Coraggio Consulting Manassas City Council Meeting, Monday, July 13, 2026 Date: Monday, July 13, 2026 Place: Manassas City Council, Virginia Length: 1h 55m (video) Official meeting video (Wistia / RegionalWebTV): https://fast.wistia.net/embed/iframe/zz0ife88yh 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 2026-10-16. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [00:00:07] Thank you very much. If you're able to please stand with me for the invocation and the Pledge of Allegiance. Dear God, we thank you for another opportunity to gather to provide governance for the residents of the city of Manassas. We are so thankful that we're able to continue to enjoy the many events in the city with our families and our friends. Please continue to protect this council, our staff, and our community as we strive each and every day to make this community the best it can be. Continue to also protect the men and women in uniform who selflessly put their lives on the line for us each day we remain thankful for all things amen please join me in the pledge of [00:00:46] allegiance i pledge allegiance thank you i want to welcome everyone again to the council meeting we have a pretty straightforward agenda agenda tonight along with a closed session so with that we'll move forward in the agenda with council time i'll call on vice mayor wolf first madam mayor i I will yield my time. [00:01:22] Thank you very much. Councilwoman Teresa Coat-Sellis. Thank you, Mayor. Yes, welcome, everybody. I'm looking forward to hearing the presentations tonight. And I wanted to remind everyone that the Architectural Review Board, July 21st, is a meeting. [00:01:41] And we'll talk about the Center Street development, once again, for public comment time. So you're welcome to come. It's Tuesday, I think, July 21st at 530. and it's at the City Hall main conference room. Also, let's see here. [00:01:58] I am also having a community meetup on Wednesday, this Wednesday, two days, at 6 o'clock at Dean Park, and you're welcome to come by and just have an informal discussion. We'll talk about the city or whatever you want to talk about, and I will have cupcakes. So we do not have sugar in my house because my husband is on a strict diet, so this is when I get my sugar fixed. [00:02:20] So come by for some cupcakes and chat. That's Dean Park on Wednesday. 6 pm thank you okay um councilman smith uh are you on my time mayor councilman osina thank you um mayor uh i will just add that we got some ribbon cuttings coming up to this week and next we had some uh last saturday uh and uh vice chair of the school board zella jones and i will be doing a neighborhood walk and talk on Saturday July 25th. Hopefully you get to meet [00:02:58] some of our following residents to hear directly from you as to what's important going on in the city. With that, I yield the rest of my time. Thank you. Thank you. Councilwoman Sonia Vasquez-Luna. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Just a reminder, welcome everybody. It's always great to see you here. [00:03:19] Congratulations to the families that are here to support you, your summer campers. It was great to see updates, and it's great to have you here. I hope you not only learn a lot, but you've made memories for the rest of your life. [00:03:35] And a reminder, we have the summer concerts going on. PRTC offers through OmniRide free rides to the summer concert, extra hours, and also on Saturday. So I just want to make sure that if you have friends that are coming, they can use the bus service for free. [00:03:56] That's it. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you. Councilwoman Hudson. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining us today. As the liaison to the Parks and Rec Committee, I want to extend a thank you to everyone who participated in the Parks Master Plan survey. That information is being parsed through now and is available. Raw data is available online. [00:04:15] I also want to share congratulations to Habitat for Humanity. They just completed a house for one of our neighbors down the road this last week, and a lot of community members and organizations gave to that. So congratulations to everyone involved, and kudos to Habitat for Humanity for the great work. [00:04:34] Thank you, Madam Mayor. Okay, thank you. For my time, just want to thank everyone for coming out on July 4th. It was an amazing event, a lot of wonderful fireworks, and everyone seemed to have a wonderful time. Congratulations to our campers who will be recognized tonight. [00:04:50] Thank you for devoting your time and wanting to learn about being firefighters here in the city. Looking forward to you receiving your certificates. We have our legislative breakfast tomorrow morning at 8 o'clock at the museum, and our Senator Rome will be there with us to discuss our legislative priorities. [00:05:08] Our police department is hosting tours on the 15th, I think, the 15th from 630 to 8. So if you ever wanted to tour the