Coraggio Consulting Manassas City Council Meeting, Monday, May 18, 2026 Date: Monday, May 18, 2026 Place: Manassas City Council, Virginia Length: 1h 16m (video) Official meeting video (Wistia / RegionalWebTV): https://fast.wistia.net/embed/iframe/v3ri5orh4t 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 2026-10-17. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [00:00:07] Vice Mayor Wolfe, here. Council Member Osina, here. Council Member Vasquez Luna, here. Council Member Ellis, here. Council Member Smith, I'm here. Council Member Hudson, here. Gorman's present. Thank you very much. We'll get right to it. Item number one, Taffy and Ms. Bergeron talking about funding for the schools. [00:00:27] I guess that's just me. Ms. Bergeron is going to throw me out there. I'm sorry. Good evening, Vice Mayor Wolfe, City Manager Burke, members of the council. I'm here before you. behalf of the school board to request your authority and approval to appropriate 1.1 million seven hundred thousand dollars in fund balance for the purchase of math textbooks for the school division these textbooks will be used for the fr 27 school year and beyond these cycles are typically five to seven years depending on the the subject matter and so we do want to use fund balance for this purchase this was on the listing of anticipated uses of fund balance that we [00:01:05] provided to you all about a month ago. Any questions? The reason you're asking for the textbooks, these are new additions? They are new additions. And are they for all grade levels? They are for all grade levels and the way that this was put together is through a committee that was established by central office and with the math department and they selected the materials based on many discussions with other school divisions as well as proposals from various vendors i take it that the evaluation included parents and teachers and stuff like that correct it was a whole committee it was a year-long process in order to get to this point and we [00:01:44] just got the the proposals uh or the the quotes from the vendors that are going to be selected you anticipate other uh subject matter books having to be replaced in upcoming years of course um typically we try to cycle these out where we don't do multiple textbook adoptions in one year and so i believe the next one coming up is either social studies or science i'm not exactly sure on which one but absolutely all right thank you thank you okay um also before i sit down i do want to mention i will be before you all again very soon um for another resolution i just want to put it on your plate and that's to increase uh the the budget by about 5.2 million dollars [00:02:22] to support our partnership with vava and so we received additional revenue from the state as a part of this this partnership with vava and that money is just passed through so that funding is going to go straight through us it's not going to be used by us it's going to go straight to Bob I just want to put that on your plate it hasn't been approved by the school board yet it will be before them tomorrow night and then we'll come before you for a vote well I believe that yes Ms. Bergeron just to clarify also this will require because of its dollar amount a public hearing so working through the timeline I will have to advertise it I will have to send an advertisement to the [00:02:56] newspaper on Wednesday it'll be in has to run twice and that is I believe the 28th and the 4th and then this public hearing would take place at the June 22nd meeting with action later that evening to budget and appropriate five plus million dollars of state revenue for this contract in this fiscal year just to clarify the timeline of that no mr. Smith just [00:03:29] we're talking 27 budget this is the amendment to 20 to 26. 26 budget so he has to pay that contract before the close of this fiscal year that's why we have to get to get it quickly once again it'll be the 26 budget because not 27. not 27 26. sonya uh thank you sir um my ask is uh when uh are there there any plans for the rest there was no no allocated but flag for the rest of the balance [00:04:04] and then how much is the balance if it has changed from what we got last night nothing's changed as far as the fund balance I'm assuming is what you're speaking to nothing's changed yet fund balance is typically re-evaluated on an annual basis after June 30 once all the numbers settle and so to answer your question we will now use all of that fund balance that was on that listing by june 30 um that those those uses are going to be future uses and so there will be bus purchases that are going to be happening in future years that was on that list as well as a transfer from operating into our cip for ongoing projects and so those things will happen probably in 27 but [00:04:41] all those buses are not scheduled to be purchased next year so it will be a an ongoing spend out the next time you'll officially see a fund balance for anybody the city schools anything will be when when we publish the fiscal year 2026 financial statements around Thanksgiving time, we usually close. [00:05:02] I know that the fiscal year ends June 30th, but we take that long to get everything closed out and audited and stuff. So that usually comes out around the end of November. And then the auditors present at the first meeting in December, whatever that date is. [00:05:19] I don't know off the top of my head. So that's the next time you'll see an official fund balance for any. Yes, ma'am. Thank you, sir. My question is more about clarification for the public. I know there has been, you know, conversation about how big our reserves are, but our reserves include our reserves for the school. [00:05:40] So they actually, this fund balance, they don't have to carry a fund balance because we do have reserves based on the amount that we are obligated to. So we have a policy that's no less than 15%. and I think around 2018-17 council authorized that to be 20% and so it's maintained at 20% then and that is your unassigned fund balance that is to take care of emergencies unforeseen issues for really the entire city with the entire entity that you're fiscally responsible for which would include the [00:06:19] schools if needed if it came down to that amount yes correct thank you Ms. Bergeron, so you're looking at this $5.2 million on the 22nd, right? Yes. Does this require two readings? [00:06:36] It does not require two readings. It's a resolution. Right. It requires two weeks of advertisements with a certain amount of days before the reading. Wanted to make sure. Anything else? I just have a question. The math material, so were they being instructed like in digital books and now they're going to paper. Is that what is happening? No, and I believe, again, don't quote me on this. I'm not a part of the committee that selects it, but I'm fairly certain there are hard textbooks as well as some digital materials included in the suite of products that we're ordering. So they're not going [00:07:15] to paper only? Not that I'm aware of. I haven't been told that. Anything else? Mr. Rosina. Mr. Vice Mayor, I move that we approve and place ordinance O-2026-984 on the consent agenda for June 8th, if it's possible. [00:07:52] Okay, very good. Anything else? I'm just following what's here. Yep, I appreciate it. All right. Thank you, Mr. Tapp. Thank you, Tapp. On to 1.2, employee handbook. Mr. Perk. Yes, sir. In front of you, there are some recommended modifications to section 5.2, sick leave of the employee handbook. [00:08:15] A number of these items were actually included in last year's budget. Chief Keene had presented some of the carryover, the funding for payout of sick leave. So that actually has been approved, but at the time we did not incorporate it into the employee handbook. [00:08:35] So there are some changes that are already policy, but just have not been incorporated. And then some minor things, award changes throughout the chapter, and just adjustments to where we're at now as far as some of the time adjustments. [00:08:58] Changing a 3.7 hour per pay period to a 4 just to make it cleaner and simpler for HR to calculate. No, sir. Any other questions, Ms. Vasquez? [00:09:17] More of a request, and it can be an email. My ask, I'm trying to understand when it comes to more like there's no place. I know there's no. Now that I say it, I'm like, maybe