problem at all. No, that's all. All right. I attended the Housing Association of Nonprofit Developers Summit.

[00:34:02] Now, hear me well. Nonprofit developers, the Housing Association. So they're not trying to make a profit. Just say that. And I went primarily to support John Hall, who was the head of our Housing and Community Service Department.

[00:34:17] I'm sorry, not Community Service. Yeah, Community Service Department. And some of the statements that were made there, and again, I'll put more context around these statements later on, but I do want to just talk a little bit or just give you some of the things that were said during that conference.

[00:34:35] The largest impediment to getting attainable housing in northern Virginia is political will. We should not let the enemy, the perfect be the enemy of the good when trying to get attainable homes.

[00:34:54] Although the region is meeting 85% of our housing goals, the region is only meeting 20% of our attainable housing goals. Lower income communities and communities of color are the people who are bearing the burden of the attainable housing problem, attainable housing brunt.

[00:35:17] Okay. I actually thought this is maybe the most impactful statement made that day. Look at the possibility to build attainable housing and the people who will live in those homes as people who will benefit our community versus people who are just a cost burden to our community. We need a total mind shift. They are not just a cost, they are a benefit. And sometimes if needed, please provide them wraparound service and inclusionary zoning

[00:35:52] is also important. 30% AMIs is not getting funded or built, so people are living in the only available units, which are leaving them house-burdened, and they can't cover their other bills. Fairfax built 500 attainable units on two acres, and that was in their urban area, which is in Tyson's Corner, but the full building was attainable. Pulling in a broader community support would be important, political will in the face of NIMBY resistance, face-based nonprofit and businesses.

[00:36:33] Setting aside land, which is land banking, will always help. I don't know what I wrote here. I was trying to write exact statements. I don't know what that says, so I won't read it. Housing trust funds that are flexible to make housing costs work need to have more political will.

[00:36:54] expedited zoning, and expedited transaction. The housing industry is competing with other industries that are buying land. Governments need to be more nimble to help the housing industries. Incentives need to be in place to encourage attainable housing.

[00:37:11] Do counties have programs dedicated to housing preservation? I thought that was very important. A couple more comments. Affordable housing development is economic development, and somebody said NIMBYs are also constituents, and they vote.

[00:37:34] They vote the loudest, so they will be heard. It's important to try to hear the voice of just not the NIMBYs, but of everyone. If you want to be progressive, you have to support offering different housing to everybody. Everybody has a narrative about who they think deserves affordable housing.

[00:37:52] There is a benefit, and this is particularly to Loudoun for starting late because we're starting later than others. Loudoun has, at this moment, with the exception of Prince William County, we are putting in the lowest amount toward our housing development funds.

[00:38:09] Alexandria is doing one cent on their real estate tax and one cent on their dining tax. Fairfax is doing one cent on their tax. I don't know the percentage, but D.C. has done $100 million for their attainable housing.

[00:38:32] With the exception, again, of Prince William, we have the lowest number. And so when we talk about that we're at $30 million, we're not even at $30 million yet, but when we get to $30 million, that's just not that much compared to everybody else. So again, as I said, I will put more context around all those statements later because during my chair's comments, I just lay down some statements that were made.

[00:38:53] Another thing that happened during the past two weeks is there was a roundtable with Senator Warner and Congressman Wexton around mental health and mental health options. And in the area, a lot of people from public and private mental health professionals spoke, including Loudoun's own Dr. Gupta, and she did a fabulous job discussing why a crisis receiving center is so important she also talked about how crisis receiving is not treatment it is triage and why it's important to have it from a rom counseling center which is around counseling and wellness center which is a

[00:39:32] private counseling center a therapist by the name of Jamie rice talked at some length and at the fact that the fact that most and most counselors do not take insurance for mental health because it's so hard for the forms to process and all those things and that insurance companies do not treat mental health like they treat physical health which is a problem because mental health is just health and they often will only fund say six mental health visits when they never do that when it comes to physical health and so a lot of counselors and

[00:40:11] and private mental health providers do not think it's even worth doing insurance, which leaves a lot of people at a hard time if they can't afford to pay for this out-of-pocket. So there was a very, very, very good discussion on whether or not, on how to get more private providers to take insurance.

[00:40:32] There was also a brief discussion, of which I will not go into the details, about whether or not what most therapists think about the ideal of having legalizing marijuana for recreational use, for recreational use. I will say that I have still not met one therapist who thinks legalizing marijuana for recreational use is a good idea, but I will let them talk about why the reasons that is true.

[00:40:59] And then there was a very big discussion on what the causes of the mental health crisis we are seeing right now, especially in our youth, most especially in our young ladies who are preteens between the ages of 10 to 13 is where we see the mental health crisis reaching just very high levels in that age group. There was a lot of discussion around why there is a book, And it is called The Anxious Generation.

[00:41:33] And it talks about how we saw the mental health crisis, especially for young people, start rising in 2010. And it correlated the mental health crisis of our young people with the rise of social media and all the reasons we saw the mental health crisis and the rise of social media.

[00:41:51] The one thing I will say at this moment is that especially our young people and especially our young, our young preteen girls will often compare how they feel on their inside to how they, how somebody looks on the outside. And so if you are, if you're 13, 14 years old, and you wake up that morning, and you have a pimple on your face, and your hair's not doing what you wanted to do, and all those things, and then you look online, and you see someone who's 17, who looks darn near perfect. Sometimes if you're 12 years old, you don't get that that's not how that person actually looks. You don't get that that person has been airbrushed and

[00:42:30] had their hair done and had makeup done and took 15 photos before they got the right one. And so you just look at that and go, I don't measure up. And a lot of that is playing itself out on social media. And so the anxiety that we see in the nation, really the world, but we'll go with the nation, really start going up in 2010.

[00:42:54] And so that's important to know that. And then lastly, I did attend the Route 28 tax meeting. I will let Mr. Letourneau talk about that since he had this amazing reign of power as chair of the Route 28 tax district, so I'll let him discuss the reign of power he conducted when he gets to his board comments.

[00:43:15] But those are my comments today. Okay, my voice for a cause today is Mobile Hope. Mobile Hope is a nonprofit organization that empowers homeless and at-risk youths up to age 24 to achieve self-sufficiency and improve well-being.

[00:43:35] Mobile Hope feeds, clothes, shelters, and helps empower the youth population through their two core services programs, the Crisis Care for Homeless and their at-risk youth. Listen for the Honk Bus Outreach. have no idea what that means. I'm sure you'll tell me in just a second. Donna Fortier is here, and she's going to introduce everyone who's come with her, and then there'll be some questions for you. Perfect. Thanks for having us. Thanks for being here. So this is Allison, who is our Director of Development. This is Soraya, who is our social worker. And Joe Cattaret is our Director of

[00:44:10] Operations and Trade School Expansion. Good. Okay. So what are your main services that you provide that Mobile Hopes provides in Loudoun County? So we have two primary missions. Our first mission is helping our homeless and at-risk youth, 24 years of age and younger, and we do everything we can to empower them and help them become self-sufficient.

[00:44:32] Our second primary mission is our Listen for the Honk, which is our neighborhood food distribution program, where we go into marginalized neighborhoods and we provide everything from food and clothes and hygiene and households so that families are able to save money so they don't become one step closer to homelessness.

[00:44:51] You know, Ms. Partey, I'm going to ask you a question that you did not get in advance, and I apologize, but it just hit me. So what we know about brain function is that most people reach brain adulthood, frontal lobe adulthood, about between 25 and 27, right?

[00:45:11] Somewhere in there. So just out of curiosity, why did you make 24-year cutoff when there's still kind of that hasn't fully reached full brain development yet? I'm just curious. If we could go back. No, I'm just kidding. We've been asked to go up to the age of 30, but we kind of did it when the school board across the country was identifying youth up to the age of 24, and so it kind of made sense for us to stick with that.

[00:45:38] Okay, that makes sense. All right. How does Mobile Hope identify and reach out to the at-risk youth? So we do that a variety of ways. We meet them where they are. We will get phone calls throughout the county that there's a homeless kid behind Safeway, there's a homeless kid at a bus depot.

[00:45:54] But we also have humbling support from the community, and we get a lot of referrals from the county, from different agencies, other nonprofits. And the biggest one that we take as a badge of honor is from our current kids who are coming in to get support, and they refer a friend of theirs so we know that we're a trusted entity in their world.

[00:46:11] Wonderful. What are Mobile Hope's plans for the future in Loudoun County? Keeping up with pace. Our current caseload is over 100, and that has increased over the last two weeks. Expanding the services that we already provide to include our trade school, our life skills, and just kind of keeping up with the pace that walks through our door.

[00:46:33] So later on, not right now, but when I was last there, You are just kind of ramping up the trade school. I want to come over and see how that's going. I look forward to talking to you a little bit more. Casey, you can show me around the trade school. Absolutely. And if people want to help or give, how's the best way to reach you?

[00:46:52] Well, we love the community getting involved because that really does help our kids in crisis know that the community cares. So they can go to our website, they can call us, they can come in for a tour, and they can follow us on any of our social medias. What is your web address? Or a social media address.

[00:47:08] Mobile-hope.org is our website. Mobile-hope.org. All right. Well, that's a tough age for a lot of reasons. And a lot of times when you have young people that mobile hope, you know, they might be 18 to 24.

[00:47:24] They're not always socially or functionally 18 to 24, which can make it really much harder to deal. There's a lot of trauma for young people who are unhoused or precariously housed. And so the fact that you're doing this is a very needed resource in the community.

[00:47:42] And we're going to talk about this a little bit more later of the needs for this age group. And so you've been doing this for a while. And we appreciate your service so much, Ms. Porte, and all of you. So thank you for coming in. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Hemstreet, do you have any comments?

[00:48:02] Thank you, Madam Chair. I have four comments for this evening. The first is that the Douglas Community Center Playground Replacement Project is receiving national attention. The April edition of the National Recreation and Park Association's magazine features an article on the unique playground that spotlights the global impact and historic contributions of African-Americans to society.

[00:48:23] In the words of the article, the playground links the past to the hope of the future through play and imagination. Second, the Loudoun County Public Library is seeking input from the community about the construction of future libraries and the renovations of existing ones. In addition to an online survey, LCPL is hosting four public input sessions this month.

[00:48:42] Dates, times, and locations of the meetings, as well as a link to the online survey may be found at library.loudon.gov slash news. And then third, Loudon County Economic Development encourages small business entrepreneurs to attend the second annual Launch Loudon Small Business Summit on April 30th at the Lodge at Hanson Park.

[00:49:03] The summit is designed for small businesses across all industries. Participants will have the opportunity to engage with keynote speaker Jason Dorsey, participate in interactive workshops and network. The event is free, but registration is required. More information is online at biz.loudon.gov.

[00:49:20] And then finally, Loudon County homeowners and small businesses once again have the opportunity to sign up to learn more about solar power options through Solarize Virginia. The program offers free satellite solar assessments, streamlined installation, and discounted pricing on solar systems from vetted installers.

[00:49:38] More information is available at SolarizeBA.org. And speaking of solar, Parks, Recreation, and Community Services staff have organized a number of events to help people view the solar eclipse on April 8th safely.

[00:49:55] Details are at loudon.gov slash PRCS. Those are my comments this evening, Madam Chair. Thank you. Thank you very, very much. Appreciate that. And, and, uh, Mr. Street. So I was talking to Mr. Torby about this earlier because the solar event, I mean, the actual moment, I think is like around 320 in the afternoon. So the, so the, there are, there are events that start like at 10 in the morning and, and, and go to, you know, four or five in the evening or in the, in the, in the evening, they're all day events, but the solar event itself is like around 320.

[00:50:27] And so I had to go look that up because it actually said, like, go to any event and watch it. And I thought, well, the solar eclipse is only at a certain time. So you can't just, so, but that's what it is. And they are everywhere. I mean, the Hanson Park, the longest one is actually at Cascades Senior Center. It starts at 10 in the morning.

[00:50:44] Yeah, no, there's some really great events. So everyone, can you give that, can you give, do you have that web address again? Because there are so many events that day. It's going to be, Parks and Rec are doing, they're doing a fantastic job with the solar event yeah it's at their main website so it'd be loudon.gov slash PRCS and then it's on the it's a link on that mainland okay and by the way they had glasses for as long as they last for anyone who needs them don't look at the solar event with your blind eyes it's not a good idea okay so we we have the environmental excellence awards which we are so excited about um we first

[00:51:23] we first have a presentation, and then we're going to have the awardees come up and receive their awards, and Ms. Bricksman and I are going to go down front after this part while Ms. Bingle reads information about the awardees. Each awardee will come up and receive their awards, and then if you received your awards, you're going to stand off to the side, and And so you come up, as Ms. Bringle reads about you, and then you take a picture with Ms. Bricksman and I, stand off to the side, and Ms. Bricksman and I and everybody, so everyone's still standing up.

[00:52:02] Yeah, sorry. And then everyone stand to the side, and then at the end, we're all going to take one picture together. Did I get that plan right? I think I got that plan right. Very good. All right, we're ready. So thank you, Madam Chair, members of the board, and we greatly appreciate you allowing us to participate in your award ceremony this evening.

[00:52:21] Before I hand it off to Mr. Veeney and Kira, I would like to just highlight that through the board's environmental ethic and strategic vision in 2021, you established the Environmental Commission. Since that time, this group has been extraordinary in providing advice and recommendations to the board through the annual reports that they bring to you and the annual work plan.

[00:52:48] You'll be seeing a little bit of that starting in TLUC here in April, as well as quarterly you get that update. So the Environmental Excellence Awards are part of that charter that you gave to the Environmental Commission, but I just would like to thank you for your visionary work on that.

[00:53:05] So at this point, I'd like to turn it over to Mr. Avini to kind of set the stage, and then Jim will probably come up momentarily. Thank you. Mark Avani, Assistant Director, Department of General Services. chair randall members of the board we are very happy to be here for the second time presenting the environmental commission awards as mr brown stated these are in the environmental commission bylaws and we are also pleased to state that we had more applications this year so the awards seem to be gaining in popularity and these awards recognize projects done between january of 2023 and february of 2024 and i do want to especially acknowledge the environmental commission

[00:53:44] the judges who made this possible, as well as Ms. Kerr Moore, who did a lot of the work that you see here today behind the scenes very quietly and efficiently, so I do want to recognize her efforts. With your permission, Chair, I'd like to call up the Chair of the Environmental Commission, Jim Bingle, to announce the winners, and then I'll come around there with the actual certificates. That would be wonderful, and Ms. Bricksman and I are going to join you down front, okay? So, Supervisors, when the winners come up, it's like a proclamation. We're all

[00:54:12] going to gather and take pictures. Okay. Well, I'd like to ask the Environmental Commission

[00:54:41] members and judges who are present to briefly stand, please. And on behalf of all of the Environmental Commission members and our judges, I'd like to offer brief comments recognizing the winners of the Loudoun County Environmental Excellence Awards. First up is the business winner is Orblinks Academy, represented by Ferry Riar, founder and CEO. This educational company creates and fosters student-driven STEM opportunities in support of gender and racial

[00:55:18] inclusivity. They were nominated for a five-year partnership with Belmont Ridge Middle School, collaborating on summer and after-school academies. One of their students' innovative projects was making furniture with fungus to help focus on the need for innovative alternatives

[00:55:35] to plastic. Fungus furniture. Pretty awesome. Sorry, what? Furniture with fungus? Yes, and I'm sure Ms. Ria can explain more. Okay. Sorry. Absolutely. Well, thank you. Thank you very much. First of all,

[00:56:12] it's an honor, honor to receive this. I appreciate the commission and the Board of Supervisors for this recognition. Yes, furniture from mushroom roots, and this is an innovation that is the first of its kind, not only in Loudoun County, but in Virginia, and as we understand, at the national level, for students of high school level to be able to make environmental-friendly furniture that can be not only is made from mushroom roots, but whenever you don't need it, you could just put it in your garden and really enjoy the beauty of it in the garden. It can be a fuel for your soil.

