Coraggio Consulting Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, Business Meeting, Tuesday, January 6, 2026 Date: Tuesday, January 6, 2026 Place: Board Room, First Floor, Government Center, 1 Harrison Street SE, Leesburg, Virginia Length: 2h 13m (video) Official meeting video (county, Granicus): https://loudoun.granicus.com/player/clip/8085 Meeting page (Granicus): https://loudoun.granicus.com/player/clip/8085 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 2026-10-10. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [00:08:05] see it? Good evening, supervisors. Good evening, staff. Good evening, Loudon, and Happy New Year to everybody. I'd like to call to order the January 6, 2026 Loudon County Board of Supervisors business meeting. This room has a hearing loop. If you need hearing assistance, please switch your [00:08:43] hearing aid to the telecoil mode. If you need a headset, we have those available as well. I, tonight, get to do words of inspiration and lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance. And so, let me start off by saying today is the fifth anniversary of January 6th. And just as we remember other important dates in our shared American history, it's important for us to remember, for good or for ill, January 6th, any attempt, any attempt to rewrite history or sugarcoat the insurrection should not be allowed, should not be accepted, should not be believed. [00:09:20] The harm done to our nation as a whole on January 6th and individual families in particular should not be glossed over. As we enter this new year, I am acutely aware that the tone of the nation is very coarse and at times it can be very demeaning. [00:09:38] In my opinion, the civility is a direct result of President Trump, or rather the lack of civility is a direct result of President Trump. However, I am equally aware that I have no influence over the president's continually giving in to his worst tendencies. [00:09:55] What I do have influence over is this board and this body. So we will strive at all times to treat one another with respect and dignity because we are human beings, we are not perfect, and we will mess up. But the goal will always be to value one another, to value staff, and to honor the weight and the position that the residents of Loudoun County have entrusted to us. [00:10:20] In that vein, I want to read a poem, and I'm not really a poem person, but I do like this poem. I want to read a poem by Maya Angelou called The Human Family. I note the obvious differences in the human family. Some of us are serious, some thrive on comedy. [00:10:38] Some declare their lives are lived as true profundity, and others claim they really live the real reality. The variety of our skin tones can confuse, bemuse, delight, brown and pink and beige and purple, tan and blue and white. [00:10:55] I sailed upon the seven seas and stopped in every land. I've seen the wonders of the world, yet not one common man. I know 10,000 women called Jane and Mary Jane, but I've not seen any two who really were the same. [00:11:13] Minor twins are different, though their features jibe, and lovers think quite differently, though lying side by side. We love and lose in China. We weep on England's moors and laugh and moan in Ghana and thrive on Spanish shores. [00:11:34] We seek success in Finland and are born and die in Maine. In minor ways, we are different. In major ways, we're the same. I note the obvious differences between each sort and type. But we are more alike, my friends, than we are unalike. [00:11:54] We are more alike, my friends, than we are unalike. Would everyone please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the United States of the Republic, which it stands. [00:12:11] Supervisors, if you're looking for your supplemental package, let me help you out here because it's a little hard to find. [00:12:27] Go into your board meeting regular package and then go under organizational matters. And under that, you'll see a tab that says supplemental. And that's where you will find the supplemental package. It's a little, if you see the little paper clip. And so tonight, as we're going through the agenda, we're mostly working out of supplemental packages. [00:12:48] I'm going to read the consent agenda, and then I'm going to talk about the fact that we have motions on the dais, many of them we saw just 45 minutes ago. And so I'm going to figure out how to handle those as well. But let's do the consent agenda first. [00:13:06] The consent agenda is as follows. Loudoun County Board of Equalization 2025 Annual Report. Item 1B, Bylaws and Amendments for the Disability Services Board. Item 1C, Fiscal Impact Committee 2025, Annual Report. Item 1D, Fiscal Impact Committee Bylaws and Amendments for 2025. [00:13:26] Item 1E, Utilization of Federal and State Asset Forfeiture Funds, Loudoun County Sheriff's Office. Item 1F, Shellhorn Road, formerly known as Sterling Boulevard Extension, Additional Funding Request. Item 2A, Appointments and Confirmations. [00:13:43] item three, the administrative items report of January 6, 2026, and item five, the board member initiative on the data center informational sheet. That item is from Mr. Sains. I will talk on that item since he could not be here with me this evening. [00:14:00] That is the consent agenda. Is there a second? Second. Seconded by Supervisor Brixman. Discussion on the consent agenda. A couple things. I do hope all the supervisors do go and read the reports from our different committees, committees, and boards. They do a really great job, they work very hard, they are public servants, and you learn a lot when you read their report, so please go do that. [00:14:24] The board member initiative for Mr. Sains is basically for us to create, we are starting to get, especially Mr. Turner, are starting to get a lot of requests from all around the nation and even some outside of the country about data centers, because we have so many here in Loudoun County and because, you know, by zoning, we've had some zoning things that we would do differently today if we knew today what we knew 20 years ago. So we're starting to get a lot of people asking us about these. And so this item is just to create a very [00:14:58] high level data fact sheet. This won't go into all land use zoning or all electricity issues or any of that, but just some things because it's starting to get overwhelmed for us to try to answer people, especially Mr. Turner again, one by one by one by one from all around the country. And so we're trying to do something we can hand somebody. I will ask staff that when you do make this, that you do have a discussion with Mr. Turner, because especially as it concerns power, he probably, I believe, is probably the most knowledgeable local board member in the country at this point. And of course, there's a lot [00:15:36] of discussions about zoning and all those types of things. So that is what that is. Mr. Sains has this idea. I think it's a fantastic idea, but in his absence, I did want to try to explain number five to everybody. Anybody else? Ms. Bricksman. Thank you, Madam Chair. I wanted to just make a comment, a couple comments on the finance committee items that are being approved on consent. The committee bylaw changes are basically so that those committees can have remote participation. Since we changed our board policy on that, the committees are adopting [00:16:14] those board policies. Also, while we have seen some law enforcement agencies across the nation make questionable purchases with asset forfeiture dollars, I want to commend the Loudoun County Sheriff's Office for their request of purchases through the asset forfeiture dollars. That's also on consent, and their purchases are completely appropriate and passed through finance unanimously, and hopefully will pass the board unanimously. Thank you. [00:16:48] Thank you, Ms. Brixman. Anybody else? Okay, all in favor of the Senate agenda, please say aye. Any opposed? That motion will pass 8-0-1. Mr. Sains is coming from work. He would be here as soon as he possibly can. I do not have any organizational updates today, and we're not doing it for a cause because this is an organizational meeting, and I actually have to walk off this day. I said 5-15 today, so we're going to try to get a little move on. [00:17:13] But Mr. Hemstreet, do you have any comments this evening? Yes, ma'am chair. I have four comments this evening. The first is that I would like to begin by wishing everyone a Happy New Year. I'd also like to pass along a New Year's resolution from our emergency management officials. [00:17:29] Resolve to be ready in 2026. The start of a new year is a great time to check your emergency supplies and update your family's safety plans. By taking proactive steps to prepare for the unexpected, you will be ready for whatever happens and will be better able to protect yourself and others in the event of a disaster. [00:17:46] More information about how to make an emergency plan can be found at loudon.gov slash ready. Second, the Environmental Commission is now accepting nominations for the fourth annual Environmental Excellence Awards. The awards honor individuals, businesses, nonprofit organizations, and educators for their leadership on environmental issues and their work in protecting Loudon's environment. [00:18:08] The deadline for submitting a nomination is March 2nd. Details and a link to the nomination form are online at loudon.gov slash environmental awards. A third, Loudoun County's popular annual financial report for fiscal year 2025 is online. As part of the county's commitment to transparency, the report is specifically designed to be easily understandable to members of the general public who do not have a background in public finance. [00:18:32] The report is available at loudoun.gov slash financial reports. And then finally, Loudoun County is accepting natural cut Christmas trees and wreaths for recycling through January 20th. The trees are converted into mulch, which is available free of charge to Loudoun County residents year-round at the Loudoun County Landfill. [00:18:50] There are five convenient locations where trees are accepted for recycling. Details are online at loudoun.gov slash recycling. Those are my comments this evening, Madam Chair. Thank you, Mr. Hemstreet. Supervisors, I think item A may have some motions on it, whereas item B and C and D do not. [00:19:09] And we can do B, C, and D and go back and do item A. because I really do want to be here for these for these items so there there is no there is no there will be no issue in electing the vice chair the standing committees and the regional bodies that will impact the rules of order so I'm going to do right so I'm going to do those first so the first thing I'm going to do tonight and then we'll go back and do the rules of order because we need a little bit more discussion on that so the first thing I would do tonight was say it would be my honor to nominate Supervisor Mike Turner from the aspirin [00:19:40] district to serve a second year as vice chair. I need a second on that. I would give that second to Mr. Crony. Discussion on this motion. Being a vice chair, I think, is an interesting thing. I actually don't miss too many meetings, and so in some ways it's harder because you're in a good chance to practice meetings because I don't miss too many meetings, but there's a lot more to being chair, thus being vice chair, than it might look like from afar. [00:20:11] And I will say Mr. Turner has said to me like over and over again, like in his very military way, I will serve when you tell me to go. And just because sometimes I've sent him to things I just don't want to go to. And he's went every single time and done a really good job. [00:20:29] It also means that you have to pitch hits often. And so if there is a press conference to be done or an answer to the media, I will often, if I am just because sometimes I'm just too busy, I'll send it to the vice chair. And so, you know, these, I do think overall these positions are, although wonderful, really wonderful, they're also more involved than I think people might believe they are. [00:20:50] And being the vice chair is significantly more involved than people, than you might see from the outside. Mr. Turner, you've been a great vice chair, and I'm happy to nominate you for a second term. Any other discussion on the motion? All right. You want to discuss it? Do you really, though? Do you really? [00:21:06] Do you really, though? Sure. Okay. It's a bad idea. Thank you, Madam Chair. It's been an honor to serve the chair and the rest of this board and county staff and work with them. This has been a real treat. I would be honored to have your support for a second term. Thank you very much. Thank you. Okay. All in favor, please say aye. Opposed? [00:21:23] Abstaining. Abstaining? Abstaining. Sorry. I abstained. That motion will pass. 711 with Mr. Turner abstaining and Mr. Sains being off the dais. [00:21:42] The Standing Committee assignments, they will not change this year, and so Ms. Bricksman will serve again as the chair of finance. Well, let me make a motion. I move the Board of Supervisors to approve the Standing Committee assignments for 2026 as outlined in the January 6th, 2026 Board of Supervisors Business Meeting Supplemental Action Item. Motion made seconded by Vice Chair Turner. I will say again, you know, I've had this discussion with Ms. Bricksman, quite a few times. Being finance chair is hard, especially as you walk into budget. It's just a [00:22:20] lot to do when you're finance chair. And she doesn't, and I say this to her all the time, too, Ms. Bixman doesn't always talk about her experience and her education and her expertise, but it is there. And I think she's done a very good job as finance chair, and it's just not an easy job to do. And you do run meetings when you're finance chair and have to be able to work with staff across the board, across every single department, because every single department has a financial implication to it. And so I'm happy to have