I'll just follow up when I'm meeting. [00:09:34] Okay. Yeah, no questions. Thank you. And I have a curiosity, and this may be more of Ms. Bergeron. Do we carry the accrued sick time as a liability in the books? We do. So, yeah, there is a financial, long-term financial. [00:09:51] compensated absences is a required calculation and it was there were changes from the GASB that were implemented this past fiscal year we actually had to come up with a pretty complex of course something complex from the GASB formula to be able to calculate them to come up with a method to book it on our books yeah so there is yes anything else folks thank you mr. Burke on to 1.3 VRE station. Dallas and Nick, please join us. See you again, Dallas. [00:10:28] Ms. Wake, good to see you as well. Thank you all for having us, Mr. Burke and others. Services of the Council, thanks for having us again. We were back to share. I'm trying to drive this thing properly. So we have a few things to cover. Start here. Project location. So I want to cover a few slides. I will start with the fact since the last time we were in this room, we've taken some counsel from this body and incorporated some changes in our design. [00:10:57] We came to share that today first with the Manassas station itself and then want to speak to you about our broad-run project as it relates to the city's interest for that project as well. So as you are very near to right now, our station here in Manassas, located on the three streets, Battle, Main, and West, the project goals, I like to always start with this, the purpose, the why, right? [00:11:24] Safety enhancements, install new right-of-way fencing. Even today I took a little walk to see there's been a lot of trespassing, we'll say, in certain places on the right-of-way. That is incredibly dangerous that we hope to prevent. So we have some right-of-way concerns from the safety enhancements. [00:11:39] Operational efficiencies, extension of our south platform to improve train boarding area. somewhat, it may seem minute, but the time it takes to load a six-car consist or an eight-car consist on a six-car platform can be difficult, in fact. So enhancing that time that we can be on station, we call that our dwell time, we have about 90-second dwell times at a lot of our locations, which is incredibly quick for the industry. And it doesn't sound like much, but for every 10 seconds that train is idling en route at every station, if we can reduce that a bit, then it's even better [00:12:16] for us as well for consumption. As you can imagine right now with fuel prices, the amount of diesel we buy in a year, that's a lot of cost. So some efficiencies to be gained in the proposal. And then community and infrastructure integration design strategically remains within the existing railroad right away and wherever possible to ensure minimal disruptions to the community as we build, both as we build and leaving a nice footprint once we're constructed. [00:12:44] Existing conditions, there are three agri-crossings, Maine, Battle, and West as I named, school buses, pedestrians with a .2 mile, lots of use by pedestrians and buses. We did do a study. There are lots of pedestrians in and around Battle Street, especially at special events, we'll say. Fourth of July was in a special, last year was in a special high, thousands and thousands of people. We have cameras and we can do counts of these locations. We're able to count pretty high numbers. Cars, however, different numbers, especially on Battle Street, less cars with lots of pedestrians. [00:13:21] The two existing tracks that we share with in Norfolk Southern, mainline here, as you know, not a whole lot of trains in the neighborhood on the daily, but very important trains as they are priority trains, especially the rock trains going into Alexandria. The platform length is insufficient for an eight car consist not all of our trains are currently eight car consist but are longer more are basically higher load trains earlier trains in the morning the first train or two is always an eight car consist and then six after that but over time as we increase passengers [00:13:57] it's easier to add cars than it is to add trains and so we can lengthen those trains by a bit and increase our ridership per boarding so existing conditions again the accurate crossings the main historic the building right you can see from a project status on April 6 our concept design 15% concept design was submitted alternatives for both the platform extension sidewalk April 30th our right of entry letters to property owners and tenants were sent out to do this work May 18th through June 19th we all have concept design 15% submitted to VRE in that timeframe and then [00:14:34] commencement of 30% design tending survey work on completion so a lot going on in the next few months. You'll see a lot of progress there. You'll see some folks here and about. Basically, the concept design that we're carrying forward is addition of the platform on the south. So if I say south, I mean railroad south. So we're going south to, I guess, technically Cardinal West, but railroad south to Broad Run, and then railroad north to Alexandria, D.C. [00:15:02] So on the south end of the strong, I think I can point with this thing. Can I not? I can't do it on this one. So the orange and yellow, if you will, with the green canopy, that would be an additional platform that would give us the prescribed eight-car boarding length between the three discontiguous, we'll say, platforms separated by the streets. And then to the north, we are adding some walkway, if you will, namely to the parking lot on the northeast end of it with access. But most important to that, you can see the black lines with the circles representing fencing came back to that operational safety stuff so we we know there's evidence of people going across the street that across the tracks there which [00:15:41] is highly unsafe I didn't want to I do want to point out in this picture the city's addition of the mut CD markings Chris Chris's I think is enhanced our view theory we did add one you did add one over on but this enhancements there as well for keeping that don't block the box we found that a lot of people are turning in that what they think is an intersection which is really a great crossing so we want to add those in in the vicinity of the crossings as well that's essentially our work adding the walkways on the opposite sides of the track so people will come be able to come from the garage to the city building [00:16:19] here itself ultimately coming down the right away so and then I will pause for a moment a little timeline again we're in this EIR PE phase and then we'll move into later and into final design as we mentioned with completing that q2 next year and then going into procurement construction pause there questions actually thank you when it comes to and thank you for the presentation and for the update when it comes to the canopy on the new south platform is it intended to match that that's across the tracks from it indeed [00:16:57] make sure we have just we like that I will call it architectural congruency like you want it to be architecturally congruent and you sometimes it's you do a bad job matching right so but we do have architectural standards in our design guidelines for gable gable ended roofs like you see out there today can we go back a slide sure oh it's like there we go so again just to verify no request to close Battle Street, is that correct? That's correct. Or any street? [00:17:36] Okay. Secondly, the fencing. You know, clearly there's, as I understand it, there's certain standards that have to be met, but the fencing does come in different colors. For instance, I understand, for instance, in Old Town Alexandria, it is not black fencing. I may be wrong, but [00:17:59] That's what I've been told, and so given the fact that where you're talking, fencing here, and this is our historic area, and we spend a lot of time and money, and we have a judicial review board and so forth and so on, I ask you to, at this point, unless you're ready, but give some consideration to appropriate fencing that meets federal requirements or railroad, but is not necessarily just black fencing here. [00:18:33] you know we'd see anywhere along the way that would be a request for you to consider once we get into our final design phase we would happily come to do a