[00:56:46] And it is absolutely functional, and it's absolutely great. So it's been amazing to see the students bringing the science in the classroom and making a groundbreaking innovation. And being in Loudoun County, it's absolutely, and LCPS being absolutely a great partner to be able to be there.

[00:57:07] Did they do anything else, Ms. Bingo? Oh, they did a lot of things, but I was trying to keep it short. This is just one of them. Just one. Are you good? Yeah, good. Okay, Supervisual, let's take a picture.

[00:57:50] Okay, next up is the community group winner, which is the Luckett's Ruritan Club, represented by Barbara Scott, Chair of the Environmental Committee, Cindy Kohler, Project Initiator, and Lily Frankenfield, a student at Tuscarora High School.

[00:58:31] So the Luckett's Ruritan Club promoted environmental awareness through multiple projects in 2023, including the weekly trash and recycling services that they've done for since 1979, and a reusable grocery tote project. They have directly contributed to the preservation and protection of Loudoun County's environment and have provided positive outcomes through community service, education, and involvement.

[00:58:56] The club gives back to the community with scholarships, and in 2023 amounted to $21,000 for seven graduating seniors.

[01:00:25] Okay, the winning educator. The winning educator is Manju Gomantinayagam, and I hope I got that right, a teacher at Farmwell Station Middle School.

[01:00:49] Ms. Gomantinayagam founded and sponsored the Farmwell Station Middle School Young Naturalist Club and was key in the school being recognized as a Virginia Naturally School through the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources. She has not only directly involved students in environmental projects which benefit our local community, She's also co-led a professional development opportunity to teach other LCPS educators how they can start young naturalist clubs and utilize outdoor classrooms.

[01:01:22] So much for this honor. I'm truly humbled. I know many, many more educators in Loudoun County that do far more than I do. So I've just been lucky that I have a great admin that thought of nominating me.

[01:01:37] That's the only thing I can think of. So thank you to all those veteran teachers that have laid the path. And I see many here in the audience. Thank you so much, Dr. Westerwald. And I see Michael Myers there. Thank you so much for the collaboration.

[01:01:53] And all my teachers and admin, thank you so much. Would you like the teachers to be in your picture? What? Yes, please. That would be amazing. Thank you. And I also have my friends there supporting me. Thank you so much. And my son is right there, too.

[01:02:08] Thank you, Rishi. Picture. You can hand the phone to Ernie. Come on, Rishi. You're welcome.

[01:02:36] Hey, the winning government employee or team is Virginia Cooperative Extension, Loudoun,

[01:03:10] and they are represented by Barbara Bailey, Community Engagement and Master Gardener Coordinator. Their project was establishing gravel tree planting beds to facilitate and support successful tree planting.

[01:03:30] The point was to provide for the temporary planting of saplings and support root growth to increase survival when they are replanted in their permanent locations. Volunteers from Extension partnered with Loudoun County Parks and Recreation to create beds in two different parks with the capacity to hold 75 saplings.

[01:03:50] This project is great because it can be replicated at other parks, on HOA common grounds, and at schools. Well, I guess we'd like to say thank you very much. We are thrilled to partner with Parks and Recs on this endeavor and increase the tree canopy here in Loudoun County and the education on how important it is to clean the air, get that carbon out of there, and be green.

[01:04:20] Thank you. Thank you so much. Let's get a picture.

[01:05:10] Our winning student is Emma Lloyd. I would take it. Emma Lloyd is a homeschooled 11th grader who has contributed nearly 100 hours of her time to benthic, chemical, and salt watch stream monitoring.

[01:05:32] And she's actively led and participated in educational outreach to teens and others in 2023. She also procured funding and collaborated with Nova Parks to design and install four educational signs on stream health at stream crossings on the WNOD trail.

[01:05:51] It's an honor to be receiving this award. It means a lot. There are so many people that I would love to thank for all the help and support and mentorship that they've given me.

[01:06:07] But because there's so many, I can only choose a few to mention. But first and foremost is Pat McElvain, who nominated me for this award and was my mentor for the project I did on stream signage. And then, of course, there's my mom, Amy Uland, who got me into stream monitoring to begin with.

[01:06:26] She's the one who took me to my first event. I did not want to go, but I ended up enjoying it so much. And then, of course, there's the rest of my family, there's my friends, and then there's the countless people I've met through all my opportunities. And, of course, Nova Parks, they were a pleasure to work with.

[01:06:45] And Loudon Wildlife Conservancy is amazing. They're who we do street monitoring with. You're 17 years old. You're 16 years old, and this is already something that you realize is important and to teach other people. That is absolutely. So the person standing next to you is really big in stream monitoring and walking through streams and all that kind of stuff.

[01:07:05] So let's do two things. Let's take a picture of you, and then let's get up all your people and take a picture of everybody up, especially your mom, okay? Let's do both those things, okay?

[01:07:14] My mom and Pat McElveen.

[01:07:47] Very good.

[01:08:00] Up, please, all the recipients.

[01:08:27] Can you come back up? While you're doing that, I just wanted to thank you for the opportunity to recognize the environmental efforts of the Loudoun community. And I want to take a quick moment to promote the Environmental Forum, May 14th, Academies of Loudoun.

[01:08:48] What day? May 14th. May 14th, Academies of Loudoun Environmental Forum. And you'll all get an invitation, flyers, et cetera, going out. And I actually want to take an opportunity to thank you because the Environmental Committee, we hear nothing but positive things about it. You all have done so much incredible work over the past, gosh, two years now.

[01:09:07] I don't think Mr. Turner, who wrote the bylaws, and everyone who supported this environmental commission going back some years. Mr. Ivani, Mark, you have been absolutely fantastic, so thank you so much. Mr. Brown, thank you for being so supportive.

[01:09:25] The whole team. The whole team, the whole team. And, Jim, I know what this means to you, so thank all of you as well. So how about you come on up here with us and take this picture? Okay.

[01:10:25] Okay, Supervisors, we are running slightly ahead of schedule, which is really wonderful.

[01:11:03] So we're going to go to, right now, nominations. If you have a nomination, please put your light on. I'm actually going to start because I'm excited about this one. I want to re-nominate Siobhan McFadden to an at-large seat on the Economic Development Authority.

[01:11:25] Any other nominations? No one? Okay, well, I guess now we're done with that. That took up so much of our time. Well, I don't want to do a closed session item because I don't want to be in closed session when our 5.30 starts.

[01:11:41] Well, Mr. Rogers, do you think a closed session could take 15 minutes? I believe the first one could, yes. Do you really think that, Mr. Rogers? Okay. All right, so you know what? Then we just as well do that. We will be back out by 5.30 so we can do the proclamation But since we're a little ahead of time, let's go on and get one of the closed sessions knocked out.

[01:12:04] Supervisor Brixman, would you please read us to closed session? Number one. I move the Board of Supervisors recess the public meeting and enter into closed session pursuant to Section 2.2-3711A3 of the Code of Virginia to consider acquisition or disposition of parcel or parcels of property for public use in the Leesburg Election District.

[01:12:31] Ms. Umstead, do you want to second that? It's in your district. Second. all right made in second that all in paper discussion on people say aye any opposed that

[01:12:53] motion will pass 8-0-1 I don't know there she is okay we are back and we are going to read out of

[01:33:11] closed session Ms. Bricksman will you please read us out of closed session thank you Madam Chair I move that the closed session be adjourned that the Board of Supervisors reconvene its public meeting that the minutes of the public meeting should reflect that no formal action was taken in the closed session and further move that the resolution certifying the closed session be adopted and reflected in the minutes of this public meeting second discussion on the motion all the people say aye aye any opposed that motion passed 701 would everybody please affirm affirm

[01:33:42] affirm affirm affirm affirm i affirm as well thank you very much okay so we are going to go on and do our resolutions. The first resolution we're going to do is for Arab American History Month and then we'll do the other two resolutions. I want everyone who is here for Arab American History Month, including everyone who is here for Dr. Ramadan, to come down and join us in the front, please.

[01:34:11] Ms. Letourne, will you please join me for Arab American History Month? This way. Hi, come this

[01:34:45] way. Everybody come down here. Yes, sir. I am receiving. I'm sorry, this is for the entire board? This is new information. I guess I'm taking him out of the resolution if it's for the entire chair. Okay, sounds good. Both sides? Everyone on both sides, please. So I want to give just a

[01:35:19] little bit of background on this resolution. And so, yes, please, on this resolution. So I need to go back a little ways. In 2008, I came to this board before I was chair, and I asked, why hadn't there been ever a resolution for Black History Month? And my predecessor, Scott York, said something to me that was very poignant and very correct. He said, if you want a resolution for Black History Month, you should write it yourself. It should come from the community. And I thought, he is

[01:35:56] absolutely right. And from there on, I've written a resolution for Black History Month. A resolution celebrating anything should come from the community that we're celebrating. We do Hispanic Heritage Month and resolutions and it comes from and is written by and requested by the Hispanic community. This was the first year we had a request for Arab American History Month and when it first came in it was a request from Fairfax which was okay but my response was to Fairfax County absolutely not because it has to come from Loudoun County and these resolutions

[01:36:32] need to be Loudon-centric. I then went about trying to understand what it is to be Arab-American, and I really didn't know what I didn't know. My first phone call was to Arben Estrefev on the school board, and I said, explain this term, Arab-American, and he gave me a whole information on where people who are Arab-American from, that they are every kind of various faiths and religions and all kinds of information. I just, I just didn't know. I then went to, um, to our DEI person. And I said, actually I called Ms. Bricksman and she and I went to our DEI person. I said,

[01:37:11] help me understand what, what it means to be Arab American and all this. And so he sat with Ms. Bricksman and I for a good hour and talked and talk to us and talk through things. And I learned so much. And, you know, sometimes when you're a minority, everyone thinks every minority understands every other minority community, but you don't. You don't. So the information that I learned over the past couple of weeks has been astonishing and so rewarding and so rich and so interesting. I then set out and said, okay, we cannot have this without talking about a person

[01:37:51] in Loudoun County who happens to be an Arab American. And my head immediately went to um Dr. Delegate David Ramadan which if you know he and I's history that actually is a thing and so then I called his one of his best friends Matt Letourner and I said Matt I want to we're doing an American history resolution and I want to honor David Ramadan for all he's done can you help me and Matt sent me information I'm sorry I sent me information but then I started doing some

[01:38:24] information gathering and researching on Dr. Ramadan myself. And oh my gosh, you are an impressive human being. You are an impressive human being. I had to three times cut down what we could say because it couldn't all fit. I will send you my original, the original words, because what you see right now was just a very small portion of what we originally started with.

[01:38:54] And so I am so proud to put this resolution forward for the first time. And I'm really proud to do it with, yeah, I am. It's great. And I'm really proud to do it with Ms. Letourneau.

[01:39:11] And thank you to Ms. Bricksman. And thank you to Carl Rush. And thank you to Arben Astrafi and everyone. I've never had a resolution that had so many people involved in writing a resolution. But that's, you know, when it's the first time, that's kind of how it goes.

[01:39:27] And so, thank you. And now I'm going to read it and pass it out. Anyone who wants to speak can speak. Thank you. I got you. Whereas the Arab-American story is deeply rooted in the fabric of the Loudoun story, embodying a tale characterized by an array of backgrounds and beliefs, dynamic cultures and tradition, pioneering ingenuity and perseverance.

[01:39:59] And whereas Arab Americans encompass a dysporic ethnic group comprised of immigrants originating from Arab-speaking nations from a spectrum of religious affiliations. Arab American and terrestrial lineage stems from 22 nations across the Middle East and North Africa.

[01:40:18] And whereas Arab American Heritage Month serves as a vital platform to combat misconceptions, misinformation, and discrimination against Arab Americans by celebrating their accomplishments and dismantling factual information about Arab American culture.

[01:40:36] This initiative promotes understanding and fosters inclusivity and recognizes that for more than a century, Arab Americans have been in enriching various facets of our society. And whereas the Honorable Dr. David Ramadan immigrated from Lebanon in 1989, obtained his undergraduate degree from George Mason University and his doctorate in leadership and learning in organizations from Vanderbilt University, and currently serves as a professor at the Schar School of Government at George Mason University,

[01:41:10] Dr. Ramadan serves as a shining example in Loudoun and around the Commonwealth of Virginia of the accomplishments of the Arab American community's commitments to service and the power of education to transform lives. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors does hereby proclaim April 2024 as Arab American History Month in Loudoun County and stands committed to honoring Arab American Heritage Month, recognizing the invaluable contributions of Americans to our community and the world at large.

[01:41:45] We affirm our dedication to fostering an inclusive environment that celebrates diversity, combats injustice, and promotes unity, prosperity, and understanding for all who call Loudoun home. Thank you.

[01:42:15] Madam Chair, Supervisor, Madam Vice Chair, Supervisors, I'm honored, but I'm honored not for recognizing me, but I'm honored for your recognition of this heritage. On behalf of my nieces and nephews, on behalf of my family, on behalf of Arab Americans that are presented by members of the organizations that are here, we are proud to call Loudon home.

[01:42:38] It's been home for 30-some years. We are proud to have elected – well, he starts with a good 20 votes every election season, right? We are proud to have elected our supervisor multiple times.

[01:42:53] We are proud to have casted our vote for you. And we are proud of all of the hard work that you do to make Loudoun the way it is. Thank you for this recognition.

[01:43:09] I wanted to bring the family today so that they can all enjoy this because this is not about one of us, not me. I'm simply a messenger holding it, but I appreciate the recognition on behalf of the community. And my brother T was waving, telling me something.