police facility, please make sure that you visit their website and sign up so you can do that. [00:05:24] So you can see how the inside works from a good perspective and make sure you do that. It is open for anyone who wants to sign up and do that. We have the work session coming up on Monday. And those who may know and remember, Mr. Ebert, our former Commonwealth attorney, served us for over 50 years. [00:05:44] His service is on the 25th at the Hilton Chapel at 11 a.m. So anyone that wishes to go to that, make sure that you visit the Open for Business exhibit at the museum. It is something to behold and see the businesses that were here in Manassas and helped us become what we are today. [00:06:06] very very very good um exhibit that we have going on and i believe that goes through may if i'm not mistaken and of course as sonia um councilman vesquez luna talked about we have acoustic third tuesdays we have thursday and saturday farmers market we have fresh music friday all free my favorite f word and right here in the middle of historic downtown all free for you so please make sure that you mark your calendars our ribbon cuttings all of our meetings except if we say it's a closed session they are open to the public and we would love to see the engagement from our [00:06:42] residents involved in the many different things that we have going on in the city and with that I will turn it over to Mr. Burke for city manager time thank you madam mayor our electric department continues to investigate the recent outages that impacted the Prince William substation on May 20th and June 11th. [00:07:00] That investigation has focused on three primary areas, the main substation transformer, protection of the relay systems, and coordination with Dominion Energy. The comprehensive testing of the main transformer identified no evidence of internal faults or arcing. [00:07:19] An independent engineering consultant also completed field testing of the protection relay system and confirmed the city's findings that there was no evidence of protection system issues or a definitive cause identified in event records. During the inspection, however, our consultant did discover an out-of-service relay that remained energized despite having a dark display panel. Although it could not be conclusively determined whether this relay contributed to the events, it has been completely disconnected and physically isolated from the system as a precautionary measure. The electric department is also coordinating with [00:07:56] Dominion Energy to conduct testing of Dominion-owned protection relays within the substation to eliminate them as a possible contributing factor. While a definitive cause has not been identified, the investigation has successfully ruled out several potential causes and is now focused on the remaining possibilities. In addition to the Tuesday, Friday, and Saturday concerts this summer. This Sunday, July 19th, we're having the Sunday Fun Day concert at 3 p.m. [00:08:28] at the Pavilion. If you're interested, you can also help remove invasive species at Wakeman Pond on Saturday, July 18th and July 25th from 9 30 a.m. to noon. If you're interested, please visit the website calendar for a link to sign up. Friday, July 24th, will be the deadline to register for the 2026 primary elections and then please visit the city's website to learn all about all the different offerings at our community center and that's all i have thank you any questions for city manager burke miss vasquez luna uh thank you madam mayor i know that we [00:09:04] have the ribbon cutting coming up for the uh aircraft rescue firefighters uh building i was wondering when uh when can we expect an update and when it comes to the building and everything related to the airport we are working if you're referring to avports specifically with the commercial we are working with avports we are hoping that in september possibly october the executive director of avports will be coming in to provide an update to council where they're at as far as the schedule for construction of the terminal where they're [00:09:43] at with any negotiations of commercial airlines and an update to the schedule so hopefully in september or october they will be here to provide that to you okay and my ask for those will be um the um small business continue to ask for an opportunity and uh if we can discuss that when that happened and then uh you know people is asking when do we expect to have the uh commercial flights but uh i guess that will be the best time so thank you any other questions for city manager if not we'll move forward in the agenda with our presentations item one item 1.1 is a presentation [00:10:21] from nvta brt action plan and miss monica backman the ceo of nvta is here this evening thank you for being here ma'am good evening madam mayor members of the council i'm monica backman the ceo of the northern virginia transportation authority i will be brief as i know your time is very important to you