similar presentation with once we get some design done with the review board wherever that looks like we did that with all the lighting I remember it's been some time ago the lighting in the city as well and it and mr. RC area it's my understanding that the as this thing is being designed and so it will go to our architectural review board is that correct that's correct all these improvements require arv approval so site plan requires a so i'm sure you will hear about it again here in greater [00:19:13] detail so we'll hear about it again figure this is some prepping you along the way another question is um so the uh how wide is this i'm calling it a sidewalk right there on the north end are you are you planning uh it's currently be as wide as the rail trail is being that's being planned it is not it is not true um the rail trail was separate with this piece um they're drawn here at scale then this is again 15 concept design five foot wide sidewalks is typical so that's what's shown [00:19:49] here and not currently um not detailed for the the 10 foot wide multi how how wide will the rail trail be it must be 10 foot wide it will be up to 10 foot wide but again very much conceptual at this point so there's a lot of design that needs to go into that project but ideally 10 foot and how wide the is the sidewalk this one's shown at five five feet not a real but it could be wider than that i mean conceivable to give people given the fact that this is an area that's going to have traffic [00:20:24] going you know multiple you know and people with suitcases perhaps or you know stuff like that i I would recommend that you look at making it wider here on the side of whiteness, if that makes sense, simply because those kinds of things in that regard. [00:20:43] So people aren't bumping backpacks and whatever else along the way. For sure. For sure. Just thoughts. And absolutely, that can be a consideration, but I'll point out, we are not the property owners of the railroad right away. That's VPRA, the state, owns the property, and they'll have to, Any non-railroad use would have to be approved by the state. [00:21:05] So that is something that consideration that we can certainly talk with city staff with and move those ideas forward. Okay. Very good. Thank you. Thank you very much. Yeah, I have a question. Actually, we have problems with people turning onto the railroad tracks. [00:21:21] I'm sure you heard that. Does anyone know which streets are most vulnerable for that? Is it battle? It's west. West Street it was West in the city's already installed we went at when we met with VRE early on we said that's a great idea went ahead with our public works department implemented those markings we actually haven't had an incursion since since the month since we put the markings out on West Street but we would expand that to battle in Maine most likely [00:21:58] what he's talking about yeah so the white the white diagonal striping like the block the box in DC. We experimented with a project in Quantico and it went well. We brought that idea to the city. They implemented themselves already on West Street. What's shown here is all three. They haven't been painted yet. West has been painted. Since that painting, we've not had an incursion. Do they usually turn right or left? They're turning left. I do honestly believe it has everything to do with Google Maps. Yeah. They're navigating them to the station on Google Maps, turn left in 50 feet. They don't know 50 feet from 500 and they turn left on the track. [00:22:33] Pretty much what's happening. And so putting, making that... Alcohol might be involved. May or may not be involved at 2 in the morning. I don't know, but yes. We have discovered cars on the track with our first train. Is Battle Street usually closed than Main Street when that happens, though? [00:22:48] I'm just curious why it's only West Street. Like, is it, like, Friday night? Traffic volumes, it's a two-way street. There could be a number of reasons. I think, honestly, it's Google Maps. We're navigating to the station, and that's the street it brings them in on. We'll turn left too soon. Yeah. Somebody made a request to Google to fix that. [00:23:07] We're also just not reading. We did have to change. It is not easy to do, but we did have to change the street address of our station in Fredericksburg. So it can be done. Anyone else? I just want to thank you for all the updates. [00:23:24] I'm sorry I won't see the next presentation, but I appreciate it that you, you know, made a priority of the feedback. I believe this will create a great impact. It will make it better for all the writers and for everybody. And that's it. [00:23:42] Thank you. Thank you. anyone else appreciate y'all taking the uh the feedback from the city and the community seriously and working with us i know it's not perfect but big step in the right direction and and we tremendously value our relationship with vre obviously so we appreciate y'all we honestly appreciate that so we will keep plugging away um with that i want to jump over to broad run yep broad run expansion project um so this is a project in a nutshell as sort of an overview i'm [00:24:17] come back to the couple slides here again railroad north to the right page right railroad south to the left this is our yard at Broad Run and the boundary you can see physically the pink line down the middle of our station is the boundary between the city and the county so literally we are bifurcated by the two jurisdictions for this project we've had to get a building permit site permit and property from both jurisdictions you can imagine that's been quite difficult, but successful. So the project purpose, again, start with the why, right? Support expands VRA's main Manassas line service, 10 new passenger rail cars delivered in [00:24:56] 2028 and accommodates future system plan growth. I want to come back to the second bullet because it's probably the most important of them right now, which is we ordered 21 rail cars, new fleet cars, joint procurement with our agency in Chicago, Metro. We are taking delivery of those cars they have to all 21 be delivered to this location like they can't be delivered to crossroads they will ultimately go to the two different places but we have to perform testing on those cars that have to be done from this location so you can imagine we where do you put 21 more cars rail cars in this yard so we have to expand the yard to take delivery of the vehicles and that's [00:25:35] imperative and that is already in process they just built the first one and took we we're not taking delivery of them until 2028, but they are in process and they will be here and we have to have a place to put them. That's a very important reason here. I'll walk you through. This is now looking sort of an isometric view looking north towards the airport, you can see. I want to point out the few existing features and sort of step through this piece. The existing track, you can see how it's lined and then the green overlay of the existing track. Yellow represents the property boundary that part of that is our ask with the city and county both separate parcels but you [00:26:15] can see sort of the the lines there and then the the one to the the squiggly line if you will represents at the bottom of the page represents coming off piper lane in the county there up to to service our equipment in the new newly expanded yard so this is the parcel we refer to as the hockey puck for obvious reasons this is the parcel we are asking the city for to complete this work. Currently, right now, we lease the lot in the far left-hand corner, the 90-degree angle in that corner. It is leased by VRE to the city, from the city to VRE, and we'd like to purchase that as part of our work to convert it permanently to parking as part of the station. The station [00:26:54] will actually move north from its current location, railroad north from its current location, and be wholly within the city property and we are there are very stringent restrictions on the property in question adjacent to the railroad because of the airport basically we were told that you couldn't build put anything vertical there's a certain line we couldn't cross on both uh sort of a diagonal line from the end of the runway and a property line on the ground that we couldn't have anything vertical um permanent built into the to the right of way so