[01:43:25] Go ahead. - Oh, the sheriff is well. - The sheriff is here. I will recognize the sheriff and the chief. I saw the chief here as well. And many of all of our service members that are here, thank you for your service. Absolutely. And if I've forgotten anyone, this is not supposed to be to recognize everybody else, but thank you for all your service. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm honored. Thank you. And anyone else like to speak? Are you sure? Okay. Let me just say very quickly,

[01:44:05] so obviously David and I are very good friends, and his story is truly extraordinary in the way that he has supported his family. But what is also extraordinary that I have learned through my friendship is uh the the mentality of service and the mentality of community is such that there are other davids in the community that have that same commitment to to helping their families to creating a better life and so this recognition david is a shining example of of the community here for us to recognize but i know through my constituents and my colleagues constituents that there are many

[01:44:42] many others um and you know we don't always see them and hear them but they're there and uh and we appreciate all of them truly yes yes member of our commission commissioner on aging yes but i i want to thank you so much on behalf of our arab americans in loudon county um we appreciate that you have recognized us we appreciate that you recognize our pillar in our community david we

[01:45:14] love him we love our dullest supervisor also because we are dullest but thank you chairman this was an outstanding thing that you have done for us we will appreciate it so much and thank you to all the board of supervisors for the hard work that you've done and thank you to our sheriff back there too. My name is Samia Bahor. I'm the Commissioner on Aging for Dulles. Thank you.

[01:45:45] My name is Raba Latiri, and I am the co-leader for Virginia. I asked for the proclamation. Since I am in Reston, Virginia, they told me I need to bring somebody from the Prince William, from Loudoun County. I am so proud to be American because I find out lately so far, I collect eight proclamations, and people notice and supporting us, and it means a lot to us to recognize us.

[01:46:25] Thank you so much. On behalf of the Arab America Foundation and all the Arab America live in Virginia, thank you again. Thank you so much. Thank you. Actually, how about you just stand next to her?

[01:46:44] How does that sound? Okay. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Stay right there. Yeah. You go in front of me. Come closer.

[01:48:52] And we're going to do the National Volunteer Week. Would everyone please come down for National Volunteer Week?

[01:50:30] I think that after the past, I guess, six weeks now, we really realized the price that you can pay for to be a volunteer in the county, especially a volunteer a firefighter first responder um when we um lost firefighter brown it was it was you know truthfully we actually don't even see see it as a volunteer we see it just a part of the fire department but the truth is he was a volunteer and he um he gave his life

[01:51:06] saving other people and working for other people so this volunteer um proclamation this year kind of hitched a little different, and it feels a little different when we know that that can be the price somebody pays, not for a job they're paid for, but for a job they're volunteering for.

[01:51:25] So before I read the proclamation, we're going to take a moment of silence for Firefighter Brown.

[01:51:39] Thank you. Okay, thank you very much. I am now going to read the proclamation for National Volunteer Week. Whereas throughout Virginia's history, citizens have actively volunteered their time talent and energy to serve and improve our communities to make our Commonwealth a better and safer place and whereas the hundreds of dedicated volunteer members of the Loudoun County combined fire and rescue system selflessly donate their time as first responders and in critical support roles

[01:52:18] to the system and whereas volunteers are the catalysts that create positive changes in our communities by bringing their compassion their time their ideas talents technical skills and professional expertise to strengthen and help our communities flourish and whereas these trained and organized volunteers are our neighbors are they are summoned to a wide variety of emergencies across the county every day including fires emergency medical incidents

[01:52:52] natural disasters hazardous materials incidents water rescue emergencies and other public service calls and whereas our community is truly fortunate truly fortunate to be served by the dedicated neighbors and volunteer first responders who give their time and service to those in need now therefore be it respond that the loudon county board of supervisors does hereby proclaim april 21st through 27th 2024 is national volunteer week in loudon county and encourages all citizens to

[01:53:28] honor the dedicated volunteers of the loudon county combined fire and rescue system thank you thank you chair randall and i'll let chief kelly in a minute say a few words as well but um thank you for the recognition thank you to the board they've been awesome during this process it it has been difficult since february 16th um the board has heard about not only the physical trauma that we all receive but the psychological trauma that will be ongoing for quite some time for me it's personal um these are my members that are out there serving every day of my career and

[01:54:06] volunteer staff 2 000 of us serving the citizens of loudon county my own father died at 56 from firefighting duties um and you know a year after i came into a career firefighting role but um most people we all know that we're a uniform that any of us can die at any point right those that are putting their harm in harm's way for others um but i don't know if the community realizes that again a volunteer that's serving their community can die in the same way as anybody else in this event this was a routine event on february 16th one that we go to several times throughout the day and it wasn't a big elaborate there were only two units on the scene initially um and it wasn't a big

[01:54:45] elaborate fire it wasn't uh all the the bells and whistles up front that you would think of in a traditional line of duty death this was a call for an outside gas leak that we responded to and seconds later an entire house explodes injuring 11 public safety folks 11 firefighters 12 excuse me 11 firefighters and one sheriff's deputy that was injured in addition to the two homeowners so again i couldn't be more proud of our system but at any point we all know i spent a a lot of time with the Brown family just yesterday, a remarkable family. I've spent time with all the injured, and while they're all healing, those three children and Mrs. Brown will never see their father

[01:55:24] and husband again, and that just puts it in perspective for us. So, Chief Kelly, you get to do the smiling part and tell us how great our system is. So, Kevin Kelly with Percival Rescue, Madam Chair, members of the board, thank you for recognizing the 1,200 volunteers who serve this system and combine to respond to calls fire ems we've spoken about what happened on february 16th but know that the volunteers continue to step forward we're just about at 1800 when volunteers will be filling stations across this county and we appreciate the recognition of their activities

[01:56:00] so thank you thank you thank you thank you so much i yes thank you one of these to you sir and then uh can i give this to mr plan because i love this here

[01:56:15] All right, you are staying, Ms. Brixman.

[01:57:24] Would you like to read it? Okay, everyone here for National Public Safety Telecommunications Week, please come down.

[01:58:05] Have Ms. Brixman read the proclamation, but I first want to talk a little bit about, you know, a lot of times when we talk about first responders, we do forget the people, especially the dispatchers and telecommunicators that work for us every day.

[01:58:23] I think this must be one of the hardest jobs, to be a dispatcher, a telecommunicator, because you know that there's a scene going on, you know there's an emergency going on, but you don't always get closure, right? You don't always know what happens in the end. So you can stay on the phone for somebody as long as you need to, but you don't always know what's going on.

[01:58:43] And so the trauma you all might experience is real. And and I think we should all recognize that it cannot be done without you. I have been over to your facilities more than once. It is complicated. It's a complicated job and it's a job you absolutely have to get right.

[01:59:02] You pick up that phone. You have no idea who's on the other end. If it's going to be a child, if it's going to be a person in distress, if it's going to be somebody whispering and that you can barely hear them. Somebody screaming, you've got to calm them down. It is absolutely amazing, which you all do every day. and i do absolutely want to say thank you um uh sheriff chapman i don't think people realize that that the telecommunications department is all one department over there so everyone's sitting together including our animal services department which has been really busy lately you guys have been very very busy lately and so i'm gonna have miss briggsman read it but i do want to say that we don't do this proclamation just because every year it just happens to come up we really do

[01:59:40] really do appreciate what you do for us so miss briggs would you please read this thank you madam chair and i'll just echo everything the chair just said i don't think i could say it better whereas emergencies can occur at any time that require the prompt response of a law enforcement of law enforcement firefighters emergency medical services providers and humane law enforcement officers to protect life and preserve property and whereas when an emergency occurs loudons public safety telecommunications are the single vital link between the first responders and persons seeking immediate relief during an emergency and whereas the safety of our law enforcement officers,

[02:00:19] firefighters, emergency medical service providers, and humane law enforcement officers is dependent upon the quality and accuracy of the information obtained from the citizens who call or text the Loudoun County Emergency Communications Center, whereas Loudoun County Public Safety telecommunicators have contributed substantially to the apprehension of criminals, suppression of fires, and emergency treatment of patients while consistently exhibiting true compassion and professionalism.

[02:00:47] Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors does hereby proclaim the week of April 14th through the 20th, 2024, as National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week in Loudoun County, the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, Loudoun County Combined Fire and Rescue System, Loudoun County Sheriff's Office, and Loudoun County Animal Services urge all residents to honor the men and women whose diligence and professionalism keep our county and citizens safe.

[02:01:19] So I do want to add one little story that I experienced just for a little humor. When I first moved into my house in Sterling, I was giving my daughter a bath, but she didn't want to get in the bath. And so she was running up and down the hallway with her phone, with the portable phone. And I'm like, stop that, stop that. And I just turned off the phone and went and put her in the bath. And all of a sudden I hear this knocking on the door. I don't know how you guys knew where to send the sheriff, but the sheriff came and they're like, we got a call from your, from your house. I'm like, okay, my little daughter must have dialed 911 on accident. And I

[02:01:56] said, but I'm just giving her a bath. I'm standing at the top of the stairs and telling the guy, I'm giving her a bath. And they're like, ma'am, you have to take your daughter out of the bathtub and bring her down here so that we can make sure that she's safe. I'm like, okay. So I brought her down they're all sudsy. Anyway, so we, I really appreciate you guys. And I know that you helped to make sure that what we need as far as safety services and fire services gets to us accurately and as fast as possible. So thank you. I have one of those and it's you all's fault. It's the sheriff's department's fault. So you guys go to the elementary schools when the little bitty people and you tell them like in an emergency call 911, but you didn't explain what an emergency is to a

[02:02:33] five-year-old. So I got a phone, a knock at my door too. And it was your sheriff's deputy. And it was like, is everything okay? And I was like, what are you talking about? And they got, we got a 911 call. And I'm like, I have no idea. So I caught both my boys down. I caught my oldest boy down. Sean was like, it wasn't me. And so we all went, Aaron. Well, Aaron was five and couldn't reach the cookies and in his little head that was an emergency and you guys had not explained to him

[02:03:07] what the emergency was but but your deputy also came in and talked to him about at that moment like he like literally went down on one knee and talked to him about like what now you consider an emergency and Aaron who was you know eating Oreos as he's being discussed with um I mean he was in so much trouble but you guys did a great job a great job with that and so you all i mean that's the kind of phone calls you guys take every single day so and you send somebody even if you know even if you know it is not an emergency you send somebody because you never know in the end

[02:03:43] so thank you well thank you chair randall uh and thank you for recognizing this outstanding group of telecommunicators uh you know when people think about first responders they think about people in uniform showing up uh fire and rescue law enforcement uh police whatever the case is you You know, but the actual first responders, the first first responders are telecommunicators are the ones who get the calls or the ones that have to vet the calls.

[02:04:06] They got to understand what's going on, whether it's cookies or whether it's something else. They have to make sure that they're getting the right information and try to determine who to send, how many people to send, what the call may consist of and all that. So it is a lot of work and it's a lot of stress. And just to give you an idea of how much they handled, just with the sheriff's office last year, we handled over 188,000 calls.

[02:04:28] That's over 500 calls each and every single day and over 200,000 incidents. You know, because some of those calls, they come in, they're inside incidents or they're things that were self-initiated. So it kind of gives you an idea of just how much these folks do on a daily basis.

[02:04:45] And they really are the unsung heroes of what we do. We could not do what we do without them, and really we're grateful for all the very good work that they do. So thank you for – an insight would be where they – like a self-initiated incident where an officer, a deputy might do a traffic stop that wasn't dispatched, where they will actually do a traffic stop.

[02:05:06] And then it has to be monitored, and it has to be followed up on by the people that are in dispatch, and that sort of thing. So it's a lot. There's a lot of things that go on there. So, really, it's a very complicated job, and they do a terrific job in what they do. So, thank you for recognizing them, and thank all of our telecommunicators for the great work that you do.

[02:05:26] Thank you. Chief Green. I'm representing the Cookie Caucus, so we'll be meeting later. What's your position on chocolate chip cookies? So, Chair Randall, Vice Chair Brisbane, all the supervisors, thank you for this proclamation.

[02:05:43] It really goes to recognizing the true work that they do. And I'd just like to highlight a few things. Twenty two thousand or two hundred and twenty thousand times last year, as Sheriff Chapman indicated, they answered a phone call both sides of the house.

[02:05:59] A busy day for us on both sides of the house is a thousand, a little over a thousand phone calls. And through the great work of training coordinator Donna McCaffrey and Jeannie Cooper, we will be recognized as an accredited center of excellence.

[02:06:18] I'm sorry. I've learned a lot in the past year about acronyms, so I want to make sure I get this right. We'll be recognized on April 16th as an accredited center of excellence for emergency medical dispatch and emergency fire dispatch, which is representative of all of the telecommunicators in the ECC.

[02:06:38] And then we also have a training program that is certified by the Association of Public Safety Communications Officials, or APCO. So, a lot of great work. But to end, I'd like to go back to that tragic day of, and I can't look over here.

[02:06:55] I'm sorry, because I will get emotional about this. So, I'll look back over here. At February 16th, they'll tell you, it takes me a little while to get through this. But on February 16th, I was nearby. I was over in Leesburg at the National Conference Center and got alerted to what had happened.

[02:07:15] And I walked in the door to the ECC. My first indication is that everybody was standing up. For those that are not telecommunicators, that's a pretty significant sign of something is going on. One of the dispatchers, the first dispatcher that I made eye contact with, was the one that had received that terrible communication that nobody ever wants to hear.

[02:07:40] But everybody was in the thick of it. They were all standing up. And one of our newest telecommunicators processed over 50 calls in one hour. So tremendous work that they do day in and day out. So thank you very much for recognizing that.

[02:07:58] Thank you, Chair Rale. Randall, I just wanted to kind of reiterate what Sheriff Chapman and Chief Green said, that every day we're grateful for what the men and women at the ECC do, along with the folks that work at our facility, but never more so than on February 16th.

[02:08:14] I had the privilege of spending some time with the crew that worked that night a few days later, along with a couple of very cute puppies that we brought from the shelter. So that helped kind of ease the tension there, and it was great to see the folks kind of unwind and smile a little bit for the first time in a couple days.

[02:08:30] And to see them kind of work together and how they helped each other was really a great moment to see. And one of the puppies got adopted by Chief Murphy, so it was a win-win all around. But we're, you know, at Animal Services, we're really grateful for the men and women that work at the ECC, along with the folks that work at our facility.

[02:08:51] And we're appreciative of the work that they do every day. I left the other one upstairs. I will make sure I get it over to your right. So I don't know how we're going to get this picture, but Mr. Glenn's going to tell us how.

[02:09:13] Hunter, we have one more person who wants to speak. Absolutely. Yeah, thank you, Chair Randall. You know, this is a day that has even special meaning to me because I started off my career as a dispatcher. So when I speak and I see everyone inside the Emergency Communication Center, I can understand what you're working through and what you're dealing with because, quite frankly, you're living the moment with whoever is calling you on the other end.

[02:09:40] I just have one question. Did the call taker tell them how to get the cookies out of the cookie jar or did that occur later? Okay, so that's good to know. So, look, I just want you to know, one of the other things, I mean, my time coming on board since July, I think one of our dispatchers delivered three babies, right, over the phone?