her and I'm happy to have [00:22:57] the entire finance committee back again. Tealuc chair, one reason we wanted, it was either going to be Mr. Crony or Mr. Kirshner because of the rural policy agenda that we're doing. Mr. Crony has been the TLUC chair. She'll be that again. And we're going to finish the rural policy this year as soon as possible. I do think that TLUC is a harder committee. [00:23:22] And I think that in some ways, the balance between Mr. Crony and Mr. Kirshner has been really good because they have differing beliefs, but they have the same care about their areas that they take care of, which is much of Western Loudoun County, and they may go about seeing about those constituents differently, our constituents differently, but it's not for a lack of caring about those constituents, and so I think TLUC has done a whole lot of work this past year, and we have a whole lot of work to do this next year, and so I want to thank all members of TLUC, because it is, again, it's a more difficult committee than it might look like. [00:24:00] Anybody else? All right, for the standing committees, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? That motion will pass, 801. Regional committees and regional and county committees and commissions. [00:24:16] I move to the Board of Supervisors to approve the regional county assignments for 2026 as outlined in the January 6, 2026 Board of Supervisors Business Meeting Supplemental Action Item. Motion is made and seconded by Vice Chair Turner. I did, if you looked in your supplemental, there are a couple of changes on this one that I caught late. [00:24:34] I did send the information out, and it was added to the item. One, the Dulles Town Center authority has been now disbanded because they're not needed anymore. And so that, it was misclassed because it's literally not an authority anymore. [00:24:53] We don't need a person assigned to it, so that's been disbanded. Secondly, LOSAP and what was the other one? OPEP. We made a mistake last year and didn't literally change the name in our rules of order from Ms. Letourneau's name to Ms. Bricksman's name. [00:25:12] She, as finance chair, has been doing the work and doing it, but we just forgot to change the name from last year. So we made the correction this year. So it is Ms. Bricksman. She sent me a text and she was like, am I coming off of these? And it was like, no, we just missed changing them. and so we're doing that. I did give Mr. Kirchner one additional regional committee aside. [00:25:34] He's like, I saw that, to COG, and I think it'd be just fabulous. I think you'd just do a great job. A lot of COG meetings now are actually online. They're actually virtual. So, but for the most part, most of them, most of the regional committees did remain the same, and supervisors, if you cannot make one of these meetings, please let us know. Please send your staff. Anybody else? [00:25:58] All in the people who say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion will pass 801. And then let's do the schedule adjustment, and then we'll go back to the rules of order. I move the Board of Supervisors to approve the 2026 and January 27 Board of Supervisors meeting schedule is provided by Attachment 2, including schedule adjustments outlined in the January 6, 2024 Supervisor's Business Meeting Supplemental Action Item. [00:26:27] Motion is made and seconded by Supervisor Glass. Let me just say there are several identified holiday conflicts in the board meeting schedule. In keeping with past practices, the second business meeting in November and December will only be held if necessary. [00:26:45] I did hold a second meeting this year, I think in November, but not December, and in keeping in past practices. If we have a meeting, if there's a holiday that follows on a Monday, the meeting will then be on the Wednesday giving staff time to make sure the package is out, but more importantly, and I think more to the point, giving supervisors time to read. [00:27:06] They kind of have that one night to read the package between the holiday and the day we step on the dais. And so we did make sure that we added all appropriate holidays to the schedule, and I did, my staff and I noodled over it for a long time. [00:27:21] And I don't think I missed anything. So I think the schedule should be fine. So I made the motion. Anybody else want to speak on the item? All right. All people say aye. Any opposed? That motion will pass 801. All right. Let's go back to the rules of order. [00:27:39] What we're going to do is this. I'm going to make the motion on the Rules of Order and have it second, and then if you have any other motions to be made on the Rules of Order, if you have any friendly amendments, if you have any amendments, if you have anything, this is the time to do that in the Rules of Order discussion. [00:27:57] That's the best way to do it, just do it off of a main motion would be the most effective and kind of, quite honestly, the easiest way to do that. So I'm going to the Board of Supervisors adopt the rules of order for 2026 as shown in Attachment 1 to the January 6, 2026 Board Supervisors Business Meeting Supplemental Organization Matters Action Item. [00:28:18] Made and seconded by Vice Chair. I will say to Loudon, I will say to you that there has been one minor adjustment made to public comments. Public comments, we have put in the rules of order that any items on the agenda that people that we have on the agenda will be called on first. [00:28:40] And so if you want to speak to any other item, you can, you absolutely can, and we welcome that, but not until we do the items on the agenda first. And in addition, I think wouldn't we agree to take it to two minutes instead of 2.5 minutes for public comments? [00:28:56] Those are the only differences to the speaking on the rules of order that I can remember. And those are in the rules of order that I can remember. So does anyone else have any friendly amendments, motions, adjustments, anything you want to do in the rules of order right now? [00:29:18] I need your light on so we can call on you right now. Mr. Letourneau. Sure. You know what I'm going to say. I would raise, at least for consideration for my colleagues, changing the business meetings to 5 p.m. on the first and third Tuesday instead of 4 p.m. [00:29:35] We have a colleague who is not able to join us at 4 o'clock, and it does bother me that that's the case. I think we've done a better job, and I know the chair has put a lot of effort into trying to manage our meetings and make them go quicker. [00:29:52] And so when we originally moved these to 4 o'clock, which was, I think, after the first year of this term, we did so, was it the whole term? Or from last term to this term? I know they were at 5 o'clock. We did it because we were going to midnight or 1 o'clock consistently, and that is not the case now. [00:30:10] So I don't necessarily need to make a motion, but I would be interested at least whether there's any interest or thoughts. Well, I will say in anticipation of this discussion, I did call the colleague. I called Mr. Sains, and I ran this by him, and I told him your concern for him and why. [00:30:27] And I asked him, I didn't lead him either way, I said, ask him what he thought. And he said he would prefer they stay at 4 o'clock. And he gave me reasons, but he said he would prefer they stay at 4 o'clock. But I did let him know that this was out of concern for the three people, you and Mr. Kirshner and Mr. Sains, who can always be here at 4 o'clock. [00:30:48] And he said he'd like to leave it at 4 o'clock. Anybody else want to have a discussion on this? All right, then thank you. We'll leave it at 4 o'clock. Okay, other discussion. Mr. Croning. Yeah, thank you, Chair Randall. So I have a motion for Section 14. [00:31:05] sorry what is that i don't know is he on the day is what this guy can really hear him very clearly where is he oh my god he's so he's so you can hear him all the way up here does he want to come take mr sainz a seat and just be part of the motion and vote and things like that because all right i'm sorry mr crony that's okay that's okay okay so i have a motion about the transportation lane use committee uh rules of order um i move that the board of supervisors amend Section 14, Establishment and Jurisdiction of Standing Committees, Paragraph M, Jurisdiction [00:31:44] of Standing Committees, Item 2, Transportation and Lane Use Committee, to transfer jurisdiction for project scope, strategy, design endorsement, and work plans for multimodal transportation projects countywide in the region, from the Finance, Government, Operations, and Economic Development Committee, to the Transportation Lane Use Committee, and the Board of Supervisors Rules of Order, and to make any other directly related language changes to the Rules of Order to affect this change in jurisdiction. [00:32:16] Motion made there a second? Ms. Glass is seconded for purpose of discussion. Well, I'll have you go, Mr. Cronin. Mr. Hemstreet, I might ask you to speak on this item from a staff functioning place. [00:32:35] So, Mr. Quinty, do you want to have an opening? Yeah, I mean, this is basically to bring the T back to the Transportation and Land Use Committee, which is the transportation part. This would just be strategy and design of transportation projects, multimodal transportation projects throughout the county and region. [00:32:54] It would be, it would include design endorsements and work plans, studies, safety and operational studies, and corridor studies. It would not include the funding, so that would still go to finance. But examples of work that could go to TLUC before going to the Finance Committee, recently, you know, the CTP is an example. [00:33:17] That probably should have gone to TLUC before it went, and that's the countywide transportation plan. It probably should have gone to TLUC before it went to the full board. There were a lot of motions on this dais. And I think TLUC is the place to really dive deeper and do an analysis and look at the strategy and look at the planning. [00:33:38] So that one definitely should have been at TLUC. The intersection improvement program, I mean, that's only done every three years. I pulled that off consent because I think it needed a deeper dive. And so now we're bringing that to TELUC. [00:33:54] And again, that's a transportation project. And then also just design endorsement of North Star Boulevard widening. You know, that I did have questions about whether we could do some of the trails, extend the trails. [00:34:11] And again, that could have been a deeper dive, looking at more strategy and planning. But I find that sometimes safety operational studies do have over-designed improvements, and you really need to dig deeper and do an analysis of what really makes sense for this corridor, and I think it can really be done only in committee. We don't have time up here. We only get three minutes. My time is ticking, so it provides an opportunity for the committee to really dig deeper, and [00:34:48] And then, of course, it would go to finance regarding the six-year CIP and where we want to put that as far as funding. Thank you. So the point of clarification I need to ask you, because I may have -- let's change it. [00:35:04] I did misunderstand something, Mr. Crony. You were saying that -- let me ask you a question so I can understand. You're saying that the funding still goes to finance? Yeah. I mean, that would -- most things need to be funded. [00:35:19] I mean, I think we're in my time. So, yeah, yes, yes. That would still need to happen. But wait, so the funding will still go to finance. Yes. So then how does that work, Mr. Crony? So, Mr. Crony. So how does this work? [00:35:46] So, so it goes to TLUC and then and it because oftentimes the funding might might change to a process, you know, depends. So it goes to TLUC and it gets one recommendation and then it goes to finance. and they have to work off that recommendation as far as funding and the scope of what just came out of TLUC, only what just came out of TLUC? Is that how you vision that? [00:36:02] I mean, they could change it. Remember, it still needs to go to the full board. But if they change it, if they change it, now you have two committees with two different sets of instructions coming to the board, I mean, coming to the staff and to the full board. [00:36:18] How does that work? Well, I think what I was thinking is that we really don't get many transportation items coming to TLUC. I think we had one the two years that I've been sitting on TLUC. [00:36:34] So the idea is to really look at it deeper, not just from a financial perspective, but to look at it from a strategy and vision perspective. And with respect, I understand I hear you, but my point of clarification is two committees would send something forward that could have two different conclusions, emphasis, funding record. [00:36:56] How does that work when we have two committees or sending something to the full board? Because what that actually means is then I become the swing boat on every single thing we're doing up here, and I'm not trying to do that, to be honest. How does that look coming out of two committees? [00:37:12] How does staff handle the instructions from two different committees? Well, I mean, I don't know that they would be that different. I think once you, like, I'm trying to avoid funding everything in full. You know what I'm saying? Like, if you really do a deeper analysis. [00:37:28] Like, I have three safety and operational studies that I think could have been pared down, could have been analyzed. Well, to respect, I'm going to stop you because you're still in my time. Yeah. When we were on this committee, on this day as last, I forget what it was, the motion that I made about one of your items that you just talked about was to send it to TLUC for information information and information would that suffice or do you need it to go to tluck ever all of the gold tluck for action that would suffice yeah information would suffice yeah