it is quite constrained and we'd like to [00:27:31] make this all part of our parcel, this parcel all part of our station going forward so we can do this. And we've made a similar ask of the county for parts where we're building permanent structures as well. So the lead track project will ultimately give us, it's an important project to NS because it basically gets us out of their way at Manassas Junction. So the lead track, this is basically the southern terminus of our future lead track into the facility. That also unlocks the key for future service we can't add trains with NS until we do that work on the lead track so you'll see us come back with that a nice rendering of the future [00:28:10] station bike locker again pretty standard architectural treatment for us our standard color palette our standard roofing ice brakes and stuff like that you will see projected two years construction duration once we start it'll be pretty complicated from the sequencing we have to still operate the yard as a fully functional yard throughout construction so we're basically plan to build outside and work our way in in some cases and outside in and inside out and in other cases so it's very complicated but again working [00:28:44] towards that deliveries calendar of 2028 I want to mention this there was a request again listening for feedback right there was an ask about could there be a walkway along up observation Road and yes there could be a road a walkway along observation road it's outside the footprint of the property that we're asking for but it certainly couldn't be built we've had Chris here behind me we're showing the additional broad run expansion the section here I think we do the section I think it's it yeah I think it's it's coming up so this this represents the future broad run lead the mainline track up to the station this [00:29:23] again is the plan view of observation road leading to the station where there could be a walkway and then this come to this where's that section actually I don't think it is in there unfortunately no yeah just the aerial but the yeah the aerial view here the point is there could be a bikeway walkway multi-use path along observation it will fit we have confirmed um it there are some VDAC design criteria that would have to be applied in this location but otherwise it will fit again outside the parcel we are asking to purchase um but yes I did want [00:29:56] to share with you beyond that, just some future ideas that have been working. The bridge at the end of residency road. This is an idea we birthed. It's very, very complicated. I mentioned the airport, the runway, right? So imagine an upside down pyramid, right? So you have these invisible lines that project from the end of the runway at a prescribed taper. And so you really can't build anything within that upside down pyramid because of the flight patterns for the planes. Additionally, so that that gives you one upper boundary additionally you have a height restriction [00:30:33] for the railroad you have to be under 23 feet right so you have to be in this envelope for the for the trains as well so trains sticking up planes coming down there's literally like you have to thread the needle we did that here with a highway bridge so you could actually fit a highway bridge at the end of residency road come over the tracks you could avoid the great crossing at Observation Road, Wigman, and you could also avoid the closures for Piper Lane, these two locations, so you'd have a dedicated way in and out of the facility, whether it's the airport or the train station, right? So it does fit. It is not part of our project, but we've done [00:31:09] what's called a TSNL, a type, size, and location study, to prove that it does fit and will fit using VDOT grades, also part of that complex geometry, under the airplanes, over the trains, So it's a pretty tight little spot. Okay. [00:31:25] I think that's all I want to cover. I'm aware that that's something that the county is long-term. Very long-term. We'd like to see happen. Very long-term. And conceivably, depending on how things go at the airport as well, you can imagine increased service, that it would be better to not have to miss your plane for a train on the tracks block on the crossing. [00:31:48] Questions? So I remember asking the airport staff about the road, the walkway, and they said that would never happen. Is that something the FAA has to also approve, you know, and be involved with? [00:32:08] I know there's a prohibition on permanent vertical structures. I mean, essentially, this is a widening of the road. The road is part of the city street system. So there would be, we'd obviously have to make sure that the airport is satisfied, that there's no FAA conflicts, but you could have a sidewalk through this area. [00:32:29] So it goes through the department, my department, for planning, design, and construction. The airport's part of that process, but yes, you could have a sidewalk. I was just curious if it was some kind of a security issue, having pedestrians. In general, you know, the airport, it's a preference. [00:32:44] they obviously the fewer people who are in a flight path the better but it is not precluded in this location and obviously it provides a connection down to gateway boulevard and to we heard from those conversations we have with the neighborhood would it be nice if we could get a pedestrian connection down in broad run so the challenge of vre was does it fit it does and we could consider it as a capital project uh going forward and the sale of the land and our construction would not preclude that in any that was the point i wanted to make emphasis on the [00:33:20] sale of the land. Interesting in a 40 year lease. Anything else? No, just on this one. So there will be a sale of land. The VRE council and our city attorney's office will work on that document. It'll come to you as a public hearing June. As soon as we, I think there's some paperwork and we need to figure out some appraisal that need to be done. There are FAA requirements when it comes to sale of land adjacent to the airport, but youth council can expect the land sale that comes a public hearing in a month or so. [00:33:55] Yeah, we're, I mean, look at all those dominoes that have to fall, right? Those cars are coming in 2018, right? There's purchase of the land, the construction, the bidding. Like, there's a lot going on to happen in the right order. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you very much. Very excited for these projects. [00:34:11] Yes, we are too. Yeah. These and more. These and more. Mr. Arcieri, you're up. Thank you, sir. The first item, sir, members of council, as part of your adopted budget, the city established the housing investment fund. [00:34:29] So that has been included in your adopted FY27 budget. In order to spend that money, you need to enable the specific state code that allows you to consider loans in the future. So what's before you, Ordinance 26, 984, and Draft, is the enabling ordinance. This doesn't lend any money specifically, but this is basically your authority to do loans in the future. [00:34:48] It's modeled after Wayloudon County has their loan program structured. But essentially, once you have this in place, you would consider loan applications in the future, including the good housing loan. up for council consideration this has gone through the housing advisory board at their last meeting we've incorporated their comments and it is ready for adoption all right seeing then i'll jump in this may just be stylistic but you start off chapter 42 talking about division one economic [00:35:21] development authority and that's the last time the eda appears in the document and then everything else is to the council council may have to review blah blah blah etc um if you want to explain the the connection with the EDA and how council action morphs into the EDA? [00:35:45] So there's no relationship to EDA. Section 42.1 already exists in your ordinances. Chapter 42 is community development. So there's other pieces under it. Housing is one. Economic development authority just happens to be division one of that chapter. Sure, we're sure. Ms. Hudson. [00:36:01] And is something changing with that economic development authority part? It's just there. It's restated for the purposes of adoption. Gotcha. Yes. assuming that other localities have things like