[02:10:00] Is that right? Yeah. Who is it? Oh, not here. Okay, delivering a baby. Maybe. I don't know. Yeah. So it's been, but that's the type of life that we live as a dispatcher in the community.

[02:10:17] You do so much. You're truly unsung heroes. But there's also got to be something known here as a special recognition. And that's been the push by the sheriff, by the fire chief, and by the Board of Supervisors, Chair Randall, to get the VRS enhancements for what you do.

[02:10:32] Because you work alongside first responders every day, and you share life with them. This is so important. So we'll continue to work on that effort. So thank you. And what a tremendous way to recognize all that you do. And I'd like to thank my colleagues.

[02:10:48] Thank you, Sheriff. Thank you, Chief. Thank you. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you for saying all that. All right.

[02:10:55] Okay, so there is a term in the medical community, especially for people who are training to be surgeons when they have new residents, and the term is watch one, teach one, do one.

[02:13:37] And that's how you learn how to be a resident or whatever you're going to do next.

[02:13:53] And I believe Ms. Bricksman has watched a lot of meetings being conducted, and I believe the next step is to teach one, and the best way for me to teach one is to sit here while she takes the gavel and runs the meeting, and then do one, it would mean she would do it while I'm not even in the room at all. And so I wasn't going to tell her, except for Erin McClellan, let it slip a little earlier.

[02:14:08] I am going to now hand the gavel to Ms. Bricksman, Vice Chair Bricksman, which means Supervisor Turner will be the person that reads us into closed session, because as third in line, he takes the role of Vice Chair, so Budget Turner, when that time comes, you'll read us into closed session.

[02:14:28] But at this moment, I'm going to hand the gavel and the meeting to Supervisor, to Vice Chair Briggsman. This is a teaching moment, and so if she has questions, I'm sitting here, and I will help, and I will answer questions, and I will do whatever she needs.

[02:14:44] But the best way to learn is to do. Ms. Briggsman, the gavel is yours. Madam Chair, point of parliamentary and clear point of order, point of personal privilege, point of – I'm only kidding. I'm going to load her up on the front end.

[02:15:00] You're good. Moves me the whole thing. Okay, see, see, this is what she has to deal with right off the bat. We haven't even started yet. Jeez. Oh, thank you, Madam Chair, for surprising me.

[02:15:16] I appreciate that. I think the only thing that may not be fair is that you get a script. Do you want a script? No, I don't use it. Would you like a script, though? No, ma'am. No, take a script. It's fine. I'm good. I think since we are at 6-11, we should probably start public comment at this point in time.

[02:15:32] There may actually be something I need to read for public comment, Madam Chair. No? Okay. All right. Well, public comment, I just want to remind everyone that we don't have any cheering and jeering in the boardroom. And I will call three different names, starting with the first person and then the person that will be second and third and so on, so that you know when your name is coming up.

[02:15:53] Please be sure to watch the timer. you have two minutes and 30 seconds thank you madam chair i do need to read this let's let's do that again uh we will now begin public input portion of the meeting speakers will be called in order in which they are signed up to speak if you are in the boardroom or lobby please come to the podium closest to you and state your name for the record the timer on the podium will indicate your remaining time when your time has expired please yield the floor to the next speaker

[02:16:25] pursuant to section xv2 a3 of the border board's rules of order at the business meetings all speakers unless otherwise noted will have a minimum of two and a half minutes but no more than three minutes except as otherwise noted no no it's two and a half minutes okay to address the board whether speaking as an individual or as a representative of any group it's organization you may want to correct that's two and a half minutes two and a half minutes period um when you are speaking, please address the board, not the audience. Those addressing the board are asked to

[02:17:01] maintain decorum while speaking and while listening to others make public comments. If you are speaking remotely, I will call on the moderator. First, to ensure you are ready to speak, please note that there is a slight delay between the broadcast and the boardroom. Okay, so first, and it doesn't matter which podium you use, you can just go to the one nearest to you. First speaker is James Russell.

[02:17:27] Following James Russell will be Matt Banner and then Peter Weeks. Hello.

[02:17:44] A few weeks ago, this board rushed through a measure expanding gun control in the county. It is the position of the Democrat Party that weapons of war and weapons of violence do not belong on the streets.

[02:18:03] Military equipment does not belong in Loudoun County. And then recently I read a statement from my president. The statement said, quote, while this bill sends military equipment to Ukraine, it spends the money right here in the United States of America, end quote. Stimulus package, a stimulus package.

[02:18:38] Weapons of war do not belong in the streets of Loudoun County. Weapons of war belong in Ukraine. Stimulus. Weapons of war do not belong in Loudoun County. Weapons of war belong in Gaza, sieging hospitals for weeks on end, targeting journalists, doctors, children. Stimulus.

[02:19:00] The government of Israel has explicitly stated it is not concerned with the conclusions of the international courts.

[02:19:17] My federal representatives, all of them Democrats, have, by voting to resource this genocidal process, also agreed in their disinterest in the conclusions of international legal systems.

[02:19:35] The time has come for this board to vote on a resolution calling for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. What does this have to do with Loudoun County? This board is a Democrat majority because the people of Loudoun County believe in the inclusion of the marginalized. But if we are silent during a genocide, that premise dissolves. If we forsake the safety of one group of our neighbors, we forsake all of them.

[02:20:06] I implore this board to call for a permanent ceasefire, and I suggest the Democrats on this board withhold their endorsements of the president and all of our federal representatives. Ceasefire now. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Mr. Russell.

[02:20:23] Next up will be Matt Banner, followed by Peter Weeks, followed by Madeline Skinner. Good evening. My name is Matt Banner. I'm a resident of Leesburg, and I am the president of the Loudoun Symphony Association. I'm speaking today because I understand the feasibility study for a performing arts center in eastern Loudoun is, in the finance committee, pending approval.

[02:20:46] From the perspective of the symphony, there are many points in the feasibility study that I find incredibly exciting. The stage size is more than sufficient to accommodate the orchestra. The inclusion of an orchestra pit will enable collaborations between many of the performing arts groups in Loudoun. And acoustics, shell towers, and reflectors are all considered.

[02:21:06] There's one point, though, that gives me pause. The study recommends the Performing Arts Center have a capacity of 600 seats. I find myself recalling Wayne Gretzky's quote, skate to where the puck is going, not where it has been. Today, most Loudoun Symphony concerts would sell out a 600-seat Performing Arts Center.

[02:21:26] When I spoke to you in February, I shared that our subscription and youth orchestra concerts fill 600 to 1,000 seats regularly. And we're growing, as are our fellow performing arts organizations in the county. I've personally heard from several groups who are excited by the symphony's recent growth and are making plans to replicate our success.

[02:21:44] My family was fortunate to stumble across the Loudoun Symphony when we moved to Leesburg in 2011. A few years later, we were excited to stumble across the Loudoun Lyric Opera and then the Master Singers of Virginia. I stumbled across the Loudoun Community Band only five weeks ago when we were both here speaking in favor of the funding for the preliminary design of a community arts center in eastern Loudoun County.

[02:22:06] I use the word stumble deliberately because without a performing arts center in Loudoun County, these groups can be really hard to find. So imagine the day when Loudoun has a home to host them and the residents of Loudoun County know where to find them. I'm confident this will result in each of these groups delighting larger audiences than ever before.

[02:22:26] This facility is years away from being a reality, and our needs in five to ten years will not be the needs of today. A performing arts center is an investment in the future of Loudoun County, and I urge the board to correctly scope the venue's capacity to maximize the return on that investment so that the performing arts organizations in Loudoun can enchant as many residents as possible in the years to come.

[02:22:49] Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Banner. Next, we have Peter Weeks, followed by Madeline Skinner, and then followed by Theo Stamatis. Good evening, Board of Supervisors. Some new faces. Welcome.

[02:23:06] My name's Peter Weeks. I'm president of the Blumont Citizens Association. I'm also vice chair of the Loudoun Historic Village Alliance. I'd like to begin with imagining a certain scenario. You wish to build a home and you want to retain an architect.

[02:23:24] What are your expectations of the architect? That this person would question you to discover what features you'd wish to emphasize, what's important to you, and what style that you would prefer. How does this relate to tonight's OM and the small area plans that the comprehensive plan has recommended?

[02:23:43] In this scenario that's being presented tonight, county staff has delivered to us their plan, but without the necessary consultation with us, and told us that this is what we've designed for you, and here's a place to sign and approve our plan.

[02:24:04] And what we're trying to say is that all of the rural villages have been working together for years now. The alliance started back in 2018. We've done a lot of the work. And so the way that the plan is being presented to you, I think, needs to be reconsidered. And although what I've just said seems as a criticism of staff, I want to emphasize that staff works extremely hard.

[02:24:39] In the past, I've worked with county staff on other issues. They work incredibly hard and are very diligent. But I feel like things have gotten a bit off track, and I'm hoping that this is not just a Western Loudoun issue, but it's an issue that affects all of us.

[02:24:58] Although I do hope that the Western Loudoun supervisors will take the lead and help bring changes to what is being presented to you. So, thank you. Thank you. uh leo i'm sorry theo stomatis will be followed by renee hogan who will be followed by i'm sorry i miss madeline skinner hello madeline skinner you can go and then theo stomatis and then renee hogan thank you good evening chair reynolds supervisors my name is madeline skinner as chair of the lhva i'm speaking in support of all of the future of all of our villages large small

[02:25:38] and a few in between. Some are represented here tonight. Others sent emails, some to you, some to me. It was a tight timeline for tonight. The work that's outlined in the CPAM will already occur in the first phase of a village small area plan, just more in depth. To attempt to determine a village's eligibility by a windshield survey, one community meeting, and two work sessions will never provide the level of information that will be collected during an individual village small area plan process and only delays this process from getting started at this point, not till second quarter of next year. This current approach ignores such considerations as

[02:26:16] social and cultural factors, environmental and geographical context, cultural heritage and traditions, historic events and figures, just to name a few, that determine the existence of a village. I am here tonight to support a joint venture that will allow at least six villages to be done concurrently with a deliverable of one year and wrap up with a phase two to capture any remaining villages. No matter the determination and the initial research, these TBD villages might still need some protective zoning or help with a historical designation that is kept in county records and at Bosch Library for those who may want to know the history if only one structure

[02:26:55] remains. When the coalition's executive committee met with county administrators offices in fourth quarter we brought up the idea of a joint project in order to get multiple villages done concurrently we received positive feedback so lhva didn't hesitate we began work on a project charter even taking a field trip to charlottesville to meet with nelson bird and waltz a firm that's done other projects with loudon county village organizations are ready to go all we need is support from the board and funding the board recognizes the contribution has recognized the contributions of lhva as five years ago we worked on the comprehensive plan and of course with zor

[02:27:32] please reconsider the cpam we know luck is as a priority but their complexity of issues and large number of participants will present quite a challenge there is much to discuss and we hope that lhva will continue to be looked upon as the stakeholder to be included as we move forward with our joint approach on small area plans with county staff and engaging an outside consultant there is so much to be gained by this approach thank you thank you miss skinner next we have theo stomatis and then renee hogan and then bobby chrisman mr stomatis if you could pause for just a moment

[02:28:07] madam chair i just wanted to um say thank you for this opportunity and i didn't mean to sound snarky with the with the script uh comment but i do appreciate this opportunity thank you oh you're not gonna you didn't sound snarky at all okay good and this is the only way you learn so it's fine Go ahead, Mr. Stamatis.

[02:28:27] Good evening. My name is Theo Stamatis, Government Relations Manager for the Loudoun Chamber of Commerce. On behalf of nearly 1,100 employers that are Loudoun Chamber members, I would like to express our thoughts on item four on tonight's consent agenda that is subject for a vote which has been passed by this board.

[02:28:47] The chamber has made it clear for more than a decade that the issue of attainable housing is our top public policy priority. We shared our concerns last month on the proposed changes to the capital intensity factors that the board considered. Our concern was the substantial fee increases have the very likely probability of making it harder to bring more market rate and affordable housing to market in Loudoun.

[02:29:12] Over the past month, the chamber met with Supervisors Turner and Letourneau to share our concerns on the CIF. The Loudoun Chamber would like to go on record thanking the board and county staff for implementing our phasing concept and the draft motion in item four that focuses on an interim policy for income-restricted dwelling units.

[02:29:35] The chamber supports the draft motion in item four, and we greatly thank this board for considering that. The motion worked in good faith by this board and county staff makes significant progress toward the county's goal for delivering attainable, affordable workforce housing for the future.

[02:29:53] Thank you, Madam Chair and Madam Vice Chair and the board for allowing us to speak. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Stamatis. You will be followed by Renee Hogan and then Bobby Chrisman and Robert Griffin. Good evening.

[02:30:08] Hi, my name is Renee Hogan. For 10 years, I have lived in one of the very many senior communities in Loudoun County. These communities have many amenities, pools, sports facilities, etc. What we don't have is a Center for the Arts.

[02:30:24] My group, the Citizens for the Arts, appreciate that the current board has recognized this need. You recently commissioned a study which came back recommending a 600-seat venue, which our group and the majority of the artists that we have met with feel is a perfect size for a community center for the arts.

[02:30:44] At the recent Finance Committee meeting, there was discussion about size and potential growth opportunity. Supervisor Briskman mentioned Strathmore Hall. Looking at the amazing history of the Strathmore, Montgomery County acquired it back in 1983, and it started small, and look how it has grown through the years.

[02:31:04] At the same meeting, Supervisor Sainz suggested one building with two different venues. After speaking further with Supervisor Sainz, he mentioned a center in Miami. I believe he was referring to the Adrian Arts Center.

[02:31:21] That center has multiple theaters of different sizes, which are connected by a plaza. It started small and grew over the years. So in our case, please consider building what we asked for, a community center for the arts first, and later connected to a larger venue.

[02:31:44] Finally, our group continues to work. We are meeting with potential sites in the hopes that, along with your help, we can jumpstart this process. Our goal now is to be alive and kicking when the premiere show debuts in the Community Center for the Arts in Eastern Loudoun. Let's get something built. When you do, the artists and the audiences will come. Thank you.

[02:32:02] Thank you, ma'am. Next up is Bobby Chrisman, followed by Robert Griffing and then Bill Bogard. Good evening, Supervisors. I am Bobbie Christman, and I am here representing the Citizens for the Art in Eastern Loudoun.

[02:32:19] I am not a gifted performer or entertainer, but rather a patron and citizen of Loudoun County. I want to speak not about how much all our talented artists and performers need a venue for their work, but rather how much the community at large needs this venue for their entertainment and enjoyment.

[02:32:40] Decisions about the design of a venue must focus on local citizens' needs first and foremost. The feasibility study articulated what citizens want and need, and importantly, will function positively.

[02:32:56] A culturally vibrant community is a desirable place to live. It attracts a diverse and multi-talented workforce and creates greater economic stability. The Community Arts Center, we have envisioned and continue to support, will provide programs and summer camps allowing our youth to flourish.