that would yeah [00:38:02] and i i think you know that was for the um cip right so so i mean for this all of this would would that so pp is going to be more for action okay see what i'm saying like those are different those are different those are different all right yeah thank you for that well i'm actually don't believe i know that i still understand but but i but okay okay mr hamston would you like to before i go to wow my whole day is just lit up mr hamstreet would you like to say something just just functionally um for the only thing i would say is that the county-wide transportation [00:38:37] plan is clearly under tluck already so if the board wants tluck to look at the ctp that's where it would go so there is no question about that uh the way i interpret the motion these are clearly implementation level reviews because they're coming to the to the board or to finance particularly design endorsements and those work plans after we've already hired a consultant and we are probably 30 to 40 percent through design if not a little bit farther so those that's why those have traditionally been within finance it doesn't matter to me where or to the staff which committee it [00:39:12] goes to however there is no way to separate the project between the money and the design endorsement so what i would ask the board is not to send it to both committees to just pick whichever committee you want to send it to and then make that determination because i am concerned madam chair about what the situation you just articulated which is getting a set of direction from one committee and then having a different set of direction from another committee the other piece is while there can be a distinction between information items and action items [00:39:51] the committees and the board do not always honor that and so we do get requests for motions on information items we definitely get feedback from the committee on information items and so I think that would still be a kind of a soft way of providing kind of input and direction to the staff and so the only thing I would ask is that definitely the items in the motion are implementation level elements and that the board just make a decision as to which committee it should go to and it only goes to that one committee. Okay thank you. Ms. Brixman? Thank you [00:40:28] Madam Chair. I won't be supporting the motion. The project scope, strategy, design endorsement and work plans are something that happens after the full board has approved something and after the full board has agreed that we will move forward with the project. And so they come to finance in the implementation phase. And the implementation phase is where we start talking about how we're going to fund it, how much it's going to cost. And then after that, it does go to [00:41:05] the full board. So if anyone has concerns about the cost of a project, the design of a project, it is appropriate at that time for them to discuss it maybe. However, the time to really discuss those things is when the full board is putting these projects in the CIP. I mean, we're talking about midstream sending something that is an implementation phase. We're talking about taking it midstream and sending it back to TLUC for potential scope and design changes. [00:41:37] And so for me, doing this is, first of all, if it goes to both committees, that's a mess. I think you've already clarified that. If it goes to both committees, that potentially creates a mess. But it also creates another sort of opportunity to extend conversations that have already happened. [00:41:58] So I'm definitely not comfortable with that. I'm not comfortable with this motion. I think that we should, you know, keep things the way they are. staff set it up this way our previous boards set it up this way for a reason once we're in this phase it's clearly in the in the jurisdiction to be under finance thank you thank you miss umstep thank you madam chair um first i want to thank uh supervisor tacroni for uh calling and i know she was trying to call every member of the board um before she brought this forward and i've always [00:42:33] found her to be very consistent in that level of outreach as I told supervisor to crony I would seriously consider this but I wanted to hear what county staff's opinion was having heard that and seeing that the motion the motion appears not to send it to two committees but to send it just these issues to TLUC. I do tend to agree with Supervisor Briskman that the implementation phase [00:43:09] is best handled in finance. So sadly, although I would love to support my colleague, Supervisor Tukroni, I can't on this particular issue. Sorry, Supervisor Kirshner. Thank you, Madam Chair. [00:43:25] So when I first read this motion, Supervisor Tukroni, I really liked it. It sounds to me like Perhaps what staff is telling us, and I think from my general experience, having been on both committees for substantial periods of time, that it's tough to de-link the funding. I think what I'm hearing is basically it's tough to de-link the design work that comes with these various projects with basically the funding of it. [00:43:51] And if we could do that, if there's a way to do that, maybe there's a way to flesh that out a little more. Obviously, I don't know if there's a referral process from one committee to another. Obviously, when it comes to the full board, if it needs further design and breakdown, it can be sent from the full board back down to maybe TLUC after the funding is done. [00:44:07] You know, there are different ways to possibly approach this. I don't think I'm entirely comfortable supporting this motion at the moment, although I do like the idea, I like the concept of trying to split that off. But until we find a better way to kind of separate the funding with the actual strategy design and project scope, I'm not sure it would be the best use of our time. [00:44:26] but I like how you're thinking, and let's keep talking in this vein, but I probably will not support this motion as currently written. Mr. Letourneau. Yeah, I'll echo what my colleague said. I think there perhaps could be an intentional effort on the front end to work between the chair and the committee chair on ensuring that specific early-stage scoping of a project before it's been fully funded and all those things could potentially be something that TELUC looks at because I am sensitive to putting the transportation back into the Transportation and Land Use Committee, [00:45:03] although I have for a long time thought it should just simply be called the Land Use Committee because of this issue, frankly. But that said, I'm not comfortable with the language here that just moves everything from one committee to the other, And then you've got the committee that's dealing with finance and implementation, which is really less about transportation and more about, like, how you're actually getting something done. [00:45:31] And quite frankly, I don't want people meddling with projects once they've been approved. And frankly, I think that's a little bit of what sometimes happens and shouldn't because it just costs us lots of money. So, like, it's so hard to get these things funded. It takes so many years. [00:45:47] You all, I don't have to repeat how long I've been waiting for certain, some of these things. But the reality is, you know, the board's made certain decisions over the years. We can all individually agree or disagree. But the projects that are in the budget and are moving forward, are in the budget and moving forward, the ones going into the budget are ones that it's fair game, I think, for everybody to look at. [00:46:09] And kind of, if T-Luck wants to take a look at some of those things, fine with me. So I'm not against that, but I wouldn't support the motion as it was constructed. Thank you. Vice Chair Turner. Oh, thank you, Madam Chair. I really support Supervisor Chair Crony's intent for TLUC to get some more transportation projects under consideration. [00:46:29] I was inclined to support this notion until I talked to the county administrator and he said we do, TLUC does see the approval or disapproval of transportation projects first. And once they are approved, then the financing of that project goes to the finance committee under the current system. [00:46:44] I'm okay with that. Additionally, the language in this motion is troubling to me. First of all, we're transferring projects to a strategy design endorsements for multimodal transportation projects. There's nothing like that in the finance jurisdiction right now, so I don't know what we're transferring because there's nothing there that would transfer. And yeah, so I really appreciate the intent. I just don't think this motion is the way to do Thank you. [00:47:14] Mr. Cunningham, so at this point, this motion will not pass. And so let me ask you, first of all, I do think what my colleagues are saying is I hear that. Now, I will say, colleagues, that when she did pull off consent, it was like seven people on the board had questions about it, not just two like people, but everybody had questions about it, which said to me that there had not been a lot of clarity to that item, and she pulled it off and people had questions. And I thought that was a very telling moment, [00:47:45] to be honest. And so it is clear that something different needs to happen as far as TLAC feeling like they're as in the loop as they need to be as these things work their way through. And the answer is not just, well, they can come to a finance meeting. That's not the answer. People, you know, you guys are, with the exception of me, you guys are assigned to a committee and you don't have to come to both. You just don't. But what she's asking is not completely, what she's saying is not completely out of line to say, you know, if it's going to be, and I think we should keep [00:48:22] the transportation and transportation, be quite honest, then how do we do that? So, Mr. Crony, if you'd like to withdraw this motion, and you and I and Ms. Bricksman, we'll have to put in the FOIA calendar and get together and try to figure out how to do this in a way that everyone on both committees feel like they are heard and and things are being transferred and so I can get with Ms. Briggs if I get with you we'll find some four-year calendar time and we'll put it on there and we'll talk through that if you don't mind withdrawing the motion I will withdraw the motion I agree I think it's a collaborative effort thank you Ms. Glass are you fine with withdrawing the motion that's the second of the motion yes all right thank you [00:48:59] very much. Are there other motions for this item? No, no more motions for this item. Okay. [00:49:19] Well, then we're back to the adoption of the rules of order. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? That would pass 801. I'm sorry, Mr. Carney, I need a moment here. What the heck, woman get over here what what is happening here these motions just came to us on last 45 minutes so what are you doing with the cigarette tax girl who is this this is your name chair randall yeah so what supervisor to crony is offering is to lower the personal property tax on vehicles in [00:49:58] fiscal year 27 to three dollars and so the motion has to be the complete motion for the budget adoption. So that first part of the motion is what came through finance, which is allocating the cigarette tax, taking it out of general revenue, and taking it or placing it or directing it to the housing fund to support down payment and closing cost programs. So that is the first part of the motion. It's repeated there because Supervisor Croni, if she makes her motion, is to have the vehicle bill us at $3. [00:50:33] Okay. Okay. Okay. Point of clarification, Madam Chair. Yes. I mean, this basically has, what the motion is doing is giving options to have a lower car tax. [00:50:48] Yeah, we're going to get there. I just saw cigarette tax, and my hand came off my body and spun around. But what it accomplishes is Supervisor DeCrony making the budget recommendation motion, which I would like to make as finance chair. Well, first of all, if I'm on this dais, and we had this discussion last night, if I'm on this dais, it's a county-wide motion, I will make that motion. [00:51:07] If I'm off the dais, you are free to make the motion. We had this discussion already. We had this discussion last night. But I had not seen this, and so I saw the cigarette tax part, which is why we don't get things 45 minutes out, because now we don't know what we're doing up here. Okay. [00:51:23] But that's fine. Organizational, I mean, sorry, the Adaption of the Residential Agenda is done and fine and good. And so actually, we do now have time to go to the finance items, and the first finance item is the unassigned fund balance item, and again, what I will do is make the motion, but Mr. Crony, you have something on this motion too, right, on the fund balance item? [00:51:52] Yes, and I'm going to make two, number two. I'm sorry? I'm just going to do the second part of it. Okay, let me find it in my supplemental. Hold on. jenny is that in the supplement or is that back in the regular motions i'm sorry it's in the okay so it's back and it's in the regular it's in the regular part okay hold on one second okay [00:52:21] all right then um is there a motion for this one can't just be the goose creek bridge motion has [00:52:58] to be the whole motion okay okay all right all right let me see it let me see yours let's don't see mine all right um mr mr turner can you fix that hold i'm sorry everyone it lost on page nine All right, so I'm going to make a motion and then I do believe, Mr. Crony, you have a -- this is the general fund balance motion. [00:53:24] I move the recommendation of the Finance, Government Operations and Economic Development Committee on the Board Supervisors to approve the use of the unassigned fund balance as described in Table 1 on the January 6, 2026 Board Supervisors meeting action item to appropriate 123,692,805 for fiscal year 2026 using uses. [00:53:44] direct