this in place like what are some examples of when these types of things these types of loans are issued so in general it's being used by laden county is a good example it's it's how they have enabled their ability for to local financing of affordable housing projects prince william county is considering this as well but essentially [00:36:35] this is what says the locality may consider lending money as one of the as one of the um financiers for affordable housing projects right thank you else and this will be on the agenda for the 22nd for first reading on june 8th june 8th thank you very good on to the landing sir all right time for a landing update let's reach up here and grab the so we wanted to touch base on a couple things with the good housing the landing as it's slowly changing into part of the landing [00:37:11] academy branch this is the landing um i'll talk about the architecture in a second but i just wanted to cover a few points. So council has obviously approved the purchase and sale agreement that is moving forward. There were no issues with the purchase and sale agreement. There's been a couple of things in the press that there were issues with financing or missed deadlines. I need to state emphatically that is not true. There have been no issues to date with the purchase and sale agreement. It is moving forward. And the next step that happens after council executes the purchase and sale agreement is we move into design. I believe, and we've talked to the paper about it up inside Nova. There was a conversation about one specific type of LIHTC funding, which is [00:37:49] called a 9%. It's a competitive LIHTC funding. It was never the applicant's intention to apply for that funding. That deadline was not missed because, again, we were never going to apply for it. So I just wanted to clear the record on that. There will be state funding. There will be LIHTC funding. There'll be private funding. That happens later in the process. Really, I believe they're looking at a July timeline for some of their financing. So that's not happened yet. We're really we're focused on design at this point. And Patrick is here if we want to talk a little bit more about where we are in the purchase and sale agreement. But again, they've gone through due diligence and we're moving into design. So what I wanted to talk about this evening, as part of the [00:38:28] approved proffers, the existing proffers for Cannon Branch, Council has the authority to review and approve the architecture. We have spent a lot of time with the applicant's architects to study and look at what's out there already, look at the existing neighborhood. And before you is the final architecture that's gone through staff review i advanced forward to this last slide if you recall a little bit of the exhibits that we put up during the discussion of the purchase and sale that area if you recall the building is u-shaped and what we had shown during purchase and sale was that that area was going to be parking and we heard comments during the public [00:39:04] hearing we heard other comments from the community about adding some green space uh good housing went back and revisited the design so they've removed all the parking from that courtyard area you can see they've added green space and they've actually shifted the top lot into that area to try to provide some additional green space. So that's all baked into the site plan at this point. I should mention the applicant has submitted their site plan. It's actually been through the first review by city staff and is moving forward. Moving backwards to the architecture. So we've spent a lot of time, this would be looking at the building from Gateway Boulevard and you can see we've spent a lot of time on that corner knowing that you're at the corner of Gateway and Goblin and it's [00:39:42] essentially the other side of the entrance to the landing at cannon branch we wanted to make sure that that side uh had some extra architectural emphasis on it it is masonary all four stories up to the top and then they've added a little bit of a parapet a hat on it to really make that side stand out we're also looking at some enhanced landscaping in that area to try to uh improve the architecture the other thing i just wanted to point out for council and you can see if you look at the upper floors again heavy on masonry when you get at the upper floors you can see the the change in this design that mirrors identically a lot of what you're seeing on the townhouses and multifamily across the street and this is a view from the [00:40:21] parking lot the only other and the only other comment I wanted to make on these is because these are prints they don't render 100% the brick because it comes across as a little bit washed out the bricks actually more red than you would and this that comes across as when you when you print it out and you put it up on the screen with any of these designs what staff does whether it's downtown or anywhere the architecture will actually get brick samples from the applicant before we do any final approval on the bricks on the bricks so it's gonna be a little bit more red than what you see out here not quite as washed out as the elevations would lead you to believe but again the colors the masonry it's all [00:40:57] picking up on cues from the neighborhood trying to again get across that this is a neighborhood that's been planned both with the existing residents or the proposed residents to be one larger neighborhood and with that we are looking for councils feedback and endorsement to move forward with the architecture and I'm happy to talk about design Patrick's here for other questions. [00:41:19] Mr. Smith, in terms of depth perception, on the right-- Sorry, I moved too fast, I'm sorry. The one where you had to go, another one, the one with the guy with the black outfit on the corner. It's the corner of-- Got it, yes. [00:41:36] --people back here by the trees. Is that roughly where that unused driveway is? Was it the ODMV? That would be roughly where the entrance is. So the footprint here is not beyond what the footprint With the parking, it goes further back than the old DMV site, but in terms of the building itself? [00:41:57] It fits within the footprint. You knew it. So on this one here, how wide are the sidewalks on both Godwin and Gateway? So the existing 10-foot multi-use trails are already installed and will not be altered. [00:42:14] It doesn't render quite correctly on this because this is more focused on the building, but those two shared use paths that the city has constructed are not proposed to change. Those are both 10 feet. And I know that there had been requests, comments, we'll say comments made about bus service, you know, getting this on the bus line. [00:42:38] And, of course, that's a discussion with OmniRide along the way here. Would such, in your opinion, would such a bus stop be on the Godwin side or the gateway side? I'm not sure without talking to how PRTC would want to service the site. [00:42:58] Most likely would be the gateway side if I were doing it and we'd have to design a bus pull-off. It could also be internal to the site, quite honestly, as the rest of the site continues to fit out. The other thing the conversation that we've had of PRTC is expanding as a pilot, their microtransit program where they're on-demand transit, so that might be a first step. [00:43:17] Again, they might be internal to the site, and it's a little hard to see here. But it could also be accommodated as a loading area. There's a parking area in front. It could be accommodated inside the site as well. So microtransit would actually come on the property. That would be another thing to look at. We've had some preliminary conversations with PR2C, both in the context of this building and the greater, what is it called, Nexus 234 development. [00:43:40] So we've begun those conversations. Thank you. Teresa? Yeah, I have a question about more of the timelines. I know that the Planning Commission just had a vote on the proffers. [00:43:57] When are we supposed to get that, the council? So two things. One, the proffer amendment is not related to this project. We actually talked to the newspaper. They're revising that article. It's been taken down. That was incorrect. The proffer amendment is for a separate apartment building, not this building. [00:44:13] That proffer amendment does come