[02:33:21] Exposure to cultural experience will inspire our youth to enjoy art and their lives now and in the future. An arts center will create jobs and revenue for the county. Businesses will benefit, since instead of going to other communities to enjoy the arts, we will be able to dine and attend programs in our own county.

[02:33:45] Our spending will remain local. In the end, a performing and visual arts center will provide entertainment for all ages, strengthen our community's character, and make Loudoun County a special place to reside.

[02:34:01] Thank you. Thank you, ma'am. Next, we have Robert Griffin, followed by Bill Bogard, followed by Hugh Forsyth. Is Mr. Griffin on the WebEx? No.

[02:34:18] Okay. I don't think he's here, so we will move on to Bill Bogard. Madam Chair, members of the board, my preference is to get directly to the point, so that's what I'm going to do.

[02:34:42] You've got a CPAM 2024-0004 in your packet, and alternative number three is the best course of action for the board to take at this time. Direction to staff should be to develop an overarching approach for creation of the small area plans for the rural historic villages.

[02:35:11] But you should have at least two paths because you've got two groups, as I see it, two groups of villages. One group, as you heard before, is ready to go. There's another group that may not have the same resources, may not have done as much preparatory work, and in some cases haven't even been identified. And they should have a separate path to take to get to that small area plan. You've heard the previous speakers talk that speak to the villages being organized,

[02:35:48] and I would strongly suggest that we take advantage of that offer. I know some of the people in that group and there are there's there's some talent so for these core villages the the ones that are if you were to do an analysis and say what is a rural historic village they would be they would be there no matter what kind of reasonable criteria you came up with if you start with those they can work separately and it's a very low risk solution the second path

[02:36:27] I would start with what's in the CPAM, which would identify and do some basic legwork and groundwork for some of the other villages. I know there's out here, there's villages that don't exist anymore for whatever reason. They've been developed, economic reasons, but we need to preserve the ones that we have remaining. So as noted in the CPAM,

[02:37:00] this two path these two paths can run concurrent and I'm would like to say I'm pleased that there's some movement towards the small area plan Mr. Bogard yes you're out of time sir if you have anything else you can email it to us or leave it with the clerk no no action thank you next we have Hugh Forsyth and then Patricia Logue I believe Chair Randall Board of Supervisors thank you very much for allowing me to discuss issues in our community. My name is Hugh or Bugs Forsyth. I'm

[02:37:37] the chairman of the Airport Commission at Leesburg. Also with me today is Scott Kaufman, the airport director. Your supervisor, your commission member is Bruce Roberts, who was unable to show up today due to a family conflict. My main reason to come to address you today is to discuss the proposed development being discussed west of the airport. This is the village of Clear Springs. It's south of Heritage High School, east of Evergreen Mill, and it's right underneath the traffic pattern of the west side of the airport, not near, not close, dead underneath. The town of Leesburg

[02:38:14] and the airport commission are opposed to this development. The original zoning identified development issues near the airport. The village of Clear Springs will increase housing units from around 50 to over 1,000. Airport traffic has increased 60% in five years. Annual takeoff and landings are 90,000 per year. I sent you all, the Board of Supervisors, a letter on 25 March addressing some of our concerns. I showed the flight path of a typical day. It was happening

[02:38:49] 14 March. It wasn't a special day. We had over 500 flights that day. And just information, A flight, a touch-and-go, which most of our patterns are for the flight schools, that counts as arrival and a departure, that's two. So a touch-and-go is two. That's not misleading.

[02:39:05] Our pattern is 800 feet, and we would go higher if we could for the noise, but we can't do the dullest approach. Noise complaints have increased a great deal, mostly north of the field. We get over 300 a year. Noise complaints will increase a great deal with this new development.

[02:39:23] I appreciate your consideration of our concerns. Previous zoning was aware of developments near an airport and the flight pass flown. Please give consideration to our concerns on this issue. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you, Mr. Forsyth.

[02:39:39] Next, we have Patricia Logue, and please correct me if I pronounced that wrong. You got it right. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair and Board of Supervisors. I'm here to talk about the rural historic village CPAM you're considering tonight, and I first want to thank you very much for prioritizing this activity.

[02:40:00] It's so important to Western Loudoun. I live in Luckett. It's very, very important to us. I want to commend the staff. I did read your packet, and I want to commend them. They're obviously concerned about efficiency. They got a lot on their plate.

[02:40:16] So it's clear that they're trying to make their work very efficient. I hope that by considering some of my comments and whatever actions you take tonight, you can also make this effective. Because if it's efficient, but it's not effective, it's a waste of time and resources. Lockets needs this plan very much. We have many issues, and they're very complex. And our hope is that in this process, we unite our community. We don't divide it. And without enough forethought, something like this can easily divide a community.

[02:40:55] That would be a disaster. You got to preserve the history and the heritage of the rural community while making it part of the current time. I've been participating in the Loudoun Historic Village Association for about the past two years, and that's been an effort to be prepared for the moment when this starts. What I've learned is that all of these villages, whether they're large or small. They share a heritage. They share a story. They're all part of Loudoun's story. And it's

[02:41:29] important that that story is told cohesively and that it's told together. And these plans should help us do that. I also support the simultaneous planning process, the concurrent planning process. It's going to allow you to create a complete story. It's also going to help you create a cohesive framework for these plans. And without that, I think your future boards are just looking at more zoning exceptions coming before you. That's not a good thing. A concurrent

[02:42:05] plan should result in good zoning, strong zoning that does not require exceptions to come before you. Luckett's is supposed to be next. If you're going to do a linear process, quite honestly, Luckett's would want to be last.

[02:42:22] Madam, you're out of time. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. I will just call one more time for Robert Griffin. Not on the WebEx either. Okay. All righty. Well, that closes our public comment time, and I think we will move on to item number three.

[02:42:46] Hold on for a moment, staff.

[02:42:59] Okay. We'll move forward with item number three. Thank you. Good evening.

[02:43:33] Good evening. I'm Jennifer Moore with community planning. The purpose of this item is to initiate and seek Board of Supervisors' direction and approval of the staff-recommended draft project plan for CPAM 2024-004 Rural Historic Village, or RHV, Classification, Comprehensive Plan Amendment, or CPAM.

[02:43:54] The CPAM will consider amendments to the existing list and accompanying map of 12 RHVs in Chapter 2 of the Loudoun County 2019 General Plan and establish criteria for classifying a community as an RHV. Plan policy in Chapter 2, Strategy 1.1, Action A, calls for this CPAM, including establishing classification criteria.

[02:44:18] Staff, therefore, brings forward this project plan to meet this 2019 General Plan policy action. The board will note Attachment 2 in tonight's packet that shows the existing list of RHVs in the 2019 General Plan. As the county proceeds to implement plan policy for small area plans for the listed RHVs, Staff acknowledges that this list is now 30 years old.

[02:44:42] In order to prioritize small area planning efforts, this RHV list must be updated and accurate. Staff notes that this is a necessary first step to ensure that all communities are evaluated for inclusion and there is equitable access to small area planning.

[02:44:58] Staff notes St. Louis, CPAM is ongoing, and Luckett is scheduled to be next. Those are both clearly RHVs. Deliverables from this project plan include an updated RHV list, windshield surveys for each village to inform a classification system or criteria for listing, revised maps and text for 2019 general plan and for the Loudoun County Zoning Ordinance, revised GIS layers.

[02:45:27] Deliverables in the draft project plan do not include small area plans. Those would be produced with each village individually, as prioritized by board direction. At this time, staff is available for questions. Thank you.

[02:45:43] If you have a question for staff, please put your light on. Mr. Turner? Mr. Turner? Oh, thank you. I'm a little confused by some of the objections that I've heard, and I'd like to ask for your characterization, because this makes perfect sense to me.

[02:46:04] It's in the plan that we should do the CPAM. This is the process to do the CPAM. It kind of makes sense that we're doing it this way, so I'm really surprised at the resistance we're getting. Can you characterize in your own mind what you think the basis of that resistance is? The impression I get is there's a faster, more efficient way to do it.

[02:46:21] But it seems to me we're kind of constrained by the proper way to do a CPAM. I think the main objection is speed, to your point. There's a desire from the community to do these faster. Because of the workload that the department currently has, when I came in front of you in January, I propose to do this as a first step towards doing more village plans with the potential that that does include doing some of them, a greater number of them concurrently.

[02:46:47] We're just not there yet. As I said then, this CPAM's intention is to essentially to create that list so we know that the total number of villages that we're potentially talking about creating plans for. Will this project, as you've laid it out, detract from the sequential completion of small area plans as we'd envisioned?

[02:47:11] Will that process go on parallel to this process? So for St. Louis and then for Luckett's, they would occur parallel to this process at the moment. As the commitment I've made to the board is that whenever the St. Louis plan is brought before the board for consideration, roughly simultaneously maybe not the exact same meeting but about the same time we will provide the project plan for luckett's to get the ball rolling on that as we are completing the board's consideration and hopeful adoption of the st louis village plan is it reasonable to assume that as we define this process over the nine months of the proposed proposal for the cpan

[02:47:47] that we will refine the process and thereby have a coral area be able to do the small airplanes more expeditiously because it'll be more codified by the cpam or do they not have anything to do with each other i don't know that they have anything to do with each other in that fashion what we will know at the end of this our intention is that we will know whether we are potentially creating smaller plans for eight geographies 10 12 16 whatever the number ends up being after we complete this process at that point it will be up to the board's direction whether we

[02:48:24] do that linearly one at a time or whether we seek funding and the potential to work with a consultant to come and do four or six or some number of them simultaneously let me ask it again because i'm not sure i heard the answer but i may have and i just didn't hear it correctly so if we follow this process um it will give us a better handle on the road map for doing the individual small area plans is that a fair statement yes okay that's what i needed thank

[02:48:52] you mr crony so when you do the windshield survey is the idea that we would you know basically just go to the different villages to see if they're still surviving I mean what what exactly is the purpose of the windshield survey so windshield surveys on the word for you know literally from your windshield looking and seeing what is still there what commercial uses are still active the settlement patterns is there a community village core that is

[02:49:28] the same as it was, what fabric from the community still exists or has atrophied away. Also, you know, the rural roads network, that type of thing that you can glean into a piece of paper for us to start making more informed decisions about what villages maybe have lost some of their original fabric and what, you know, if there's any commercial uses that are continuing today is that still present really we just need to have an overview of each village by windshield survey but do you think that you could do that just by doing the small area plan

[02:50:05] just by starting it so i hear the community the community wants to get started you know we've been talking about small area plans since 2019 and here we are in 2024 and we've only gotten one not even complete yet. And that's taken two and a half years. So my question is, is this two step process really necessary for the villages that we know exist? You know, they've been around for years, like Aldi and, you know, some of the other villages, you know, is it really necessary

[02:50:41] to do this two step process? So it's necessary from the point of efficiency, looking at the total supply of uh potential villages however if the board's direction were instead to um not pursue this at this time and to focus on a set number of villages that honestly at this point the board would be defining that's another alternative path to take that's just not what we have discussed up to this point nor presented to the board um previously or today yeah i think it was discussed during the 2019 comp plan i think these villages were discussed they were discussed but i was in the original meetings we had with the villages even before the village alliance was actually

[02:51:17] created so we've talked about a lot of these the intention has been to get to small area plans the issue is just a number a matter of staff capacity how many different projects on different topics we have done it's not that there hasn't been an intention to to get there we started with st louis at the board's direction and added on luckets when the board wanted that to be the next one included yeah i just think it's more efficient to start on the small area plans for the villages that we know exist the villages that have been identified in the 2019 comp plan because it seems to me doing this nine-month process you'd almost have to redo it when you start up again with a

[02:51:54] small area when you start doing a small area plan like it seems like it's double work in my view versus just starting on the small area plan for the villages we know mr crony so you're out of time but go ahead and respond mr i was just going to say that the intention for this is to create to confirm the list and or make any additions and subtractions to it so that we know the overall number so that if we do need some board support from a financial standpoint to hire consultants, we know what we're seeking. Right now, we are not confident that all 12 of those remain villages. We also know of others that are not included in that list that likely should be. Thank you. Mr. Kirshner.

[02:52:33] Thank you, Chair. Thank you, staff. So when I brought the concept of these small area plans um for our villages to the board um the really the concept was to provide a lot of the protections i know and we've already started a lot of it started with waterford already um and the the infrastructure project that we're addressing i know luckets is on the list i know um that we have several others that are kind of in the pipeline that will be being brought to us so um i the concept i had was we want this inventory so i think this is part of what we're doing here is trying to figure out exactly what the inventory is but i also hear what the community is saying is the ones that we

[02:53:13] know are clearly villages is that going to slow down the process so so i have a couple of questions for staff on how we proceed number one this really seems to be me be like one i'm putting this in layman's terms but one we want to identify what our villages are we want to make sure we're mapping them correctly and um and revising that that's really the largely the objective of this kind of initial jumpstart is that correct yes okay so if we're going to do that it would seem to me we know there are certain villages we we know exactly that they are villages so would it be would it

[02:53:50] make sense and i know we want to do a comprehensive approach and i think that's what this does but my question is would it make sense to perhaps break some of those off and get those that are more obvious done first and then work on the inventorying the others so that we can perhaps move a little more rapidly on those or get them in the pipeline sooner is there a process by which we could do that I mean the process would be adding them either individually or collectively to the work plan the the fact of the matter is at this point with the number of items on the work plan especially for community planning I don't really have any additional project managers to

[02:54:25] offer to run numerous other planning projects so we would have to reprioritize what's there if the board wanted those to start essentially now or in the very near future because this is the third project plan we've brought to the board in the past couple months just just to get the ball rolling on some of the projects that have been approved for the work so this seems to be more like rather than doing village by village by village we're gonna say oh the first your staffs concept is let's identify what the villages are and let's get a map yes rather than doing village and also to have some essentially some objective criteria in doing so so that there's agreement about what we're looking at and it's not just our opinion that this one is is and that one is not and have to kind of just colloquially

[02:55:05] anecdotally explain why. Okay. Would there be, and this is an opinion question, would there be any benefit to kicking this to TLUC? Because I know one of the motions up here by Supervisor Trone is maybe, and I'm not sure what she stands, but to move it to TLUC to try to move things along more quickly. Is there anything that you could provide in a less formal setting in TLUC that would be helpful to staff to perhaps move this along? If the board agrees with the intent of this CPAM, I don't know that there's benefit of sending this project plan to TLUC, because I'm not sure it would be adding or changing for this.

[02:55:42] If the board would like us to bring a plan forward that would look at speeding up in some fashion small area plans for the villages more generally otherwise, I think we could work towards that, but that would be, I don't think that overlapped with this project plan myself. And maybe that's what we need to do, but I'm out of time.

[02:55:59] You're out of time. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. You know, it's interesting. We've never actually talked about sending something to a subcommittee to speed up the process. I know. It doesn't make any sense at all to think that, like, that's not really how that works normally.