staff to include up to $34 million for the one-time purpose and the FY 2027 proposed budget and direct staff for 25 for the fiscal reserves and $11,700,000 to the self-insured fund. Is there a second motion on that, Ms. Brixman? Would you like to second the motion? [00:54:04] Okay, the motion is made and seconded. And we, I know we have a motion, I won't speak on the motion because I know there's another motion coming. Might as well go in and do that right now and then we can speak on the motion overall. So, Mr. I think you can make this as a friendly. I don't think you have to actually make this as an alternate motion. Madam Chair, I'd like to split the motion. You'd like to split the motion? Okay, never mind then. So you just want to make this motion first? Yeah. Okay, so we're just going to make this motion first and so because Mr. Turner wants to split the motion. Well, we can't do this motion first if she's going to split the motion. [00:54:42] Oh, you're just doing one of your motions. Okay, well then this is the motion that's that's up right now. So I don't feel any need to discuss. This is a pretty obvious motion. Ms. Brixman, do you have anything on the motion as Finance Committee Chair? [00:54:59] Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, the Finance Committee deliberated the fund balance allocations. The two small changes that occurred in committee that hopefully the full board will approve is $2 million to go to the invasive species removal projects And additionally, a million to the Whitfield Place crosswalk improvements that came out of a safety study and design because of the fatality that happened in front of the Cascades Library and Senior Center. [00:55:35] So I appreciate my colleagues supporting the fund balance motion. Thank you. Thank you, Supervisor Brisbane. So any other discussions on the proposed amendment? you're we're in we're in your oh i'm sorry we're in the base motion right now yeah yeah okay then we'll entertain an amendment which i believe is your number one on your motion right this is just a package i know can i make my we don't want yeah and now is the time for you to make the amendment okay i'm only going to do the second part of uh what you have in front of you i move that the [00:56:10] board of supervisors move um to reduce the line item federal impacts contingency by 750 000 and create a new line item, Goose Creek Bridge Design, and allocate $750,000 for this purpose in Table 1 in the January 6, 2026 Board of Supervisors Business Meeting Action Item. [00:56:32] Second. I'm sorry, I have to step away for a second. We have a motion on the table. The main motion is on the table. We don't want to vote on that motion yet because we have an amended amendment. Point of clarification, Madam Chair. [00:56:48] And we're discussing the amendment. Point of clarification, Madam Chair. Yeah. You can, in fact, pass the first base motion, and then after the fact, you can have Supervisor DeCrony make her motion because that just changes what is in the base motion, taking $750,000 out of the federal contingency. [00:57:05] Which is what I thought you meant when you said you want to submit her motion. So you can pass the first motion and then have her do her motion. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. Yeah, when you said to me, I want to divide the motion, that's what I thought you were trying to do anyway. So how about we hold up on this amendment? there's also an amendment on the personal property tax rate which is the one we should take up now right hold off on this amendment hold off on that amendment this is the fund balance item hold off on this amendment and we're going to first vote on the base motion and then I will go to you on the fund balance item for the federal money and then we will go to the other item okay [00:57:43] so this is just a main base motion on the on the fund balance items all we're doing right now? Just for imbalance, everybody. No. All right. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion passed 8-0-1. Now, Mr. Crony, would you like to make a motion for, no, it's not to amend. Okay, I'll make a motion. Make a motion. Thank you, Chair Randall. I move that the Board of Supervisors reduce the line item Federal impacts contingency by $750,000, create a new line item, Goose Creek Bridge Design, [00:58:20] and allocate $750,000 for this purpose in Table 1 in the January 6, 2026 Board of Supervisors Business Meeting Action Item. Second. I'm going to take that second. Okay, thank you. All right, would you like to discuss that? Yeah, so this is a Nova Parks project and not really a district project. The board does not have a process for Nova Parks to ask for CIP projects and they can't afford to restore the bridge. This remarkable stone bridge structure has been a landmark in Loudoun County for over 200 years. It was built when Thomas Jefferson was president. It was the [00:58:59] center of the Battle of Upperville and part of the run-up to Gettysburg and it carried road traffic on Route 50 into the middle of the 20th century. The bridge has been repaired many times. The recent engineering report recommends an extensive rebuild that would involve disassembly of much of the bridge and reassembly to bring it back to the condition like it was 200 years ago. [00:59:23] Such a repair would secure the future of this iconic structure for generations. This work is estimated to cost between 4.5 to 6.5 million, far exceeding Nova Parks resources for a project like this. [00:59:39] But Nova Parks has proposed a partnership for this project with the county. The county would fund the rebuild of the bridge and do the upfront design work, which is what this motion is for. The 750,000 is for the design. [00:59:55] And then Nova Parks secures all property rights needed and develops other supporting improvements like adding parking spaces and creating trails and interpretive overlooks on the east side of the bridge to better interpret the battle that took place there. [01:00:11] These improvements will enhance the experience for park visitors who will be able to witness the iconic structure as it looked 200 years ago. Thank you. - Thank you, Mr. Letourneau. - So I guess my confusion here is there will be, There will have to be a CIP project to fund the remainder or actual construction of the Goose Creek bridge design, right? [01:00:35] I think I may be asking staff this question. The item does say if you fund the design, we would recommend adding the construction to the CIP, which is the request of Nova Parks. But do we have an MOU with Nova Parks about the cost share on the project, or are we responsible for the entire thing? [01:00:56] I believe the request is for the entire cost of the construction. Oh, they just want us to fund the whole thing. Not a lot of cost going on here. Right. Apparently not. So, I mean, normally what we would do, we would create the project and then marry the funding for design with the funding for the rest of it. [01:01:16] How much work have we done on scoping out the project itself? Nova Parks has, but has our staff done any work on it? I believe DTCI is here and might be able to answer the question. But we collaborated with Nova Parks on the cost estimate, I believe. [01:01:32] Okay. Yeah, as Ms. Dietz is coming up, we have an existing MOU with Nova Park. So approximately a year, 18 months ago, we were approached by Nova Park, who had secured a VDOT grant to do the preliminary study of the condition of the bridge. [01:01:50] They did not have the capability to hire an engineer to do that preliminary study, so they asked us if we would do it. We agreed to do it because there was no cost to the county. And so the estimate for design as well as the renovation is coming out of that study. [01:02:06] All right, so quickly, I know we're getting ahead of it, but the $5 to $6 million for construction, when is that going to go into the CIP from a year projection, or is it future fiscal year? We would prepare it in the proposed CIP, and it's aligned with design to start when the funding is available, and I think construction would begin in FY28 or 29. [01:02:29] that we would put it in for FY28, potentially. So what's coming out to accommodate that? It's been something we've been working to put into the proposed CIP. The $5 million that's going to this project, what else could it be funding? [01:02:45] Don't answer that. It's a hypothetical. The point is, when you make these kind of decisions in a vacuum, this is not how you should budget. You should see the scope of what the requests are, and then if you want to fund this, you can fund it. We don't have to move this contingency funding today. [01:03:00] This federal contingency is sitting there the entire year. This motion would be appropriate at really in any time to just transfer. And then we could actually look at the budget and decide what year it goes into. And then you would have a decision that you could actually make with all the facts in front of you. [01:03:18] So it's not that I'm against doing it, but I don't like doing things blindsided. Ms. Bricksman. Thank you, Madam Chair. A question for staff. It's my understanding that the request is kind of urgent, that the deterioration of the bridge kind of calls for us to put it in the 28, in the years 28 and 29. Is that correct? [01:03:47] Good evening. This is Heather Dietz from DTCI. Yes, as part of that report that the assessment that was performed, there are emergency needed repairs as part of that construction cost. Okay. Do we know what the emergency kind of stabilization repairs will cost? [01:04:06] I would have to check the detailed estimate. Okay. Okay. So the executive director of Nova Parks and I met this morning, he sent an email with some background information on this. [01:04:23] I tend to agree with Supervisor Letourneau that something, you know, we do have some five and six million dollar projects in our future years that, you know, potentially could get displaced. [01:04:39] But I had a long conversation with the county administrator today about how the priorities are determined for the CIP. And he said it's not necessarily just pulling things off of the future years list. It is board priorities that sometimes get funded first or mostly get funded first. [01:05:00] But I do. That was one of the things I wanted to make clear to the full board and why I did not want this to come as a finance committee recommendation. And I wanted the full board to know and realize and acknowledge that this is putting a project in the CIP for years 28 and 29. [01:05:20] I'm fairly supportive of it, but again, we are not sure what won't get funded because we are going to spend the $5 million on this important resource and important heritage asset in our county but it does in fact put something in the cip that you know has not been a board priority until a couple weeks ago and it's not in our future years list so that's the thing that i wanted the full board to be considering as we discuss this and why i wanted it to come to the [01:06:00] full board for consideration instead of coming out of finance as a recommendation it is adding something to the cip it's asking the county administrator to put this in his budget and if we weren't making it a priority and having a vote on this tonight he would have the discretion to put other things in the cip that may come out of the future years list or other board priorities thank you madam chair thank you but this is federal funding right this is federal right Okay, Mr. Armstead. [01:06:30] Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate Supervisor Tacroni going over this item with me earlier today. At that point, I believe she was considering, and we discussed, using funds from other projects for this and not taking this out of the Federal Impacts Contingency Fund. [01:06:57] I think this is a great project, but we don't yet know what all the federal impacts are going to be. We don't know if we have anywhere near what we'll need for a contingency fund. And today we learned that the federal government has contacted VDOT and told them to dismantle their women-owned and minority-owned business contracts. [01:07:27] We don't know if that will have a negative impact on Loudoun County and any of our projects, so I cannot support this tonight. Thank you. Vice Chair Turner. Thank you, Madam Chair. [01:07:44] Unless I'm misreading this, we're creating a line item for $750,000 for a Goose Creek Bridge design. That's all we're doing. That $750,000 line item will design the new Goose Creek Bridge. [01:08:01] my understanding was we're in conversation with nova parks and um and that they have requested this i don't believe this motion as made commits us to anything we will simply have a goose creek bridge design worst case if it gets funded and paid for uh on the shelf we can choose to the deliberate over the cip item down the road and and but i don't i don't see anything in this motion that commits us to the entire project am i missing something can i address the county administration yes yes mr i agree with that statement i think what we were trying to say as staff is that [01:08:39] when you assign the design that does create the project and our practice is to try and fund the next phase of the project but to your point mr vice chair the board could remove that money or delay it or do whatever you want when you get to the budget deliberation thank you so i i did have I have a meeting or a discussion with the new head of Nova Parks, Justin Wilson, and Jim Bonfield, who is Loudoun County, very active citizen also on Nova Parks. [01:09:10] He and I had breakfast a little while ago. I think if you think of Nova Parks, think of Nova Parks like one of our towns, and that they're never going to have the money that they need to do the things that they want to do. But the asset is still a Loudoun County asset. [01:09:26] So think of it like that. I understand why somebody might balk and say, well, but it's not even our asset. But it is, it will be an asset for Loudoun County citizens. I do think