to you at your first June meeting. So, okay, let me backtrack then. for this the good housing their goal is to get approval by virginia housing is that their end goal is that what they're working towards they need multiple sources of financing so of course the city piece is part of it and then also the virginia housing and their private investors would all be part of that financing package okay so first the city and then virginia housing and then outside investors to get this project to move forward um what's the timeline that they're [00:44:50] expecting they'll have that together? By the end of the year. We'd expect to go to closing by the end of the year at this point. First quarter. First quarter of closing construction starting sometime around March was the plan. Yep. So if the proffers are tied into, if I recall, the number of residential units, if for some reason this does not happen, doesn't that affect that uh amendment the proffer amendment so back in 2016 this corner the csc site was proffered [00:45:24] for 221 apartments basically a square that is approved today you do not need to change the proffers to allow this project to go forward but if this does not go forward you can still reserve it for 221 units residential units okay um it seems like we should vote on the proffer amendment then after the good housing is ready to go still it's a huge project and then to go do amendments on that property real estate do we have a timeline with buchanan on that is that why we're pushing [00:46:02] that forward so they have they go they have like a deadline no so what happened if you recall is we had community meetings we had community meetings in the fall and we had community in january good housing wasn't honestly part of that conversation the conversation with the community was how do we restart the project so we you know especially the frustration with the commercial project so working with the Buchanan partners we said okay good housing 100 units at the corner what do you do with the remaining 120 units and good housing has come in I mean I'm sorry Buchanan partners came in and proposed essentially picking up those 120 units and moving them to the water [00:46:39] front tying that to the construction of the park tying that to hopefully getting the next 10,000 square feet of commercial under construction related but they are not directly required there is no requirement for the proper amendment for this project to move forward so if the proper amendment doesn't go forward essentially think about this building you could have another 120 units essentially on this adjacent to this site it just doesn't allow Buchanan to ship the apartments they're not connected to each other. Okay I'll talk about that. Thank you. Mr. O'Cyr [00:47:16] let's just for everyone's edification be crystal clear the contract that we are going to enter into hopefully or may enter into with good housing is a contingent contract and that contract correct me where i'm wrong here that contract is not executable and the property does not transfer until they have their financing in place that correct that is correct there's a final you have entered that contract not considering entering you have a fully executed purchase and sale agreement [00:47:54] that has contingencies in it those contingencies include your financing include vhda financing include site plan approval and other items that have yet to happen and we are on track to start checking the boxes of each of those the reality if i might is that the dha and any private investor would require them having a contract in from the city in hand before doing any financing in order for them to make their application to vhda they must have site control which they do by virtue of [00:48:31] the contingent contract and i believe they must also have the financing approval from the city so vhda is looking as part of the application process vhda is looking for your partnership in this transaction so chicken or egg contract your financing then vhda fine anything else ladies gentlemen on mr smith i guess if you repeat of what you just said i'm not i thought your opening [00:49:04] remark had to do with the finance affecting some misinformation misunderstanding or whatever so what you're saying that they have not applied where there's no application pending or no decision been made vhda has quarterly application periods when any developer like good housing can turn their application in for finance. The deadline that Good Housing, the application period that Good Housing has always been targeting is a July application. Somehow it's gotten out [00:49:41] there that they were supposed to have done this in March, and that's false. They have always targeted a July financing application, which was predicated on you adopting your budget prior to July 1, which sets aside the $6 million that is the city's financing piece. And later in closed session, we'll be talking about some of the terms and conditions of that financing, which will then appear on a subsequent public agenda. So we're on track, no steps missed, no extensions requested [00:50:18] or granted, no special considerations. They requested a two-week extension of the deadline to file for the title objections because this property goes back so far in time the title had a lot of issues associated with it including things like the former dmv lease that you had so they requested an extra two weeks to complete their title objections mr burke granted them that as your resolution enabled him to do i believe we shared that information with city council they subsequently [00:50:57] within that two-week deadline, filed their title objections. Your acting city attorney has since addressed those title objections, the balance of which will be cleaned up when we do site plan approval and the plat recordation and the property transfer because the remaining objections specifically deal with things like utilities that we have in the ground out there that we don't have easements for because we're not allowed to record easements on our own properties so it's it's [00:51:33] esoteric there's nothing significant in there in terms of objections that won't be cleared up but in any real estate transaction of this nature you have a long list of things that everyone is concerned about and those concerns have all been addressed other than the normal real estate use of the word contingency there's no contingency issues that may block them going forward no sir [00:51:59] Thank y'all. Mr. Burke, running games time. Yes, sir. At the last joint meeting between the county and two cities about the shared services, there was a little bit of discussion about how to advance a new agreement. [00:52:24] And part of that was a discussion of continuing either a population-based formula, a usage-based formula, or possibly an incurred cost. Basically, where the counties, where the current agreement has been is you take the number of people in the city of Manassas, the number of people in the city of Manassas Park, and the number of people in the county, each locality pays their population share of different costs and there are [00:53:01] there's inherent issues with that because nobody knows who how many people from Manassas Manassas Park are actually making use of that so there's there's some fundamental flaws with that rationale that the usage would be you count the number of people that either go to the senior center go participate with Cooperative Extension and then basis of billing the problem [00:53:33] that the county brought up and and there is a rational argument probably half the people in in Prince William County if you ask them where they live they say they're in the city of Manassas and so city would by the nature of everybody wanting to live in Manassas or at least we would we would be unfairly burdened with those fees and then an incurred cost where we just basically would try and come up with a fixed cost of this or that so that is one of the items that [00:54:09] the county would like to have input on before the next July meeting of the joint meeting in your packet there's kind of just a breakdown of the different services I have asked the county to provide us greater definition of the what services each of those groups provide some of those it's a little bit nebulous and so I'm hoping that we'll be able to provide gel with more information about that the next page this