[02:56:20] My question was the same as Mr. Crony's, and I'm a little uncomfortable with the answer of this question about a windshield survey. It's hard to imagine that a windshield survey will give you all the information that you need to have to make some of these decisions.

[02:56:37] And my fear is that some of our communities that just traditionally have been kind of overlooked and the residents have not been talked to a lot, Willisville, Howardsville, especially for me, may not get the attention that I think that they've lacked and deserve in a windshield survey.

[02:56:59] Having said that, I don't know what the answer is because people want to go fast, but they also want a lot of things done at one time, which is hard to do that. So I'm going to listen to the discussion, and I don't, you know, if I, Mr. Crony, if you're going to make an alternate motion to send that to TLUC, if you don't mind a discussion on that motion letting me know how sending it to TLUC could speed up the process, if that's what you want.

[02:57:29] Because I mean, we haven't done this for 30 years, so my issue is never go fast. My issue is get it right. 30 years is a very long time, and not a whole lot has changed in our villages in 30 years, which is a good thing, but we're doing this for the future.

[02:57:47] And so it's more important to me to get it right than to do it quickly. Although I do understand why people want to do it, it's more important to me to get it right. And so I'm not hung up on the timeline at all. And I also am very cognizant of how much, how many other things are going on with the staff right now.

[02:58:05] And I never want to do anything to, you know, the staff is, making sure the staff is okay is so important. So I'm going to listen close to the conversation. I may support sending this to TELIC, but I want to know what that will accomplish. And I want to understand the windshield survey a little bit more.

[02:58:24] And I want to make sure that we talk to some of the communities that don't get a lot of attention or happen in the past as well. Thank you. I'm happy to respond about the windshield survey a little more now, if you'd like. So essentially, for one thing, a windshield survey is sort of a term of art in planning. There's not a specific way in which a windshield survey has to be done.

[02:58:41] What we're trying to imply is that it gets staff out in the community to go out and either drive or walk, but to go there and not just look at things on a map, not just pull up GIS and look at things that way. Okay, that's helpful. It's to see the community, to take notes about the community. Can you talk with people during a windshield survey? Potentially. It depends on what your ultimate goal is.

[02:58:58] So it might be like, is this business still working and what's going on? So, okay, that's really helpful. I didn't know it was a term of art, so that's really much more helpful. That just sounds like you're in a car looking at stuff as it flies by you through your windshield.

[02:59:14] Sure, and that is definitely not what we do over the intention. Okay, thank you. Thank you. I would just add, Chair Randall, that this project, being within community planning, obviously our focus is on communities. And our eye is certainly on the Willisvilles and the Howardsvilles and other communities that, including Bowman, is currently on the list.

[02:59:33] And that is not something that we would allow to receive any less attention. Thank you. Did we forget to start her time? Or did she run out of three minutes and then I said give her another three minutes? Yeah.

[02:59:50] Okay, thank you. Thank you. I was like, if I did that, no one's screaming, so that's unusual. Okay, thank you for answering those questions. It sounds to me as if the feedback is the community wants Luckett's and St. Louis to go fast.

[03:00:11] That's the concern, and then that maybe adding this additional study and analysis around it, the fear is that would slow it down. Is that a correct statement? I believe that the community's feeling as to have more than just those two go fast.

[03:00:29] They would like half a dozen or more to go fast. Okay, okay. Well, and the community's not the only one that wants stuff to go faster. I mean, we all would, but we do appreciate that you guys are trying to do the best you can. I noticed that Howardsville is on the list, but then when I looked at the map, I didn't see Howardsville on the map.

[03:00:51] Should I be concerned about that? It is not currently listed as a Royal Stork Village. It may be a Crossroads community. I see. Okay. But will they be getting a windshield survey? We have a list of potentials such as Howardsville, Morrisonville, that are not currently listed as RHVs that may need to be, so yes, they will.

[03:01:15] Okay, okay. I tend to agree with Chair Randall that we have never sent something to committee to make it go faster. Does staff think it would go faster if it went to TELOC? Again, I don't think, if the board agrees that this CPAM to build that inventory is necessary, I don't think sending this to TELOC makes it go faster.

[03:01:37] I think there's two different conversations and some confusion about this taking the place of a broader strategy, and that is not the intent. This is the first step toward a broader strategy. Okay, okay. I mean, I read through it, and I was comfortable with staff's recommendation, but I also don't necessarily represent the area, so I'm a little bit agnostic.

[03:01:59] But given that we are trying to make these sorts of things go a little faster, I'm hesitant to send it to TLUC. Those were all the questions I had. Thank you. so colleagues the the protocol is to make the packet motion first and then have a discussion and if we if supervisor to crony wants to make an alternate motion she might be able to do that during the discussion or we could just vote down the packet motion and then go to to her motion so I'll go ahead actually okay I'll go ahead and make the motion I have my glasses thank

[03:02:37] you. I move the Board of Supervisors initiate and approve the draft project plan for CPAM 2024-0004. Rural Historic Village Classification provided in Attachment 1 to the April 2, 2024 Board of Supervisors Business Meeting Action Item.

[03:02:55] Second. Thank you. Any discussion on the motion? Oh, actually, I think I'm supposed to be making an opening, but I did that when I was asking staff questions, so I'm good. Does anyone else have comments on the motion? Make an alternative motion.

[03:03:16] um i'm gonna go to supervisor kirschner first he had his light on first okay now i'm all now i'm all distracted i forget what i was about ready to say sorry um i was kind of actually asked for a friendly on this motion um but the front the friendly was so it's come to me so it's my friendly the friendly was to go move forward with this but also ask staff to um come back with a how do i want to say this with a discussion as to as to or perhaps an update how did you if i

[03:03:50] could talk to speak with staff in terms of the the uh small area plans for the rural villages how how did you phrase that because i thought that was a really good idea if it's okay with well so our our intention was always that this would be this first step and that the second step would be coming back to talk i think what you're talking about now is how many could we do how quickly could we do them that sort of thing right so if you if the board would like a an item earlier while we're potentially processing this at the same time we could bring an item back that would present options for the the number and speed at which smaller your plans could be accomplished for do you need a

[03:04:28] friendly on this in order to do that or is that something that the staff feels like it can bring to T luck regardless go ahead so if it's going to T like their board would need to make a specific referral that so you would need to add the friendly to this motion. The discussion going to TLUC, not specifically this item. That was the motion. The motion's on the table, which is to... Correct. But if you want the discussion you just described to go to TLUC, you would need to make the friendly like that and then have the board

[03:05:02] include that. But this would not delay this process, correct? This would still go forward as even with the friendly. If I'm understanding you're friendly correctly, yes. Yes. Okay. So I make that friendly for that onto this motion for for us to continue to have this the small area plan discussion in tluck but for staff to continue forward as laid out in this draft motion would you accept that friendly um i'd like to ask staff a question first um it sounds like staff said you're going to be coming back to the full board anyway to report out on this and talk about the

[03:05:42] progress and recommendations if this base motion passes it's not like the conversation's over at the full board, correct? Correct. I think the question is, again, speed. If the board would like to have that conversation before we are able to give you a full inventory based on this project, then we could do that sooner at board direction. Okay. I'm not going to accept that motion or that friendly because I think it's going to happen anyway. Well, my only concern is, and if I could Yeah, you're still in your time. 15 seconds. My only concern is that I want to make sure we have full consensus, but I want staff to start working on this so we don't delay any time. So a further

[03:06:19] discussion on the rural plan, I think, will help us flesh this out a little bit more, if that makes sense, rather than sending the full item to Teluk and waiting for a month for them to get started. Supervisor Turner.

[03:06:35] So now I'm confused. Do we have a friendly? No. There is no friendly, so we're just on the main motion. Okay. I have nothing. Supervisor Tacroni. Can I make an alternative motion? Yes. Can I make a motion? Can I make a motion?

[03:06:51] Yes. So, I move that the Board of Supervisors send the draft project plan for CPAM 2024-004 Rural Historic Village Classification provided as attachment one to the April 2nd, 2024 Board of Supervisors meeting action item to the Transportation and Land Use Committee for review.

[03:07:23] She could have, yeah. Yeah, so that's an alternate motion, so it needs a second. Yep. Okay. So Supervisor Tacroni's motion is on the table with a second by Ms. Glass. Is there any discussion on this motion? Do I get an opening?

[03:07:40] Yes, you do. Thank you for reminding me. Thank you. So I believe we need to begin the smaller area plans for the list of known villages that we know exist. We've listed them out in the 2019 general plan.

[03:07:56] A classification CPAM is not needed for those villages. I do think we need to figure out how we can expedite that process. I think we can do a parallel process for villages that are called hamlets or crossroads.

[03:08:13] But I do think that does add a layer of complexity and confusion to a very simple solution involving a small number of communities that have been recognized as villages for a very long time, like Howardsville and Willisville and Unison.

[03:08:30] They have differences, but they have a shared need to preserve their future. So these villages have been waiting for years. 2019, we talked about this, and I just don't think it's necessary to do a windshield survey or focus groups or community meetings.

[03:08:49] I think we've got to get in the village and start meeting with the community and start coming up with the plans, start mapping them. At TLUC, we can talk about this parallel process. You know, if we're not sure that these villages exist, we can talk about that.

[03:09:06] How does that look for those villages? But I can look at this list right here in the general plan, and I know there's at least eight that are thriving and that are historic villages and that we've documented. They've all been documented in newspapers, on the National Register of Historic Places, the Virginia Landmarks Register, and our own HDRC.

[03:09:28] So I feel like sending this to TLUC would give us a process that makes sense for these villages, for these recognized villages, so we can move forward. I think we do need to hire a consultant. I do think that they can all be done at once so that we're not looking at one village after the next, but we can do them at once.

[03:09:50] And then the ones that aren't identified that we think are, you know, these crossroads or hamlets, we can do a different process. and TELA can come up with that process working with staff. I do think there's a little more work that needs to be done on the CPAM so that we can expedite things and we don't waste resources because, like I said, these villages are ready.

[03:10:17] They're ready. Blumont's ready. Aldi's ready. We have a whole list here that's ready for a small area plan. So I think this provides the option that we need to really move things forward without, you know, delaying the process.

[03:10:35] And it also gives us an opportunity to include some of these other villages that aren't included in this list so that they're not left out. So I hope. Thank you, Supervisor DeCrony. Supervisor Umstead. Oh, thank you, Madam Chair.

[03:10:53] My concern is that staff has certain limitations on what it can process, and I know in the past that staff has told us even if they brought on a consultant, it would still take staff time to direct that consultant how to handle this project.

[03:11:16] So I don't know if there's a way to speed this up, if that is the case. But Madam Chair, if I could ask Supervisor Tacroni a question through the chair? Sure. Supervisor Tacroni, do you feel that your motion offers a faster way to accomplish what the citizens have requested here tonight?

[03:11:45] Yes, because it doesn't require the process that staff has outlined of, like, 10 things that need to be done for the villages that are not, I think, identified as well.

[03:12:01] So this does provide a faster process for the villages that we know exist and have been recognized, the villages that are thriving, like Bluemont, like Aldi. It does quicken that process, but again, I also want the parallel process because there are villages that have been overlooked, like Howardsville and Willisville in unison, so I want to make sure they're at least going through a tangent, separate process, but again, I don't think it needs to be all of this.

[03:12:34] I think we can work together to shorten it and to make it more efficient. All right. Thank you very much. Supervisor Turner? Thank you, Madam Chair. So, using Supervisor Tacroni's description, there's a faster way to do it, and it doesn't involve all this.

[03:12:53] This motion simply moves all of this to TLUC. It doesn't change the process. It just takes the process that is now before the board and transports over to TLUC. Now, if the motion is to do a different process to speed it up, then that's a vote no on this motion and make an alternative motion to create a different process.

[03:13:14] based on the questions and answers that I got, I think, from staff that I heard is this is a way of inventorying the size of the job, the need that's there, and categorizing it, and then proceeding forward with a deliberate plan. And I agree with that approach. I think I heard that that doesn't mean we're going to stop doing small area plans that we're doing right now, which is St. Louis and Luckett's. We're going to continue to do that process. And hopefully, As a result of this plan, we're going to come up with a better inventory of those villages.

[03:13:49] But I'm a stickler. I have no problems at all with having to work in TLUC, but I'm a stickler to making sure that we are adding value that is necessary to add by going to TLUC, and I'm not persuaded that that value is added, and I tend to be persuaded by the notion that if it's going to TLUC, it means staff prep for TLUC meetings, and I haven't heard anything substantively different that would be discussed in TLUC other than come up with a different process, not this one, and that's a different motion.

[03:14:15] Thank you. Thank you. Supervisor Kirshner. Thank you, Chair. I have a tendency to agree with Supervisor Turner on this. So there's a lot kind of going on in these discussions, and I actually quite frankly agree with a lot of this being said, and I just want to kind of bring it cohesively together here.

[03:14:31] So I think the idea is the community as well as the number of us supervisors want to make sure this train runs as fast on time as it can. Staff is also telling us, listen, we have limited resources. This is a first step to really get things moving. I don't think, it sounds to me like even if we brought it, so if we brought it to TLUC, we're already going to delay it a month or two.

[03:14:50] When we can start this going, I think this process ends the end of this year before you bring it to the board approximately, give or take, maybe January, whatever it was. Assuming that those trains run on time, delaying it two months just delays that process an additional two months. I do think that there are some tweaks that could perhaps be done on this plan, but that's why I was asking for maybe bringing the item to us at TLUC at some point just for some further discussion to make sure everything's running.

[03:15:17] I mean, I would ask maybe the Chair of Tealock to suggest that we have a review of that at some point. I think that would be incredibly helpful, maybe somewhere into the summer or whatnot, just to get an update of where we are. I think that would be very, very helpful. So I think there's a simple solution to some of this for Supervisor Tricroni that maybe her staff, my staff, myself, herself, along with the Village Coalition, could get together and discuss maybe some tweaks to this and talk to staff about it.

[03:15:47] If we had to bring it back to the board because it was a required board action, perhaps we could do that. But I think that might perhaps be the more efficient way of doing that rather than sending us all to TLUC. So I don't think from what I'm hearing now, I'll support this motion, but I am in favor of having further discussions on how to better improve.

[03:16:06] This seems to be a pretty comprehensive approach for first steps. I mean, the idea is to identify the windshield survey. Obviously, that's a term of art that we're using to really help identify aspects of the village themselves. We're getting in there to make sure that we map that.

[03:16:24] If you look at the beginning of this, it talks about all the different things that we want to see in the small area plan, but we're not really necessarily deciding all those or how that's going to work. But I do hope in my comments that we can, the key ones, we can kick off sooner as we get there as soon as possible.

[03:16:42] In my last, if I can ask a question of staff, when you had mentioned that Luckett's would be kicked off, was it when this was brought off about that time? Is that what I understood you? Sooner. Whenever the St. Louis plan is brought before the board for their consideration, about the same time, we will bring the project plan similar to this for Luckett's to the board for consideration.