that, and I've said this to people I've met with, when things come this fast, it's hard to do what we need to do with them or to them. [01:09:46] And so that's also always a problem. Supervisor, I'll take this opportunity to say, overall, I'm going to start not allowing things on the day if we do not get a motion. I'd like it 24 hours in advance. I definitely need it by 12 noon. 45 minutes out, I would just start pulling motions and not allow them on the days at all because there is nothing you, the public hasn't seen them, your colleagues haven't seen them, the staff hasn't always bedded them, and it's impossible to really do anything with them. [01:10:15] However, because this one was discussed at some length with most of us, most of us have an understanding. I think Mr. Beistra Turner is right. It's a design only, and so nothing does have to move out if it's just a design at this time and i think that when you have a asset that is for lack of a better word a time sensitive asset which this is then you don't always have the luxury to to look at the as mr turner would say the whole cip he makes a point and he's not wrong but i do think that there are there are every once in a while you have to make an exception to [01:10:51] the rule if you have a failing asset that if it's not saved quickly, we could lose. And so I would normally completely agree with Mr. Letourneau and Mr. Kirsten, and I agree with them in principle, but it's not worth losing the asset when we know that this is just too designed, and so nothing does have to move out of the CIP at this time. [01:11:19] And so I will vote for this. I will vote for the affirmative for this. But, colleagues, I'm going to start saying no if things do not come by 12 noon. I'm forewarning right now. Do not be surprised when I do it. Mr. Crony? Thank you, Chair Randall. [01:11:35] So there is an MOU with Nova Parks for the stabilization of the bridge. And this is for the design. This is $750,000 for the design out of the fund balance. [01:11:53] And then we can have the discussion during the CIP process about when it makes sense to stabilize the bridge. But it is a historic asset that deserves care and attention and deserves to be restabilized and brought back to the community. [01:12:14] It is a county-wide asset and, in fact, probably a regional asset. So I hope my colleagues will support putting this into the fund balance, the $750,000 to fund the design of the historic 200-year-old bridge. [01:12:31] Thank you. McCroney made the motion. I second the motion. All in people say aye. Aye. Opposed? No. So that motion will pass 7-2 with Mr. Letourneau and Ms. Umstead voting against the motion. Supervisors, I could make the next motion, but I don't have time to walk through the next motion before I have to leave at 515. [01:12:53] So I am going to hand that motion to the finance chair if the vice chair doesn't mind. Supervisors, this is the motion to fund the county. If this motion ties, somebody call me so I can call a recess and call me so I can turn my car around and come back here if I need to, because this motion cannot have a tie on this motion. [01:13:14] So y'all get together, and if it's a tie, I'll find my way back here. But don't be a tie. Thank you all. Happy New Year, and I'm headed over to Falcon's Landing. Vice Chair, the meeting's yours. [01:13:30] Thank you, Madam Chair. And with that, I will hand it off to our Finance Chair to make the motion. Thank you so much, Vice Chair and Madam Chair. I'll see you in a little bit. This is the motion, as she said, to fund the county for FY27. [01:13:48] I move the recommendation of the Finance, Government, Operations, and Economic Development Committee that the Board of Supervisors direct the county administrator to remove the cigarette tax from the definition of the local tax funding and dedicate the revenue to the housing fund for the purposes of funding down payment and closing cost assistance. [01:14:05] I further move the recommendation of the Finance, Government, Operations, and Economic Development Committee that the Board of Supervisors direct the county administrator to prepare the FY 2027 proposed budget based on the real property tax rate of 80.5 cents per 100 of assessed value, $100 of assessed value, a general personal property tax rate of $4.15 per $100 of assessed value, and a real property tax rate for vehicles of $3.09 per $100 of assessed value, [01:14:38] A 9% growth rate for the county's operating budget and an 8% growth rate for the Loudoun County Public Schools operating budget, with additional local tax funding allocated to the capital improvement program, less 20% to be allocated to the housing fund. [01:14:58] Made and seconded by Supervisor Sainz. Discussion on the motion. Thank you. So this is a little different than previous years because we are starting to face or starting to plan for facing a more constrained budget as we move forward with our revenue streams from data centers, which is expected to slow over the next five years. [01:15:23] With that in mind, we are working from a growth rate perspective rather than a, quote-unquote, tax rate perspective on the county budget. We are, with this motion, constraining the growth of the county budget to 9%. [01:15:40] In previous years, the county budget has grown, in my time, by 13%, by 11%, by 10%. So we are working our way toward a slower growth rate. and we are looking at a similar scenario for the school system rather than having the 40-60 split of new revenue with the school system we are looking at an eight percent growth rate for the school system and have spoken with them about it we are also working on our housing because [01:16:16] the board gave clear direction to staff that we will not be lowering the personal property tax rate on data centers. We will have what has been termed as excess revenue over that 9% growth rate that we are working toward. That excess revenue has to be allocated because we, by law, have to have balanced budgets. So it has to be allocated. So what the finance committee is recommending is that 80% of that go to one-time expenses in our capital improvement program, and also on my [01:16:53] motion, 20% of that excess funding, which turns out to be, I believe, $3.6 million into the housing fund. In that way, we are using those excess funds for one-time expenses, and we're not growing the budget in that way. So that is the compromise we came to and the cigarette tax language might be a little bit confusing so I'll just explain what the chair's intention with that motion which also passed with the recommendation from the finance committee. That intent is to have the cigarette [01:17:28] tax go directly to housing assistance for down payments and sort of like first-time homeowners in the county and that comes to about another 3.2 million that will go into our housing fund on top of already what we're putting into the housing fund which is a full cent on the tax rate which is about 19 million this year and I also want to in my last 10 seconds emphasize that although we are talking about an 80 and a half cent tax rate exactly the same as last year that is the highest tax rate that can be advertised that doesn't mean that's the final tax rate that will pass in April [01:18:07] thank you i'm sorry i've distilled it down and i think this is most quickly resolved if we presume it's an amendment and the amendment simply adds the phrase after the phrase three dollars and nine cents per hundred dollars of assessed value it adds the phrase with options to decrease the rate to three dollars for tax year 2027 that's is that your amendment yep that's the base motion all right base motion is there a second to the amendment second by supervisor luterna would you like to [01:18:46] speak on the amendments? Yes, yes, I will. Point of clarification. An amendment just needs to be accepted by the maker of the motion. If it's a friendly amendment. Yeah. Is this a friendly amendment? It's a friendly amendment. And it's accepted as a friendly amendment? I accept that amendment. Very good. Thank you. Thank you. Does the seconder accept it? Okay. Okay. Okay. So, so this it's already done it's accepted oh so I don't have to talk about however now now it's an amended based motion and you can make comments about the amended based motion if you'd like to [01:19:25] do that yeah I would okay okay so with the county's FY 2026 adopted budget the board was able to reduce the vehicle tax rate to 309 for tax year 26 I would like to see this rate further reduced in tax year 2027. The county will have approximately 15 million in excess funds available from data center revenue. I support lowering our debt in the CIP and allocating a percentage to the housing fund, but I also believe we need to give residents relief with a vehicle tax reduction. Residents need to see the financial benefits of data centers and feel the financial [01:20:03] benefits of data centers because they have a significant impact on the community. The county has excess data center revenue and i believe we need to continue to reduce the vehicle tax rate during the fy 2026 budget discussion i asked if we could reduce the vehicle tax rate to zero still taking relief from the state and staff recommended doing this in three or more years i want to reiterate reducing the vehicle tax to three dollars in tax year 2027 is a reduction of 2.2 million. So it's not a huge reduction in our budget. The board established a revenue stabilization [01:20:43] fund to help control the unpredictability of data center revenue. I believe the county should pursue a thoughtful and strategic fiscal policy that includes reserving a portion of excess data center revenue for one-time expenses and to continue lowering the vehicle property tax. I think staff said that they would like to hold it at 309 just to see the impact, but we will know the [01:21:15] impact because we will have that realized because the tax for the 309 will be levied in the spring of FY 26 and the fall of FY 27. So we will have a full year to see the impact. I don't agree with going through tax year 26 and then not giving residents a relief, an additional relief in tax year 27 with the vehicle tax rate reduction. Thank you. Thank you, Supervisor Crony. Any other [01:21:50] comments on the motion as amended um supervisor um thank you mr vice chair i will support this motion uh the phrasing i'm comfortable with the phrasing that we we address staff's concerns with the initial 309 but that we look at alternatives for lowering it so based based on that i'm happy to support supervisor to crony supervisor kershner thank you i just want to clarify the motion's been accepted as the base motion correct since it's been accepted as a friendly so we don't need a vote on her motion so now we're back to the base motion correct [01:22:26] all right so i'm very happy with the motion that was put forward i think supervisor troni myself put forward the motion last year to reduce the vehicle tax rate the the big jump that we did and i'm glad that we i was hoping to get below three so maybe we can get there when we actually to the budget process but who knows um what i'm what i'm not able to support in this motion of course is the one cent above the equalized rate for homeowners i think we've been through four or five years of significant inflation growth i went back and looked at the numbers um and the [01:23:01] annual average tax increase over the last since this board's been in place has been about 1080 annually to the homeowner now that doesn't seem like a lot but over a four-year period with with significant inflation like we've been experiencing as a whole thousand dollars does make a big difference and that's for the average homeowner obviously um and so i i and i appreciate what supervisor brisman said is hey we don't have to remain here at 80.5 um that's great i just know how sometimes this budget these budget process works we've all been through a number of budgets some of us more than others here at this dais and when we start at 80.05 it's going to be a whole [01:23:39] lot harder to go down than it is going to go up so i think that is really my hold up um most of this motion i pretty much support as a whole i'm glad we made we're making the amendment to decrease three but if if we're not i mean we are the highest per household income in the nation we we have we have a a a massive data center growth that we've experienced and we and and i just don't see why we can't keep our equalized rate at 79 and a half cents for the homeowners we talk about affordable housing those sorts of things this is one this goes to the core of affordable housing [01:24:17] I mean it may not seem like a lot but it is creep and we've seen creep and so I just can't support this underlying motions simply because we are not staying at the equalized rate for the for the homeowner themselves so I will not be supporting the motion in its current form thank you. Yeah I am pleased that the board adopted the amendment to go down to three dollars. I did try to do that with the finance committee but there was not support that night. That said I just am kind of fundamentally not entirely there on the way that we've constructed our guidance this year [01:24:52] similar to what Mr. Kirshner said but I always prefer to start lower and then have the board add things than have the board have to reduce things to get to an equalized tax rate, because as he accurately said, the board will generally not do it. And I think you give more scrutiny to things when you add them than when they're already part of the base budget and you have to reduce them. It is true that we've had some years of higher growth, but we really had gotten into that because of the addition of data center revenue that was coming in of big numbers, and we've been utilizing that. The, you know, the 8% growth rate to me is on the [01:25:31] school side is still a little high, and the 9% on the county side to me is just still a little bit high. I think seven and a half, eight and a half, something like that is a more reasonable thing. It doesn't sound like a big difference, but it's actually almost a half a penny or more when you start getting into it. So I would have preferred to start at a lower real property tax rate. I'm now comfortable with where we are in the personal property tax rate. I do think it's important we continue to move that down, but I think generally speaking, we're just a little bit higher than I would want to be for fiscal guidance. Now, we all know when assessments come in, there could be [01:26:06] changes, and usually it's to our favor. The day may come where that is not the case, so my hope is that this is not where we end up in this budget, and it's possible it won't be, but this is not the first time I've made the argument on fiscal guidance that we should start lower, and then if we want to add, we can add, instead of the other way around. So I won't support the guidance this evening. Thank you. Thank you. Supervisor Leiterno, closing comments. Supervisor Brisbane. [01:26:34] Thank you. So I'm going to push back a little bit on the idea that our taxpayers are not seeing relief because of the data center revenue. That is an absolutely insane statement. There is no county in this commonwealth that can stroke a check for 22 million dollars to buy oak hill there is no county in this commonwealth that can stroke a check to build a crisis receiving center for 16 million dollars there is probably no county in this common and still lower taxes [01:27:12] at the same time there is no county in this commonwealth that can build 135 million dollar rec center like the one we have in Ashburn now and still lower tax rates. We were a full cent below the equalized tax rate last year. Since I've come into office, we have lowered the real property tax rate by 24 cents. 