actually comes directly from the [00:54:45] information that the county provided at the meeting it's a breakdown of the community service indirect cost allocation the items in yellow just jumped off the page to me that there's no reason why the city should be paying a portion of the Board of Supervisors or the administrative costs staff cost for any of the given items yes well this is it was the original and this is what the county is still continuing to use as their rationale for money that we are [00:55:24] not paying them and honestly we have no I would have no intent of recommending council even consider any of these that aren't highlighted again we'd have to question them so they're regardless of whether or not the the city co co shared the the public health effort the Board of Supervisors is going to be there and they would have to pay for the salaries of all of the Board of Supervisors so So there's, again, flawed rationale of, well, there should be some cost sharing for these things. [00:56:05] So, and then the last page that I provided to you all is, again, whether or not we would think that some of these items would be chargeable or non-chargeable, and then it lets itself continue with, well, how do we deal with future escalation if we can come up with a rationale of the shared services. [00:56:28] And one of the things that Diane will bring up always is just the county, just inherently with the budget that they have, they will typically purchase either new equipment, give higher raises than the city would. [00:56:50] And so how do we have a voice in how the county advances their costs versus what we feel would be a reasonable cost to the city? So there's a lot of questions going that would need to continue to be had as far as the shared services agreement. [00:57:10] But we wanted to give you all the opportunity to at least see some of the concerns that staff has about any and all of the ways of developing it. And see if there's a desire for council to have a work session in June specifically to discuss these items. [00:57:31] And let me, Ms. Racine, if I just forget anything or misquote anything, let me know. The discussion, to be fair to our colleagues in the county, they were much more amenable to having this discussion than I was afraid they might otherwise be. [00:57:50] Certainly more amenable in this than they were on other topics that we discussed. They wanted to start off with a staff process, and I felt as though it was important that there is a political determination by all the parties that we're looking to make a change in the process. [00:58:15] Not trying to say exactly what that is, but I didn't think it was appropriate to have a bunch of staff work that politicians aren't going to adopt it at the end. And to Mr. Burke's point, to me, the two key points, number one is what's been pointed out here, some of the indirect costs. [00:58:38] And this is just one department. And I will tell you, this has been many years since I've dug into this in terrible detail. Their accounting in every department of the county is different. So there are some that we don't pay for the Board of Supervisors. [00:58:59] There are some we do. I mean, it's just all over the place. So there needs to be consistency. I think there was a grudging consensus that the best place to go would be an entirely new agreement that had periodic revisions or sunsets. [00:59:17] Every five years, we come back, and this, again, is organizations. And I think the other piece, and I think I said this, but me speaking to the city, we have a problem paying for what we use, our residents use. [00:59:33] I have a real problem paying for stuff that we don't use. And to the degree that it can be determined reasonably accurately what usage is, There's going to be some things you can't, and I understand that. But when you can, that should be the metric we are using, rather than a pure population basis. [00:59:53] Yes. And we need to be aggressive in pushing that envelope with our friends in the county and, frankly, the park, as to which metric each service falls under. And, again, it may be that we owe more for community services. [01:00:12] If we do, we should pay it. But we don't. So that was the conversation, I guess. Mr. Birk's point, having a detailed work session, but there will be another meeting of the Intergeristructional Committee on July 8th, and I would like to be able to go back to that with basically a head nod from the group saying, yeah, yeah, yeah, this is the direction you should go. [01:00:41] I think it's important to remember what the goal is ideally, notice I said the word ideally from what I heard just being in the audience listening in, is to develop this, we'll say, new shared services agreement so that it could be implemented for FY28. [01:01:02] For that to happen, of course, that, you know, times of the essence meeting, you know, you start this when the next inter-jurisdictional meeting is July the 8th, and you're going to hear from three parties. You're going to hear from Manassas Park as well, and they're going to have their own thoughts. [01:01:19] They may be similar to ours. They may be different. You can hear from the county along the way here. And that has to be hashed out at a higher level before we let loose the staff to start meeting and talking and what have you. [01:01:36] Keeping in mind that, in our case, you know, our Diane, her staff, as an example, we're involving social services, any of these other departments that get involved. You know, they've got regular work to do that takes up their time. the way in that you know we're going to be asking on top of that for these these things to be done so we want to be uh once a consensus is is developed and be nice if july 8th is the case because they meet what every three months i believe it is every other month two months every two months so you can see if you can't resolve it in july then we're talking september and look [01:02:14] we're already can's been kicked a little bit further along and could be more difficult to make it by f1 28 totally agree our all they can this these numbers that you have makes me chuckle in a way because 2006 in a private capacity representing community organizations and a discussion regarding human relations these are the numbers they showed us when i mean i don't [01:02:50] have that sheet before me but i recognize those that i stood in front of that podium and argued that you could reduce and put some towards that so yes I mean 17 years later then I will say after printer the attorney may be doing better than what they showed out here but yeah justified in looking at this yes hang up anyone else well nine heads we get traces anything else mr. Burke do you want to answer I will then I will talk real quickly there was discussion about been [01:03:28] school, it was a public forum. I think there's an article today in Princeton Times, which I think sort of captures it. There was a lot more discussion than was put in the article. I think it's fair to say that the representatives from the county made it very clear that the ship has sailed in their consideration. When they passed their budget and their CIP, that was their vote on the future of that school. And absent the city, ponying up, probably on the order of $25 or $30 million, that ain't going to change. [01:04:08] And to be fair to our friends in the county, they are under some significant constraints from the courts, and we've seen communication on some of that. So they are in a little bit between a rock and a hard place, and I understand that. Ms. Vasquez-Lewin and I both had conversations, though, expressing our dismay with the process the county has pursued. [01:04:36] When you think back to the 2018 plan that was presented for the judicial campus and then what was later produced in 2025, neither one of which included the demolition of the school and neither one of which included a parking deck up against our houses in the city for them to have made a significant change without communication to the city or the residents in any way, shape, or form. [01:05:04] I think a disservice to the community is what it is at this point. And related to that, we did, the two of you got the chair, the four supervisors to, I won't say commit. [01:05:25] I wrote down the notes here that the county would be happy to host a community engagement meeting in the city for city