[03:17:03] So when one's adopted, we can get the other one rolling. And part of this is actually to identify all the villages as well. That's part of this process that we've put forward, as I understand the work plan here. Is that correct? Yes. So there's a list of 12 villages, 12 communities that are classified as villages in the current plan, and they have stayed the same for 30 or more years.

[03:17:24] So I think there's general agreement that some of them probably should not be on that list. But communities that have been mentioned tonight, like Howardsville, Unison, they are not currently listed as villages on the plan. So as things stand now, since we use the villages as defined as a general plan for our list, if the board told us tomorrow to go do small area plans for all the villages, those 12 names would be the list.

[03:17:47] The other communities that aren't in that list would not be included unless the board told us to do a plan for Unison and for any of the others that you feel like should be listed. Thank you. Thank you, Supervisor Kirshner. Madam Chair? Thank you. So, I'm a little confused. Maybe I've missed something. In all the emails that I've received, and I read my emails, I definitely read my emails from Meltland Skinner. I have not heard the community say to me, go faster, go faster, go faster. That's not what I'm hearing. I'm hearing the community say, be dedicated to getting this done, be dedicated to getting it done right. I've heard them put input in and information. I don't know where the go faster thing is coming from

[03:18:26] right now because it's really not coming from the community and so I don't know where that why why would that's the big focus right now unless it's a staff issue and if it is I get that and I totally understand that but I don't I don't I'm missing where the go faster get this done right now is happening I I've heard people say it's been too long we have to get it right we have to have a commitment to doing it and not let anything else get in the way that's not the same thing as do it fast. And so I'm a little, maybe I'm missing something. Secondly, there is no way in God's green earth, I'm going to sit up here and say that how it's feeling, will this fear

[03:19:05] because they're not been classified before as villages, they're not going to be included. That is the reason these communities have been missed. That is the reason those are the communities where people are still had, still had privies and that type of thing. We are to be very, very blunt. We are missing, with the exception of St. Louis, historically African-American places. And I am not going to sit here and say we can have these and not have discussions of others. I think I am wildly offended by that notion. Mr. Crony, I was actually going to support your motion,

[03:19:40] but I say your statements confused me. I was writing things down. You both said we don't need to meet with people, and you said we need to have community meetings. And you made a couple of statements last night that were just contradicting. So I don't even know where you're at with that right now. I don't have any issue going with going to TLUC. I think there's a lot of things to be figured out, but I'm not going to go to TLUC because it's going to make it go faster. I will go to TLUC because I wanted to ask questions like, what are we doing with Unison? What are we doing with Willisville? What are we doing with Howardsville? Who has talked to these people

[03:20:16] at all. Because even as we're doing St. Louis, you know, if you've talked to your planning commissioners, that was actually left in planning commission because no one had gone out and had a meeting with the people in St. Louis. And so doing these, having these decisions made without talking to people in the areas just doesn't work for me at all. So somebody explained to me the let's go fast and somebody explained to me what we're going to do with unison willisville howardsville so that because i'm right i'm not getting it right now and mr crony if you want to explain

[03:20:51] that to me that's fine but i'm not approving anything that doesn't that doesn't include historically african-american areas i'm just not doing that mr crony you can do that in your closing okay because she's out of time um so uh i don't think i'm going to support the motion um especially since the tluck chair doesn't think that sending it to tluck will necessarily add value to the process um i read through the process and i think it's a good process so uh i think i'm going to be

[03:21:31] a no on the on this motion and i feel as if if my colleagues feel like staff is going in the wrong direction when they come back um and talk to us about this item and and the progress on this item then we have an opportunity then to maybe mold things um or or redirect or take some things off the plate or or whatever but at this point um i think staff should go forward with the original um plan and the draft that is presented in this item mr crony do you have a closing Mr. Chair Brisbane. So I don't think I'm trying to quicken the process. I'm just trying not to

[03:22:09] delay it further. That's the idea is not to delay it further. And I definitely believe we should get out in the community and meet with the community and listen to the voices of the community. I think what I meant is the process that staff has outlined is two focus group meetings and one community meeting. And it's like, I assume they're not necessarily in each individual village. It's It's more just meetings, right, general meetings, not in the villages themselves.

[03:22:39] At this point, it would be one large community meeting in the rural policy. One large community meeting. And so what I'm saying is that it's really needed to get out into the community and hear the voices of the community. I think TLUC is a committee, so I think it's a perfect place to look at the process, to see if we can improve the process.

[03:22:59] And this process that's outlined in the CPAM isn't needed for recognized and existing villages. It's not needed, it delays the process. For villages that aren't included in the 2019 comp plan, that requires something a little different.

[03:23:16] And that process may be going out into the community, like Chair Randall said, listening to Howardsville, listening to Willisville, listening to the voices of the community and figuring out, you know, let's add them to the list of villages. Let's map them out.

[03:23:33] But my idea is that I feel like we're doing duplicate work, and we don't really need to do the work in some of these recognized and established villages. And so TLAC would give us the opportunity to talk about the process, to figure out how to add Howardsville, Willisville, Unison, some of the villages that aren't included in this list and come up with a process that's efficient and that's a parallel process so we're not wasting staff resources on existing and recognized

[03:24:08] villages so thank you uh yes thank you um so we have an alternate motion on the table from supervisor to crony seconded by um supervisor glass all in favor please say aye aye all opposed Okay, so that motion fails 261 with Supervisor Saines off the dais.

[03:24:44] So now we'll go back to the main motion. Has anybody not spoken on the main motion? I have not. I think you have. You can't. Madam Chair. I haven't spoken on the main motion.

[03:25:01] Has there been, has staff met with the Village Alliance and then with DPZ on a plan? Has staff met with the Village Alliance yet? No. Part of the, as described in the work plan, part of this, in this process, we would meet with the Village Alliance to talk about next steps and about what community.

[03:25:23] That's what you would do. And as part of this, you would meet with them to talk about next steps. Okay. Talk to me again about how, because you actually, Ms. Moore, you actually said, don't worry we're going to include howardsville and willisville in unison and all those but then later on said but they're not here and so we wouldn't take them to a consideration how would both those things work what i was trying to to articulate was that if you ask us tomorrow to do smaller plans for all of the quote-unquote villages as defined in the plan howardsville willisville are not included the intention of this project is to determine objective criteria

[03:26:02] potentially for the inclusion of those other communities that are not in this list right now Others that are in this list, we may ultimately recommend that come off the list of the current 12. We're trying to all come to agreement on the inventory of what we should be looking at. That's pretty much the entire intention of this question.

[03:26:18] And I can appreciate that. After you come to that conclusion of these that are here, and some of them might come off the list, how then do you go address the ones that are not villages but are, what are we calling them, hamlets? What are we calling them?

[03:26:34] Right now they're called crossroad communities. crossroad. How then do you address the crossroad communities? So at a minimum, what we'd first come back to the board with is our proposed plan for the ranking of villages and what order they should be tackled in for doing small area plans, how many of them we might be able to do at some time.

[03:26:51] But another part of that is do we want a plan for communities that aren't villages, but they are crossroad communities or whatever title we end up giving them. The intention is that there's two buckets so let me ask you this could you would you have a discussion around a crossroad community that is close to a village at the same time because there are some that are there so I mean so in other words you don't have to go through all the villages and then go later on to the crossroad communities or whatever we're going to call them could you do any of those crossroads communities that sit right in a near village at the same time is that possible yes absolutely

[03:27:28] Okay, but there is a commitment that those communities will be addressed as well. There is a commitment that we will, as a result of this, staff will bring forward our recommendation of how to classify these different communities.

[03:27:48] And then the board will decide whether they agree or disagree. And then based on that ultimate list, we will move forward with doing plans at whatever speed, at whatever cost the board is comfortable with, of doing plans after that. Including the crossroad communities. yes okay all right thank you madam chair um so i guess the main motion i made the main motion so i get maybe a little bit of a closing um i just would like to ask staff if after you do your assessments um and you start moving through your draft plan if you feel as if there needs to be

[03:28:26] more community input would you add community meetings if you feel like something's burning desire or some people need their voices heard yes and that's in the draft project plan that community meetings will be scheduled if needed going forward okay okay so so just because they aren't actually put in here right now doesn't mean that's another community meeting or public input session would not happen necessarily yes one of the intentions of bringing the quarterly work plan updates is that as we run into those things on projects we can update the board and essentially ask for permission to extend a project by four months or six months if need be as things

[03:29:04] occur instead of having to create a whole new item to bring back just for the purposes of talking about that. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Okay. So the motion on the table is the packet motion. I made the motion. Supervisor Kirshner seconded. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed. Okay.

[03:29:23] That motion passes 8-0-1. Colleagues, we have not had a break, but I am thinking we could do board comments and then just read into closed session and that'll be it you guys okay with that all right without opposition we will you have a guy you don't need a break is that how that works i knew i was going to hear that i knew i was going to hear that um okay um supervisor glass board comments wow thank you uh let me go with disclosures

[03:30:01] on wednesday march 20th my staff met with representatives for the village at clear springs application on thursday march 22nd i met with representatives for the mars substation application on monday march 25th my staff participated in a pre-application meeting for Moorfield Station residential rezoning and pre-app meeting for a PINSTAC signed development plan.

[03:30:29] On Tuesday, March 26th, my staff met with representatives. For the Till's View application, I met with representatives for a possible Adams Center special exception application. On Thursday, March 28th, I participated in a virtual town hall to discuss the Milestone Belmont Interchange Monopol application.

[03:30:48] On Thursday, March 28th, I attended the Virginia Values Veterans V3 Workforce Summit that was organized by the Fairfax County Economic Development Authority.

[03:31:05] And there were two discussion panels regarding bringing veterans and spouses into the workforce. The V3 program helps employers develop and implement successful long-term strategies to recruit, hire, and retain Virginia veterans.

[03:31:27] And I didn't know this, but Virginia has one of the youngest veteran populations in the U.S. So that's something I would like for us to look into to see how we can have our veterans become part of our workforce for the county.

[03:31:51] And one thing I just wanted to talk about is today is World Autism Awareness Day. It's an internationally recognized day that encourages member states of the United Nations to take measures to raise awareness about individuals with autism throughout the world.

[03:32:15] And Autism Speaks pledged to act fearless for change to create a world where autistic people are recognized and have the opportunities they deserve. And today, my school wore red, and that's the reason why I'm wearing red today, to recognize and celebrate people with autism.

[03:32:39] Thank you, Vice Chair. All right. Thank you, Supervisor Glass, Supervisor Umstead. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I do not have any disclosures, but I do have several thank yous I'd like to go through.

[03:32:58] I would like to thank the Town of Leesburg's mayor and the town council, as well as the Board of Supervisors, county staff, and town staff for their hard work on the annexation settlement. People worked for years on this, and it was a real delight to see it come to fruition.

[03:33:19] I would like to thank State Senator Russett Perry for managing to get a bill banning auto Sears, a device that turns a handgun into an automatic weapon, for working with the governor and securing his signature on that bill after she got it through both the Senate and the House.

[03:33:45] I would also like to thank Senator Subramaniam for co-sponsoring that bill with Senator Perry. I would like to thank Chuck Kuhn of Kuhn Aviation and Julie O'Brien of Projet Aviation, both based at the Leesburg Executive Airport, for their financial support for four NASA Hunch finalists at Tuscarora High School.

[03:34:16] I'm hoping that we can get a proclamation for those students, two of them are young women, two are young men, and for them in May.

[03:34:41] They participated in a NASA-led project to create hardware and software that could be used for NASA, to create materials that can be used for space flights, even to create food items that can be used on space flights. So it's a very broad program that NASA sponsors, and I'm very proud of our students for having made it to the finalists.

[03:35:00] Thank you also to their technology teacher, William Craig, who reached out to multiple businesses for financial support for these students to participate. I would like to thank U. S. Senator Mark Warner and Congresswoman Jennifer Wexton for their hard work in getting the U. S.

[03:35:37] Senate to put in their budget over $4 million in federal funds for Loudoun County's Mental Health Crisis and Stabilization Center. I would also like to thank Senator Warner for taking the time out of his busy schedule to thank a number of journalists around the state who were recognized by being put on the 2023 Media Honor Roll Award from the Virginia School Boards Association.

[03:36:07] As Senator Warner says in his letter to one, this honor is a tribute to your talent as a journalist. You have helped your neighbors remain up to date about the programs of local school divisions and better understand Virginia's public education system.

[03:36:26] This commitment to using your abilities to connect Virginians with their communities is beneficial to the Commonwealth. I commend you for your tremendous service. That letter was written to Mr. Nick Manok of WJLA, a Sinclair Broadcasting Group station. And I would like to congratulate Mr. Manok for receiving that award. And that is all I have. Thank you.

[03:36:56] Thank you, Supervisor Kirshner. Thank you, Chair. Just in terms of disclosures, on March 12th, my staff and I met with Aaron Swishelm of Walsh-Galucci about the Belmont Innovation Application. We also, at the meeting, met with Ron Meyer, Todd, Aaron, David, Fielder, Joe, Livesey, and Ryan David.

[03:37:14] In terms of a few comments, I have what's going on in Catoctin, just so we have a few updates, so if people are interested in attending. We have Morvin Park has a number of equestrian events coming up this month. it is the season includes loudon's hunt point-to-point races pony club horse trials some schooling days in the park and the spring show for virginia dressage association or the virginia chapter go to morbin park's web page if you wish to attend any of those they are great events i've been to a couple of them hillsborough gardens in the gap is coming on april 19th through the 22nd it is a four-day celebration of hillsborough's beautiful historic gardens as well as the gaps

[03:37:50] 250 year heritage as the hub for a whole agricultural region the event will include garden tours presentation plant and gardening demonstrations and arts and crafts festival and finally in perceville music and arts festival will happen on april 22nd from noon to 7 p.m rain or shine i'm going to be interesting if it rains april showers bring may flowers hopefully they're over by then it's a free a family friendly event held at fireman's field park with 15 live music performances on four stages along with an art exhibit games face painting

[03:38:24] local art artist artisans excuse me and food and drink vendors and that fellow supervisors is the news from good talking thank you supervisor to crony thank you vice chair brissman um so with disclosures on friday march 22nd i met with kathleen leonard bob richardson tracy mcdonald and James Young from Dominion regarding Morrisville to Wishing Star transmission lines.

[03:38:53] And I wanted to let everybody know on Saturday, April 6th, I am a team lead for Scrape the Grape at the Bluemont Dirt Farm Brewery. This is a community-wide campaign aimed at protecting the county's vineyards and other crops from the invasive spotted lanternfly.

[03:39:14] And it basically goes from the tree of heaven, the lanternfly, and onto grapevines and fruit trees, putting our farms and wineries in jeopardy. Visit Loudon is working with the Loudon Invasive Removal Alliance, Cooperative Extension Service, and the Loudon Wineries and Wine Grows Association to encourage residents to find and destroy the spotted lanternfly egg masses with credit card-sized scrapers.