24 cents. My out-of-pocket tax bill was less last year, so I'm not sure where Supervisor Kirshner is getting his numbers. But we also have to face the fact that the assessments on homes have gone up. That should be a good [01:27:50] thing for a homeowner. That should be a good thing, that the value of your most important asset is going up and up. Maybe more than we want them to, but they are. But the idea that our taxpayers and our residents are not seeing the benefits of the data center revenue is an insane statement for anybody to make. Absolutely insane. We are land banking right and left. We are using the wisely for the future of our county. The CIP funds, the cash that we're putting in the CIP, [01:28:30] right, 80% of the excess revenue, that saves taxpayers money in the future because we're putting that cash in the CIP. We won't have to put local tax revenue, local tax funds in the CIP in the future because we're investing in that now. We will have fewer bonds because we will be investing, hopefully, with my next motion for the next three years, we will be investing 80% of that excess data center revenue into our CIP. So don't tell me that's not going to save [01:29:03] taxpayers money year over year over year. It is good fiscal policy. Again, I will reiterate that the 80.5 cent rate that we are going to hopefully approve tonight is the highest advertised rate. [01:29:19] That doesn't say we're going to end up there in April. I appreciate staff's work on the budget. We've been working in finance committees since like July. So thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you to the finance committee as well. And thank you to my colleagues for supporting the motion. [01:29:36] Thank you. Motion has been made, seconded as amended. The motion, can I see the vote for the fiscal 27 final budget guidance? The motion is before us. [01:29:52] All those in favor, please say aye. Any opposed? No. That motion will carry 621 with Chair Randall off the dais. And then, Supervisor Brestman, you have one more motion you'd like to make? [01:30:10] Thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair Turner. This is the pink sheet for my colleagues on the dais. I move that the Board of Supervisors direct the county administrator to prepare the next three proposed budgets with additional local tax funding allocated to the capital improvement program less 20% to be allocated to the housing fund. Motion made. Is there a second? Second by Supervisor Glass. Opening comments. Thank you. Thank you very much. So this motion is basically codifying is not really the [01:30:45] right word because it's not permanent fiscal policy. But what this motion does is what we decided in finance committee and what we just approved with any excess revenue over our growth rate of 9% right now, what we just approved is 80% is going to go into the CIP one time and 20% is going to go to the housing fund. What this does is have that policy move forward that way for the next three budget cycles. So in other words, to not do that, there would have to be in action by the board. If we left it, we would have to have this conversation every year about [01:31:24] the excess revenue. So I was just wanting to make that sort of our policy for the next three years at least, because we know that that data center revenue should be growing for the next five to seven years. So this sets that kind of in a fiscal policy that the excess revenue over our growth rate will be divided in this way. I would really appreciate my colleagues' support on that. Happy to answer questions. Thank you, Supervisor Briskman. And I'm sorry, who seconded that? [01:31:52] Oh, that's right. Supervisor Glass. Thank you. Supervisor Tocroni. So I don't know if I can support that because my amendment to the motion, to the base motion, basically said that I would like some of the excess revenue going to a reduction in the vehicle tax. So I don't know that I can support this because I think $2.2 million was the amount that would take it from [01:32:22] $309 to $3. So I was thinking it would be part of that excess LTF. That's what would allow us to continue to reduce the vehicle tax rate. I don't know, Mr. Hemstreet, if you could clarify that, but that's kind of what i was missing you can answer yeah so we would interpret both motions together so we would uh if the board reduced the tax rate that the tax rate would be that would be done first which means you would have less excess and then the 20 would be applied uh okay so that [01:33:02] would be done first okay okay i understand thank you for that clarification so let me ask mr what if the board gave fiscal guidance to pass along the excess revenue in the form of a tax reduction? Then there would be no access to that. Would you would you interpret this motion that was precluding that? Oh no if you there because by definition there is no there's no excess. Okay so I do have and we talked about this in finance I have some fundamental concerns with kind of the construct of how we're approaching this which is basically to say that we should keep the tax rate [01:33:38] at 80.5 for the foreseeable future multi-budget years, and then simply allocate all excess money. I understand that's not what this motion is. I'm just giving that predicate for my second comment. This motion is dealing with, in the event that there's excess money, what happens with it? [01:33:55] I understood that to be the direction for the coming fiscal year, but I have no idea if I would want that to be the direction for the second or third fiscal year, especially the 20% for housing. That may be appropriate and may not be appropriate depending on where we are, depending on how much money the board puts into the housing fund outside of this process. [01:34:17] You know, there's a lot of factors here. What is the CIP going to look like? Do we need to put more money into CIP if there is excess money? My first goal with the budget would be to use some of the excess funding to reduce the tax rate, which is not the plan if you look at the multi-term strategy that we have now set forth, which I don't agree with. [01:34:38] But beyond that, even if that was the plan, I'm not willing to commit two and three years down the road to this particular 80-20 split, nor do I see any reason to. Because we will absolutely have a fiscal guidance item that's going to come to the Finance Committee next year. [01:34:54] And the question of how to allocate excess money was not something that we spent a great deal of time on. That really wasn't the discussion. It was about exactly what the tax rate should be and what the guidance should be. So to me, it's not a very heavy lift to next year, say we want it to be 80-20 and so on. [01:35:10] So I just don't see this as a necessary motion and it's not necessary to commit us to future years. And then if the answer is, well, we don't have to stick to it, then fine, then why bother doing it? It's just not, to me, not necessary. Thank you, Supervisor Letourneau. [01:35:26] Supervisor Umsat. Thank you, Mr. Vice-Chair. Mr. Vice-Chair, if I could, through the Vice-Chair, ask a question. either of finance chair bristman or uh tim hemstreet so we have 19 million a full penny on the tax rate going to housing how much more remind me how much more would this add depends on the excess so this year this year this year with 20 it's 3.6 million 3.6 million okay all right thank [01:36:03] Thank you. I mean, I was not in favor of increasing the percentage and taking that 10% away from capital projects when this came up before finance. I do tend to agree with supervisor Letourneau. I might be, I'm not wild about it, but I might be more amenable if this were just doing it for this year, but, and not for the foreseeable future. [01:36:36] But I do agree with Supervisor Letourneau. I would rather see this go to reducing the real property tax rate rather than sending this amount of money to the housing fund. Thank you. [01:36:54] for us or saints thank you vice chair turner if i can ask the question to staff either mr hemstreet or the team in front of us here so if we were to do this with this and i guess i kind of did answer earlier this would lock us in for the next three years or lock us in for three years but then technically we could hypothetically look at the numbers next year and take it out and then the following year do the same thing is that your interpretation i believe staff would anticipate the finance committee would have its budget development discussions throughout the fall where you give budget guidance and final guidance and so we would prepare our guidance items with [01:37:30] this incorporated and then the finance committee could recommend something to the board if it's an alignment with what this motion is or some other guidance we would anticipate that that would follow the same process but how I interpret this motion is that staff's being directed to prepare guidance with this guideline okay and would staff feel be easy to say after we look at see the numbers to remove this say next year or the year after if need be we would take the recommendation of the finance committee and the board on how to prepare the proposed budget you [01:38:05] would well i think there's i think there's one more element to this which is that we are projecting things off of a straight line revenues don't necessarily proceed that way so it is also possible there is no excess next year right and so we would have to we would apply this as guidance because remember we're at guidance right this is now then say if we didn't have the revenue then you would point that out and say hey you might want to rethink this and remove it or not as as the county administrator i still reserve the right to make a recommendation to you that i view to be [01:38:44] in the best interest of the county and so this is we view this as guidance so this is not direction saying you shall do this every year it's hey in those years where we continue to follow this strategy we want you to consider placing 20 towards housing it's possible as i said there may not be in excess next year it's possible that some board members have expressed discomfort in the way that we are putting this budget together. Finance and the board next year may say we don't want to follow this practice where we'll go back to a more traditional way [01:39:23] of building the budget and so this guidance wouldn't apply because there is no excess. Okay thank you and with with that I yeah I can't support the motion I think the way we're doing it now where we see their numbers review and then give guidance is appropriate than planning two or three years in advance and not knowing exactly what the numbers might be so yeah at this time I cannot support the motion but I enjoy this the spirit of it. Thank you Supervisor Saints. I'd like to weigh in on this one. I'm sorry Supervisor Glass. Thank you Vice Chair. Actually I think I heard it [01:40:01] another way when Mr. Hemstreet said was that we can look at it in the next year or so and say okay if we have this amount of money then we can do this to give us guidance we would not have to do it that's why mr hemstreet did i hear that correctly because i felt more comfortable when you made that statement absolutely so yeah you have wide discretion so this is guidance we come [01:40:36] and ms burke said it as well we will come with what our suggestions are to finance and to the board this would be incorporated as part of that concept because we have guidance if if the funding is there and we continue to follow the board continues to give the same guidance around having some excess revenue okay thank you i can support this motion uh all right uh i think we are um budget guidance is budget guidance it's budget guidance whether it sits at 10 percent whether it goes to 20% its budget guidance. I take your point that the two ways to look at [01:41:15] it is we've got a default position right now and then if we want to go to 20% we can make an active motion to do that. Supervisor Brisbane's simply saying let's make the default position for the next three years 20% if we want to come down off that that's just fine. My concern is that we have a whole bunch of delegates going down to the session in Richmond specifically to take housing prerogatives