residents and anyone else open to the public, but specifically for city residents to talk about their plans. [01:05:43] They didn't commit to time, date, place, all that sort of thing. But I would hope that we would follow up on that and make sure that our residents, you know, have a chance to hear about that along the way in that regard here. [01:06:00] I think as the county portrayed it, state law allows each circuit court judges to have a lot of latitude in calling the shots of how big and how many courtrooms and what have you their chambers are and so forth. [01:06:30] And so judges have indicated that they need additional courtroom space, additional space for attorney, things of this sort here, which are really driving this sort of thing. And under state law, the expense of this largely falls to the localities to pick up along the way, as I understood the discussion from that meeting and that sort of thing. [01:06:56] And so the county recognizes that it needs to be moving ahead on something of this sort. anything else Teresa yeah so a lot of the conversation I mean it's kind of disturbing like uh if the state law is saying you know this expansion has to happen what does that mean down the line you know in the future when they have to expand even more I mean they're almost at capacity so they're going to have to start entrenching into our city um and take property [01:07:29] to expand um so that's kind of you know like where our hands are tied i feel like we're giving up a lot of control with this expansion how much is this going to cost in 200 million they're saying 230 million of which they are paying 100 percent we will end up paying a pair of higher operating costs but exactly and that's where we have to figure out usage correct um when it comes to the community engagement absolutely you know i think they need to talk to our our residents about what [01:08:07] they're doing including the demolition of bennett school um you know the 25 to 35 million it's funny because they said it would be 55 million but only 25 to 35 to us like well and that would to be fair that was the number i just made up okay the conversation with the chair was they would be wanting a significant contribution. [01:08:31] I mean, the city giving them a million dollars of a $56 million project doesn't move the needle. Why would they want a penny from us? Well, they do. Pay to play. It's a certain feeling that they'd let fall apart. [01:08:49] You know, they're also doing a lot of studies right now, what I heard. Did they give any reports on what they're finding? They indicated that the environmental should be done this month or June, and that they would be conducting the site archaeological study July, August, and they didn't really give an idea when those results would be. [01:09:14] Well, what I wrote down, sorry, what I wrote down is between April 27th and May 1st, they did a facility assessment where they actually went in the building, or they hired a firm. Mold, lead paint, termites, abestus. [01:09:32] They were able to look in the basement, I think they said. No, they were in the basement, but not the attic. That's right. And they got up to the second floor through another set of stairs there. For the future to be done, I wrote down here in July, ground penetrating radar, archaeological test holes. [01:09:54] In early June, they'll have a report on the building condition. So let me back up. So that facility assessment done in late April, early May, there's expected early June to get a report on the building condition. And then for the future to be done in July, the ground penetrating radar and the archaeological test holes will be done. [01:10:17] But there was no, I didn't hear a date for when the results would be made. In that discussion, or in any of the discussions, did they even broach the subject of moving the building, given the age of the bricks? [01:10:37] They did. they just mentioned how current foundation is essentially a rubble foundation so if the building and i think they honestly have concerns that the building can't be moved it's structurally just not sound enough but that if it is moved uh you would have to build a new foundation and they had a pricing number for that all the things we'd have to do depends where they would try to move it too. And yeah, that's, once you get to that, that's an additional eight, three cents. [01:11:16] So the company that's doing the studies, I think is the same company that's building the expansion. From what I'm hearing, it's Dewberry. So I have a real question about the validity of their study, to be honest. It's in their best interest to build a whole new building so is that what you heard was do Barry I don't remember as do Barry was doing the I will share I've been in the building and it's been a lot of years and it was nasty on nasty this is so do Barry is an engineer yeah it's [01:11:56] a very large-scale engineering engineering company for the expansion is also doing the study that wasn't stated yeah I just wonder why would we have an outside bid on that you know that's very I know that's what I'm saying we're really being bullied here you know we're just like letting them do it to us it's kind of frustrating have the same engineer for them give an assessment of a building when they want [01:12:35] to tear it down to expand what they're going to do it makes you know that's just not a good study I wouldn't even consider that is valid Anyway, I get your frustration. [01:12:50] How is the building? 109 years old? 109? Yeah. So we don't qualify. 109. 109. Not 190. The engineering firm wouldn't get that quantity of money. They would just be involved in the engineering firm. They should have an outside engineer firm. [01:13:08] Well, they could well be doing that. There's an outside engineer firm. I'm sure DuBerry hired someone to go into the environment. Oh, that's what you mean by outside. Yeah. Other questions? Yes, ma'am. As for the moving, you know, ARB, HRB, you know, they're all in support of trying to figure out a way to save old Bennett on both sides, county and city. [01:13:34] I don't know about Manassas Park. So there is a huge outcry. I don't think this is just going to, people are just going to say, oh, okay, county, do whatever you want. Absolutely. You know, so it's more important than what they're saying. It's not just a bunch of rocks. [01:13:53] there is there is a way to move there is there are ways to move that building where we don't have to take down street lights and lines and it could be in sections seriously how seriously or how deep they looked into it are planning to look into that it's not a last-minute decision type thing I mean that if they were serious about trying to move it considering moving it it looks like they would be doing some analysis I will have already done those kind of analysis Well, I'm not real sure I can trust any of the analysis that they're going to be giving us. [01:14:27] But, you know, there's like over 50 building, I'm sorry, bodies underneath that building. That building was built as a memorial to the unknown souls under that building. So when the sonar readings come back as to whatever that is, that's a whole other story. [01:14:44] It's just, it's a shame they can't incorporate the building into what they're trying to do with expansion. That's like the best scenario. It is. And, you know, architects are looking at this as well as historians. And, you know, I just don't think, I know this is not over. [01:15:05] Anything else? Mr. Osina, closed session. Yes. I'm glad you asked me. We do want to get out of here. Let's see, do we want a closed session? Do we want a closed session? [01:15:22] And I'd like to move resolution R-2026-996, authorizing closed meeting of city council. So moved. Second. Was I going to say second? You're the second. I was a second. My bad. [01:15:38] Mr. Smith. Council Member Osina. Yes. Council Member Hudson. Yes. Vice Mayor Wolfe. Yes. Council Member Vasquez Luna. Council Member Ellis. Yes. Council Member Smith. Yes. Motion carries. All right. [01:16:02] Mr. Smith. Council Member Osina. Yes. Council Member Hudson. Yes. Vice Mayor Wolfe. - Yes. - Council Member Ellis. - Yes. - Council Member Smith. - Yes. - Motion carries. - Anything else for the good of the order? [01:16:17] Adios. - That was done. - Nice. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Coraggio Consulting ยท aguyonx.com