[03:39:43] And we're also going to be tagging the location of the Tree of Heaven plants for later removal, because that's an invasive. I want to give a special shout-out to Mike Lippman, who leads LIRA, the Loudon Invasives Alliance. You know, there's like 36 HOAs representing nearly 200,000 residents in this group.

[03:40:06] And please consider volunteering for Scrape the Grape this Saturday. As a thank you, the wineries intend to provide special promotions at the vineyards and breweries for all volunteers and you get a cool bandana and you can sign up at loudoninvasives.com and if you pick Bluemont Dirt Farm Brewery you'll be able to join me and Beth Erickson and we'll be working hard to get rid of the invasive spotted lanternfly. So April is Earth Day and I'll be attending lots of events in the Little River District this month. I'm going to go to the National Botanic Garden

[03:40:44] at Ticonderoga on April 19th. They're having a big celebration and an Earth Day celebration at Willowsford that same day. I'll also be going to the Banshee Reeks Nature Preserve on April 20th and 21st.

[03:41:00] They do a big Earth Day celebration, and this is actually in the Little River District. So hopefully people will come and bring your family. It's a beautiful nature preserve. So thank you, and I hope to see you at one of these events. Thank you, Supervisor Tacroni, Supervisor Letourneau.

[03:41:18] Chair Randall asked me to give an update from the Route 28 meeting. It may be of interest to our colleagues that we actually are doing so well with our assessments in the 28 corridor that we were able to lower the tax rate, I believe, by two cents and lay out a plan to continue lowering the tax rate on the 28 tax district for a number of years until the district is completely paid off um in the future so that is the trajectory that that is moving on there which is very good news um it must be an oversight chair i know i still have not received my five minute video presentation

[03:41:58] or award for chairing the commission for 29 minutes this past year that is all i have thank you supervisor turner thank you madam vice chair um thursday march 21st i met with Aaron Swiss home from Walsh Kalushi as well as Ron Meyer from RMA LLC to discuss the application for Belmont Innovation Campus on Tuesday March 26 my staff met with Mike Romeo from Walsh Kalushi Tushar Awar from Garov Slade Jake Ballard from Rooney Properties as well as Andrea Crossett and Drew Smith from Land Design to discuss the application for Belmont Cove on

[03:42:36] Thursday March 28th my staff and I met with Aaron Swiss Helm from Walsh Kalushi Andy Gorecki from J2 engineers as well as Hobie Mitchell from Clear Springs Development Group, to discuss the application for the village at Clear Springs. On Monday, April 1st, yesterday, my staff and I met with Aaron Swisholm from Wash Kalushi, Ron Meyer from RMA LLC, as well as David Seidler from SDC Capital Partners to discuss the application for Belmont Innovation Campus. Just three quick things of note. We're going to have

[03:43:09] an 80 percent, 87 percent eclipse this week. And I remember we had one of these when I was 10 years old, where it was not a total eclipse, it was a partial eclipse. And what I remember is, and it was similar to this 87 percent, the sun is very, very bright at 87 percent. It's very difficult to see the eclipse until it's almost a total eclipse. The point here is I remember warnings all over the media, do not stare at the sun when it's at 87% eclipse. It's very dangerous. You can burn both retinas very easily with just that sliver of sunlight. So don't, you glance at

[03:43:46] it maybe, but do not stare at the sun with an 87% eclipse. It is not safe to look at it. Second, I was walking, Maggie, tonight, and I had some neighbors that were walking with us, and one of the neighbors laid an incident that occurred in a supermarket just the other day, a woman of Iranian descent who has been a U.S. citizen, had been in the country for 20 years, was in the supermarket. And somebody came up behind her, a guy came up behind her and started screaming at her, telling her to go home where she came from, called her the B-word multiple

[03:44:20] times. And I'm hearing that that kind of a thing would occur in Loudoun County, although these days it's become pretty commonplace, sadly, because of the ex-president's behavior. But I thought at the time, what would I do as an elected official if I encountered that situation? And it's a tough one because I don't know what I would have done. The only reason I bring it up is because it's happening more and more frequently. It's happening in our neighborhoods. And we need, as elected officials, to think through a game plan of how we would handle those incidents when we see them.

[03:44:52] Finally, Village at Clear Springs. I've watched the comments. In fact, the village is directly underneath the downwind leg of the touch and go pattern for most of local traffic. And so after I met with the applicant, I went down and stood on the back part of the church parking lot, which is where the Village of Clear Springs is going to be built. And I was there for 20 minutes. I was directly under the downwind leg. In that 20 minutes, one Cessna 150 went overhead at 800 feet.

[03:45:30] I pulled out my decibel meter and they were at 50 to 55 decibels until the airplane was directly overhead and directly overhead. It spiked for about 10 seconds to 70 decibels and then dropped off. I may have been there at a weird time, but I had gone there expecting to see regular traffic overhead continuously based on the messages that the airport sent out.

[03:45:52] It's not optimum having a single-engine airplane directly over housing development at 800 feet repeatedly is probably, that's of concern. I grew up on Air Force bases. I don't remember a single time where there was a housing development in the traffic pattern. There were always jets around, but having a housing development right in the pattern.

[03:46:11] But my estimate, just personally in that anecdotal single circumstances, that was not prohibitive. A single Cessna 150 at 800 feet in 20 minutes was not a prohibitive factor for me. I know it creates potential noise complaints for the airport.

[03:46:26] I understand their position, but it's just one more factor. It was not what I expected. I expected regular traffic right at 800 feet over the houses, a considerable noise factor. Noise was not a factor at all. The noise from the greenway was way louder than the noise from the airplane.

[03:46:42] So that's just a little bit of anecdotal information as that one comes before us. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Supervisor. Chair Randall? Do you have everybody else? I believe we did. Okay. So a couple things. Ms. Glass, we have the V3 program in Loudoun County.

[03:46:59] I brought it to Loudoun County in my first year of office, so that's already here and doing real well.

[03:47:18] In 2020, in February of 2020, the African-American Heritage Association of Eagle Ridge Middle School asked me to be their keynote speaker at an event. I was happy to do that, and oftentimes I will invite especially groups of young people into the county building and spend some time with them.

[03:47:37] I usually put them on the dais to do a mock meeting. I do this pretty often, actually, with Girl Scout troops, Boy Scout troops, kids, if they ask, because, you know, we're supposed to be growing up the next generation. So this was in 2020, and I invited them like I invite so many, and then one month later, COVID hit. So these kids never got a chance to come. This, this week, or last week, I'm in my office and we get an email and a call. And it is the group of kids from 2020 who are, who stayed

[03:48:13] together. They are now at Briarwoods High School. They are now juniors and seniors. And they basically called and said, we want our day. And so I am, you know, when we talked about our schools earlier, we are raising kids and both parents and people in their lives and people who love them and help them, including their educators, who literally four years later think it's important. Now, they might just, you know, like to have some time off school, which is also good, because look what they're going to do.

[03:48:50] But I just think it's amazing. I think our kids today are amazing, and I have talked to four of senior staff, and I'm going to be talking to two more to join me that day, and I'm so excited, so excited about the Briarwoods High School, used to be Eagle Ridge Middle School kids coming over to do this event with me.

[03:49:12] I do want to talk a little bit more and give a little bit more color commentary, if you Housing Association Nonprofit Summit, also called HAND. The fact that it was said over and over and over and over and over again that the number one issue that impedes us getting attainable housing in Loudoun County is political will was very, very important to me and I thought very powerful.

[03:49:41] We will never have a time, I have never seen one time, where a community comes in and says, absolutely, please build more houses near me. We really need that housing. You'll hear things like, oh, no, I love affordable housing. I want affordable housing, but not by me or do it someplace else.

[03:49:59] If we do not commit to actually building housing in this county, attainable housing that people who are in the 0 to 30 percent or 30 to 60 percent AMI can move into, then we should basically stop talking about a strategic housing plan and stop having this discussion altogether. The fact that we are going to have communities that are going to push against housing. I have lived in Loudoun County since 1993. 1993. We were like the second family in Ashburn Village in 1993.

[03:50:39] If we do not show some political wherewithal and courage, we're never going to have attainable housing in our county. And attainable housing really is so important for the economy.

[03:50:56] But the other discussion that I thought was really powerful is if all you see when you think about housing development is how much each child will cost you who's moving in to that housing development, what a poverty of imagination, what a poverty of generosity, what a poverty of thought, And what a poverty of not understanding what a beautiful tapestry of this county can have by inviting more people of differing abilities, of differing ages, of differing cultures into our county.

[03:51:31] People are not simply a price tag. They add such value and complexity and tapestry to our county. So I just want us to remember some of those words when we attach nothing to our county, especially children in our county, but how much they're going to cost.

[03:51:50] So thank you. Thank you, Madam Acting Chair. Well said, Madam Chair. By way of disclosure, on March 26th, I had a briefing on Village at Clear Springs with Aaron Swishelm and the applicant.

[03:52:08] Actually, today I had a meeting with Stephen Bradford Rose from REDC about the Primac soils item that's coming to public hearing. On March 25th, I joined the Inova Roundtable, which was very informative and interesting. And then on March 29th, I know I don't need to disclose these things, but on March 29th, I did attend the Vietnam Veterans Day of Honor in Leesburg.

[03:52:34] And we heard some very moving stories from Judge Fisher and Judge Plowman. And Mr. James Russell spoke earlier this evening, and he's a constituent of mine, and we've had many, several conversations about the crisis in Gaza.

[03:52:54] And he has been leaving me voicemails. I see him in the coffee shop, and I did not know he was going to be here tonight. But I did decide to make some comments on what's going on in Gaza, especially because today seven workers with the Central Kitchen were killed when they were trying to do their work to feed folks in Gaza who are suffering greatly.

[03:53:20] Central Kitchen is one of the few organizations delivering desperately needed food in Gaza, where 2. 2 million people do not have enough to eat, where aid agencies warn that half of the population is on the brink of starvation and famine because Israel is blocking aid and creating widespread destruction.

[03:53:42] Of course, Israel has a right to defend themselves, but what is happening right now is beyond the pale and definitely not an equal response to the tragic events of October. More than 30,000 people are dead.

[03:53:59] They are starving. They have no safe place to go. Their lives have been destroyed. The attack on Central Kitchen volunteers that Israel is calling a mistake is completely unacceptable.

[03:54:16] We were concerned about Benjamin Netanyahu's authoritarian tendencies before the events of October 7th, and I don't think we have any reason to feel any different, and I believe the actions are showing this. We do recognize that Hamas is a terrorist organization, but to gut hospitals and kill patients and doctors and to kill folks that are trying to feed people is appalling to me at this point.

[03:54:50] Israel even struck what they called a Hamas target in Syria today, an Iranian embassy. So if we don't think that continuing to write blank checks to Israel will not spread disaster across the Middle East, I think we are wrong.

[03:55:08] The same thing can be happening that we actually recognize with Russia going into Ukraine. And I think unequivocally, our community is hurting. I heard statistics last night that will back up what Supervisor Turner heard about in one of our grocery stores.

[03:55:26] Muslim-Arab Middle Eastern hate crime is way up. It's time for a definitive ceasefire. In response to the horrific attack on the aid workers today, Netanyahu just said it happens in war.

[03:55:43] You can't tell me that there's not technology to prevent something like that and so many other deaths. It's an unacceptable answer. Violent rhetoric is still on the rise as well. The former president saw his gag order expanded yesterday by a court, and it's very distressing that he would post on social media a photo of our current president hog-tied in the back of a truck.

[03:56:12] This rhetoric is just disgusting, and I also had some folks comment on the fact that I commented about our MAGA elections denier and his wife being arrested, and I said it wasn't a surprise that they were at January 6th.

[03:56:31] What came back at me was that I hate these people, I hate my constituents, I hate anyone that's not like me, I hate anyone that doesn't vote Democrat. What does this do when they claim that I hate people? It adds a hint of violence to my comments that was not there, it takes away my agency over my feelings, by putting words in my mouth that allows others to view me as the enemy, to view me as violent, to view me as hateful, and could instigate violent behavior against me.

[03:57:02] It's all up and down the spectrum. It needs to end. By way of gun violence, in four months in 2024, there have been 4,045 total gun deaths, 98 mass shootings. The deaths included 57 children under the age of 11, 280 teens, ages 12 to 17.

[03:57:22] And with that, I would like to ask Supervisor Turner to read us into closed session. Point of, I don't know. Order? Well, yeah. So technically, once you're reading closed session, you're supposed to go to closed session.

[03:57:38] And we literally haven't had a break. Yeah, I was actually thinking, do you guys want a five-minute break? Anybody need a five-minute break? Let's take a five-minute break. There you go. We'll take a five-minute break. We'll be back by 8.01.

[03:57:54] It's back into order.

[04:03:52] Everybody's here. Supervisor Turner, can you read us into closed session, please? Oh, yeah, yeah, that's me. I can do that. I don't even need a reason. I move that the Board of Supervisors recess the public meeting and enter into closed session pursuant to Sections 2.2-3711, Perrin's A, Perrin's 7 of the Code of Virginia, consult with legal counsel on actual or probable litigation regarding the application by Virginia Electric and Power Company for the approval and certification of electric transmission lines in the vicinity of Route 7 in Loudoun County.

[04:04:27] Thank you. Any discussion on the motion? Supervisor Glass seconded the motion to go into closed session by Supervisor Turner. Any discussion on the motion? Seeing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Thank you. We are in closed session.

[04:54:02] All right. All right. Supervisor Turner, can you read us out of closed session, please? As soon as I get my glasses, I will. Were they in there?

[04:54:21] Well, thank you. Thank you, Madam Vice Chair. I move that the closed session be adjourned, that the Board of Supervisors reconvene at the public meeting, that the minutes of the public meeting should reflect that no formal action was taken in the closed session and further move that the resolution certifying the closed session be adopted and reflected in the minutes of this public meeting do I need to read the resolution thank you all right we have a motion by supervisor Turner second by supervisor glass all in favor please say aye aye please affirm affirm affirm affirm affirm affirm affirm all right

[04:54:57] great we do have one motion out of closed session that chair Randall will be reading I move that the Board of Supervisors authorize and direct the county attorney to file a Notice of Participation in Dominion's Power Application for the Aspen to Golden High Voltage Transmission Lines pending before the State Corporation Commission.

[04:55:20] Second. Okay, we have a motion by Chair Rannell, second by Supervisor Turner. Any comments on the motion? None. An opening? No. No opening. No comments. Okay, would you like a closing? I would not. Okay. Motion by Chair Randall, seconded by Supervisor Turner.

[04:55:42] Turner, all in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes 8-0-1 with Supervisor Sains off the dais. And with that, we are finished with our April 2nd board business meeting. We are adjourned. Wait, wait, good job.

[04:55:58] Thank you. We are adjourned.

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