away from local government and are going to propose those motions, one of whom is on our legislative delegation. This statement is a statement that says we take attainable housing in Loudoun County [01:41:53] very seriously and so we are going to dedicate 20% of our excess revenue to the housing fund. it doesn't mean we're locking in it means that's our intent that's our default position to make a statement that we are serious about attainable housing and i think given the atmosphere that could exist down in richmond in the next couple of weeks i think it's probably a wise move for loud and kennedy to do it so i will happily uh support this motion thank you uh vice chair turner and and thank you for making that point it is absolutely true and not only that um [01:42:29] There are some proposals out there that are going to say any county with more than 20 data centers are going to have to spend their data center revenue on something specific that we don't get to vote on. So I think that this, again, it would be budget guidance. [01:42:46] It's not just 20 percent to housing. It's 80 percent to our CIP. And let's remember, this is largely excess revenue created by the data center industry. And so to me, this indicates that this board is going to be using those funds responsibly. [01:43:08] So don't try to take our funds away from us and force us to build electric infrastructure or stuff like that. It is a statement, it is budget guidance, it can be changed next year when we're working on the budget, yes, absolutely. If there's no excess, we don't have a choice. [01:43:25] But what this says is for the next three years, This is our plan, 20% to housing, 80% to our CIP, all of which helps our residents and saves our residents' taxpayer dollars. Thank you. Thank you, Supervisor Brestman. [01:43:41] Motion made and seconded. All those in favor, please say aye. Any opposed? No. I think I counted one, two, three, four nays, and one, two, three, four ayes was— Fails. [01:44:04] It fails, for lack of a majority. And, okay, that's fine. I thought we were, suddenly I was thinking we're back on the fiscal guidance and I had to call Chair Randall, but no, we're fine. All right, thank you very much. Next item is item number 2B, nominations. [01:44:21] Does anyone have nominations for the board? Supervisor Sainz. Thank you, Vice Chair Turner. I nominate Michael Huber for the reappointment as at-large representative on the Route 28 Landowners Advisory Board. [01:44:38] Thank you. Supervisor, I'm sorry. let me pull these up i have two nominations um no one nomination eileen shaffer for at-large reappointment to the disability services board surprise glass thank you chair i nominate mr james bonfils for reappointment to an at-large seat on the loudon water board ah you took my nomination any other nominations hearing none uh all nominations are closed the [01:45:15] The final item on the agenda for tonight is item number four, net metering position statement. And I will make the motion for that. We can discuss anything we need to discuss in the motion. I move that the Board of Supervisors endorse the Environmental Commission recommendations of the county's position statement for testimony during the Dominion Energy State Corporation Commission hearing on January 20, 2026 on case PUR 2025-00079 titled Petition of Dominion Energy Virginia for approval to revise its net metering program. Is there a second? Second from Supervisor [01:45:50] Brisbane. I don't know if any of you actually got in and read the the Environmental Commission's recommendations are quite lengthy and quite detailed. Essentially Dominion is petitioning the FCC to radically reduce the amount of benefits that individual homeowners get from solar arrays and battery storage it's a very complex position statement but I think it's a good one having read through it and and I think it's wise for the board to endorse the Environmental Commission's recommend a proposed [01:46:23] statement regarding this issue and super yeah shocking to nobody here I'm not supportive of the motion I would note that the the rate proposal actually does has a grandfathering position component. [01:46:39] So in the recommendation that was provided to us by the Environmental Commission, I'm not sure that was entirely accurate because I think it missed that. I went beyond that and actually looked at the filings themselves, which I hadn't done yet. Essentially, Dominion is arguing that the current system has a cost shift. [01:46:56] And I told you all this before when I said I figured this was probably why, and that the new structure will reduce rates for all customers by about $5. essentially the way that the credits are accumulated are over the course of a year, but tend to be utilized more at peak time, summer peak time. So the utility continues having to generate power, but it's under recovering costs at that point. Again, I don't know whether that's accurate or not. I really don't. I think that's for the SEC to decide, but I would caution the board to take a position which the utility is saying is going to lead to higher rates, [01:47:36] or at least a position against something utility says is going to reduce rates, given what we know about electricity rates in this county. So my advocacy here is not on either side of this. It's simply for the board to stay out of it and to allow the SCC and all of their experts to take a hard look at Dominion's arguments and take a hard look at the opponent's arguments and come up with what they think is the right decision. [01:48:02] I do not have faith in anybody up here that we have that type of technical knowledge, including myself, despite the fact that I've worked in the energy industry before. So I just think that we're over our skis, and any input we provide is not going to be the technical type of nature that is actually helpful to the commission anyway, and so there's not much point in doing it. [01:48:23] Thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair Gourney. Thank you, Vice Chair Turner. So Dominion says it doesn't want to raise rates for others. reality is net metering is less than 2% of all energy in Virginia, less than 2%. It debunks the cost-shifting argument. Dominion has 3.6 million customers, and the penetration rate of solar is less than 3% for Dominion. So I don't believe it's going to change, it's going to increase costs for [01:48:56] other consumers. APCO lost their, they lost their proposal to weaken the net metering program. It failed. And that is because the Virginia Clean Economy Act passed in 2020 required utilities to provide a fair rate of return, to provide the one-to-one retail rate. So that is part of the Virginia Clean Economy Act passed in 2020. I think the statement that the Environmental [01:49:31] Commission has put forward is an excellent statement. I also think NVRC, I don't know if people read NVRC's position, it was excellent. And we do have other jurisdictions who are involved in the case regionally. The city of Alexandria is involved. I think it makes sense for us to participate, given the crisis, the energy crisis that's happening due to our data center community, our high load users. [01:50:04] I think it makes sense to be encouraging solar, rooftop solar for constituents so that they can have energy independence. We know that energy, that the bills are gonna go up for consumers, and I would like to provide them the opportunity to make solar affordable for all. [01:50:26] Solar for all is what I think we should be encouraging. I know the Environmental Commission has put that out as one of their strategies is to try and get more solar. You know, JLARC even found that there would be an unconstrained demand for power in Virginia that will double within the next 10 years, if you look at the JLARC study. [01:50:48] So we really do have an energy crisis and it does not make sense for Dominion to be reducing incentives for rooftop solar when power is so critically needed in our area. Thank you. Thank you, Supervisor Crony. [01:51:05] Supervisor Umstott. Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair. Since Mr. Brown is at the staff table, I completely appreciate the arguments on both sides of this issue. I'm leaning towards supporting the argument that Supervisor Tacroni just laid out. [01:51:24] But do you have any useful information that would help me decide? Useful information. So I would say that the Environmental Commission took a slightly different approach that does not contradict with Supervisor LeTourneau's points. [01:51:46] And it really takes to the issues that we have with the Virginia Clean Economy Act, the timing associated with this, and the urgency that we have uniquely to Loudoun County for a generation of additional alternative power sources. And they've really honed in a little bit on the consistencies relative to policies right now with the push for battery storage and how this does create those conflicts. [01:52:10] So I believe they stayed away intentionally from the technical argument that Mr. Lutourneau rightfully brought up tonight and really went to our energy strategy, our comprehensive plan, and our unique needs associated within Loudoun County as it relates to bringing more power to the grid through a means that is, yes, it is incentivizing that. [01:52:28] There's no question about it that net metering is currently incentivized, but we do that frequently with a number of promotional efforts to maybe level out the playing field as we're trying to do with the energy demands that we have here in Loudoun County. So I would say the Environmental Commission took that particular approach that does not, from my understanding, conflict with the valid points that Mr. Letourneau brought up. Thank you. Okay, I made the motion and I am going to make a friendly amendment to my motion because I was just pointing out to be my Mr. Rogers that I did not grab the updated supplemental version of the motion. So without objection, I'm going to amend my own [01:53:06] motion and reread it. And if anyone would like to make comment on the amended motion, that's just fine. We can do another round. I don't think we'll need to. So the amended motion, friendly amended motion is I move that the Board of Supervisors endorse the environmental commission recommendations as the county's position statement for testimony during the Dominion Energy State Corporation Commission hearing on January 20th, 2026 on case PUR 2025 00079, titled Petition of Dominion Energy Virginia for approval to revise its net metering program, provided as attachment one to the January 6, 2026 Board of Supervisors Business Meeting Supplemental Action Item. I further move that [01:53:42] board of supervisors authorize the county administrator to appoint a staff member to serve as the board's witness for the testimony thank you guys thank you very much supervisor briskman uh and with that i believe we're up for a vote all those in favor of the motion please say aye any opposed uh that motion will pass 7-1-1 and um it was pointed out to me that um the script that we had did not include board comments regional updates and disclosures so we will close out this evening with an offer for anyone who has board comments regional updates or [01:54:21] disclosures let's just start down here and work down this way supervisor brisman thank you i don't have any um disclosures uh happy new year to everybody i want to express congratulations to algonkian district school board member april chandler who has been elected to chair the school board this year and and donahue also deserves congratulations she will be vice chair of the school board this year still unfortunately their meetings are at the same time as our meetings [01:54:52] as much as i've begged them not to do that i also have a little bit of sad news for my office my excellent and wonderful chief of staff ethan gardner has accepted a new opportunity um he wasn't looking i'll just say he wasn't uh anyway so i i am so proud of ethan he is going to um have his last day actually on thursday and he will be the associate director of government affairs for the george mason university prince williams science and technology campus [01:55:31] and if you know anything about that innovation campus it includes an investment from the state and an investment from Prince William County to basically be an innovation campus around science and technology. So it's an amazing opportunity for him. [01:55:47] And I know that he is just gonna, I wanna say a bad word, he's gonna kick you know what, just like he did in my office. So please, if you see him over the next couple days, congratulate him on this wonderful opportunity for him. And I'm just extremely proud of the folks that have left my office and the roles that they have. [01:56:08] One of them is with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, working on African issues, national, international issues. As we know, Ray Banks is over with Equinix, and now Ethan will be over with George Mason. [01:56:23] So if you have any questions, please reach out. We will be conducting a job search here in the next couple weeks, or sorry, a candidate search in the next couple weeks. So please reach out to me if you have any questions, or Amon or Ashley. And as I said, Happy New Year. [01:56:39] I will echo the chair's comments about this being January 6th. It's actually my sister's birthday as well. So happy birthday to her. And what a day to have a birthday. And then on gun violence, I did want to share that we're doing actually a little bit better from 25 than we did over 24. [01:56:59] In 24, there were 41,000 gun deaths. And in 25, there were 38,745. We had 408 mass shootings in 25, where we had 504 in the year of 24. The deaths for children and teenagers are about the same. [01:57:19] As we begin the new year, we've already seen 166 total gun deaths and seven mass shootings more than days in the year. And three children under the age of 12 and 10, age 12 to 17, have passed. Thank you. Supervisor, I'm sorry. [01:57:35] Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair. just wanted to direct some compliments towards county staff. I've been working with Steve Torpy of Parks Rec Community Services and Shireen Derazio of DTCI, as well as Mr. Vincent Jones. They have been wonderful in supporting our office in meeting with constituents. We had a [01:58:12] meeting with about 30 Leesburg constituents last night. It was organized by that the community of Country Club and Clubhouse Drive not organized by our office. Staff was willing to support but We did not need them at that meeting, but I wanted to share with the board something I have shared with county staff, the two directors, as well as with the Leesburg Town Council. [01:58:42] There is strong support in that community for the counties having made the West Park golf course a naturalized area. They love that. There is very strong concern, however, in opposition to putting in an active element to that natural park, and that active element would be disc golf. [01:59:10] There is strong opposition to that. The disc golf course would run too close to the homes, and disc golf, they're afraid disc golf discs, which our projectiles would end up coming into their yards, injuring either their property, their children, or their pets. [01:59:28] So we could probably expect to hear from them that they will beg us not to make disc golf part of the plan that we eventually adopt for this park. [01:59:43] But there were other concerns as well, and we may hear from the community, But that was the one, seemed to be unanimous concern, is to please eliminate the disc golf element. So that's all I have tonight. I just want to thank the mayor of Leesburg and the town council for all their hard work with that community as well. [02:00:07] Thank you, Vice Chair Turner. One disclosure on Wednesday, December 17th, I met with representatives from American Real Estate Partners to discuss Quantum Park data center application. I also would like to congratulate our new school board member for Broad Runs. [02:00:29] Ross Vince and I look forward to collaborating and communicating with him with our Broad Run constituents. And that is a happy new year to everyone. Thank you. Thank you. [02:00:45] So just first, I want to pay my respects. I was able to attend the funeral today of Donald E. Walker I. As we know, many of us know Donnie Walker. His father tragically passed away a couple of weeks ago, and they had the funeral today. It's a very touching funeral and learned a lot about a man who has been a significant pillar in this community for many years. [02:01:05] As a matter of fact, he was on the first rural A1 Economic Development Committee that we ever had back in the 90s. So he saw a lot of change here, put his hands on a lot of buildings, built a lot, master builder, et cetera, and very touching. [02:01:22] And so keep that family in your prayers as well as this loss. It was great because he did get to meet his namesake, Donald E. Walker III, who is Diane Walker's youngest child who was born about two months ago. [02:01:37] So I think that was a really great aspect of the funeral for sure. And there was one picture that they had of all three of them together. The other thing, just to kind of switch gears, to address the insanity of my first statements, which Supervisor Brissman suggested that I had made some insane statements, I just want to point out, in 2021, the average taxpayer real property paid $172 more. [02:02:00] In 2022, the average taxpayer paid an additional $102 more. In 2023, the average household taxpayer paid $288 more additional. And in 2024, the average taxpayer paid $384 more additional. [02:02:17] And in 2025, and this comes from our county website, the taxpayer paid an additional $250, totaling, I think, approximately $1,080 more per year that the average homeowner in Loudoun County pays for their real property tax since this board has been in place. [02:02:36] Now, there are a lot of good arguments that can be made, but one of the basic arguments I'm making is we have so much revenue from our data centers, there's no reason why a single taxpayer in Loudoun County should pay $1,080 more for their home than they did five years ago, especially given inflation. That was the point that I always made. I don't think that's an insane argument. [02:02:58] Obviously, I think that it's actually very sane, and that is we should find ways to maybe restrict our buddaging a little bit so that our homeowners can have paid approximately the same every year annually based upon our significant revenue income that we have enjoyed through the data center community. Thank you very much. Supervisor Sainz. Thank you Vice Chair Turner. Mandatory disclosures on December 3rd my staff met with Packy Crown of Bowman, Steve Danuches and the [02:03:32] applicant team about the Pantovic property rezoning application. On December 16th my staff And I met with Amanda Williams for Cooley and the digital reality team about their application for a digital Dulles campus application. And I just want to, if I can ask Mr. Hemistry, Vice Chair Turner to actually correct something here. [02:03:56] Well, I don't want to say correct, but I just want to make sure that it's on the record that folks do know that we have done a lot for attainable housing here in the county. So if you allow Mr. Hemistry to, for the record, kind of illustrate over the years what Loudoun County has done for attainable housing and affordable housing in Loudoun County, because I don't want to make it have the impression that Loudoun County is not doing anything for attainable housing, especially with the vote being 4-4 and that motion did not carry because we are doing a lot for attainable housing here in Loudoun County. [02:04:29] So, Mr. Hemmstreet, if you wouldn't mind sharing some of our good deeds for attainable housing in Loudoun. Sure. I think the biggest piece is that the board has adopted an unmet housing needs strategic plan. So, we are following that plan, which is a focus and a priority of the board to support attainable housing in Loudoun County. [02:04:52] The current year's local fund allocation towards attainable housing is $27.5 million. So that's a significant amount of money. Just through the budget guidance process, the board is proposing to add, as part of the fiscal 27 budget, a dedicated $3 million towards down payment and closing cost assistance. [02:05:15] Over the past couple years, the board has funded multiple attainable housing projects that funds more than 1,100 units that are in development and expected to be delivered in the next few years. [02:05:32] We have tripled the number of attainable housing partners since 2022, and we continue to create new resources and tools that foster additional partnerships. The board has created an expedited process around those projects, the legislative application process for those projects that are 100% attainable. [02:05:52] That is the expedited process that you've approved previously. [02:06:07] We also have, through our efforts, internally put together kind of coordinated efforts between several departments, including housing and community development, planning and zoning, building and development, to push or support the delivery of attainable units. That has resulted in delivery of more than 560 units since 2022. [02:06:24] And then we believe approximately 200 units are expected to be delivered over the next year. We do use a number of different local resources to support attainable housing. It includes direct funding that I just alluded to in my previous comments, land, as well as developer commitments to increase those housing numbers. [02:06:49] And that's just kind of a nutshell, quick shot at what we've been doing around this issue in the last few years. Thank you, Mr. Hemstreet. Mr. Turner. Thank you. Supervisor LeTerno. Yeah, Happy New Year, everybody. Just briefly, Supervisor Brisbane mentioned the school board. [02:07:04] I just want to take a moment to congratulate the outgoing Dallas District School Board Representative Melinda Mansfield on her return to private life, so to speak. She was the chair of the school board for the last two years, and also congratulate John Pepper, who is the new Dulles District School Board member. [02:07:23] John and I had a chance to sit down for a few hours over the break and hope to continue having a good, productive relationship with him, as I did with Melinda. That is obviously a difficult job, and we all have our own opinions, but I think it's always important that we have a good dialogue and open line of communication with our counterparts. [02:07:43] So I hope nothing to the best for our new school board and looking forward to seeing them soon as we talk about their budget. That is it for me. Supervisor Carney. Thank you, Vice Chair Turner. On December 17th, I met with Packy Crown, Bronco, Pontovic, Scott, and Romana Botch-Helder regarding the Pontovic property rezoning. [02:08:08] This is the two-year mark of my first term in public office. I want to thank residents for allowing me to serve as a supervisor in the Little River District. It has also been a pleasure working with the best staff in the region. We've accomplished a lot these last two years and have much more to accomplish together. [02:08:29] Some of the board accomplishments and initiatives that I am most proud of include the intersection improvement at North Star Boulevard and Creighton Road, the Birchwood bus proffer removal, funding for Belmont Ridge Road short and midterm improvements, reduction of the vehicle tax while holding the general rate for data center computer equipment, adoption of the St. Louis small area plan, endorsement of the Runway 30 Aviation Noise Mitigation Project recommendations, three of the four recommendations, purchase of the Monroe's [02:09:04] Oak Hill for a future state park, working with Amazon to mitigate the impact of data centers on the Meadows community. Yes, we did a mitigation plan, and I'm very happy to report Amazon was willing to work with the community and be a good neighbor. Initiative to include a policy statement about no encroachment of data centers in the transition policy area, an initiative to improve design standards and add a setback near residential for utility substations. [02:09:38] Your voice guides my decisions and I am thankful for all the participation and public input. We will continue hosting open office hours and I hope to meet everybody in person. Wishing you a happy healthy and prosperous new year. On another topic the Arcola volunteer fire department which is in my district is hosting an inova blood drive tomorrow wednesday january 7th from 1 to 5 p.m at the arcola fire station in brambleton 23675 belmont ridge road donating [02:10:13] blood is a simple way to save lives just one donation can help up to three patients please consider donating appointments are encouraged and can be scheduled in advance at inovabloodsaves.org work. Thank you. Thank you, Supervisor Tocroni. Well, let's see, in no particular order. I also think one statistic, Chair Randall mentioned this the other day, but Mr. Hemstreet, she said, made the comment that Loudoun County has exceeded every state housing goal and that we're the only [02:10:47] county in Virginia to have done that. Is that accurate? Chair Randall has said that. Yeah, It's accurate that she said that. That is accurate. She has said that. I believe we have met the goals that the state has set aside for Loudoun County. [02:11:07] Okay. Okay. The other point on housing, to Supervisor Kirchner's point, in each one of those years, yes, property taxes, the amount that a property tax that an individual homeowner paid went up. But I believe in at least three of those years, we hit record property tax value increases at the same time. [02:11:26] And I sat down on at least one of those years and calculated, and that year the county absorbed two-thirds of the property value tax increase and left the remaining third to the homeowner. So, yes, taxes went up, but property values went up way, way more than the individual tax rates went up. [02:11:44] And the last item is, you're going to hear this from me over the next six months quite a bit. um i believe 2026 may be a historically dangerous year for this democracy i think we are going to face challenges um and issues that none of us on this dais have faced in our lifetimes um and i believe that i am intensely proud of my job here of the of my colleagues and the work that we've [02:12:20] all done of county staff which you can't say enough about county staffs how good they are but we are all going to be tested in this year i believe in ways that we have never been tested before and i the argument i make i mean i never sought county government until the chair put me on the stakeholders committee and i went through the two-year stakeholder process and like most americans i always envisioned a vertical hierarchy with the federal government at the top, the state government in the middle, and the county government at the bottom. [02:12:50] And in fact, what I found out through this job is it's exactly the opposite. We are the front line of American democracy. Right now, we are the front line of this democracy, and we are going to have to hold that line against all comers over the next year, and it's going to be a really challenging time. [02:13:08] I know all of you. You have honor. You have integrity. You are decent human beings. You have compassion. You treat your fellow human beings, your fellow Americans, with compassion and caring equitably. Whether you want to use that word or not, you do. And I think if we remain focused on our core values as a board and as citizens of Loudoun County and as county staff, then we'll be just fine. [02:13:32] But we are going to be tested, I believe, and it's going to be very important for us to fall back on our core values that I know we all share. And with that, I don't believe we have any other business before the board, and we are adjourned. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Coraggio Consulting · aguyonx.com