but i do want to touch base with the city council about the authorities and the region's bus rapid transit action plan but before i get into the details of the brt action plan i wanted to note that to date as of now the authority has invested five billion dollars with our regional [00:10:58] revenues it says 37 and a half million invested in the city but it's actually 70 million based on the action that the authority took last thursday night and we want to thank madam mayor for leading our planning and programming committee and council member of mr smith for serving on our planning coordination advisory committee but some of the key projects that we funded in the city is liberia avenue roundabout at route 28 route 28 whitening mathis avenue dean drive sidewalk and bicycle infill initiatives and the list does go on but you should also note that we've distributed 29 [00:11:36] million dollars to the city which is your share of the 30 percent revenues and with that 30 as a brief reminder that is for your transportation purposes so our brt action plan we call it one system 28 routes last july july of 2025 the authority adopted the bus rapid transit action plan and it was born from dune conducting our long-range transportation plan which was adopted in december of 2022 that long-range transportation plan transaction is a needs-based plan so it's [00:12:13] fiscally and geographically unconstrained but we look at what are the gaps in our networks once we receive projects from all of the localities and agencies in the region and once we do our evaluation what are gaps in the network now i will say a few people said can we extend metro but some people said we need something that we can do a lot sooner that will provide high capacity, high quality, reliable, and safe service. So that's how the Bus Rapid Transit Action Plan was born. It's a blueprint for jurisdictions and agencies to develop BRT incrementally in [00:12:52] addition to supplying necessary information on how to go about developing BRT and us helping you to identify how to fund BRT. Now, the one thing I want to say about Blueprint, these 28 routes does not mean by the end of next year, all 28 routes will be operational. What it does mean, we are currently funding five routes today. The one in Richmond Highway, Route 7, West End Transit Way, Duke Street Transit Way, and Metro Way. And again, because we adopted our six-year program [00:13:25] last Thursday. Our investment in BRT is over a billion dollars. So the authority, we are pleased and proud to invest in bus rapid transit. Why is bus rapid transit important? Because the data tells us by 2045 that we will have 47 million annual riders on this BRT system. 27,000 daily car trips that will be shifted to transit and will have 23 tons carbon dioxide avoided on a daily basis [00:14:00] but what does BRT mean for the city of Manassas well the city is a key player in these 28 routes three of the 28 routes directly involve the city is routes 22 23 and 24 the Virginia 28 South Manassas Connector and Prince William Parkway these routes start at the Manassas VRE station and end at Dulles, the Northern Virginia Community College, and Potomac Mills. [00:14:29] Now, and I want to go back right here because people have asked me, well, what properties are you taking? Whoa, we are not there yet. While we talk about these as routes, what we are currently working on is phase two of this BRT action plan. [00:14:44] What we are doing is some additional modeling, additional refinement, getting additional data. and that's one of the reasons why i'm going out to the jurisdictions to talk to the governing bodies and we're doing pop-ups and things of that nature so that we can hear from you while we are currently funding five routes others are going to take a little longer and that's one of the reasons why i'm here we want to talk to you to you about getting these routes in your comp plans mobility plans transit plans your strategic plans whatever plan you need to feel comfortable to submit to us [00:15:21] to try to qualify for funding per the law mbta can only fund projects that are in our long-range transportation plan so we want to make sure that you are well aware of this plan and really that you are embracing what this plan contains more than that though we want to know what are your land use needs you know what are the densities that are required to make this system fully functional the other points to be made this evening is that we want to continue to advance a coordinated regional strategy i already mentioned having the routes included in our [00:16:01] long range transportation plan refining the work of our bus rapid transit working group which your staff has participated and continues to participate on partner with our member jurisdictions and agencies particularly the commonwealth i have had conversations with the secretary of transportation and i told him and he agreed how important it is that we get these routes in the commonwealth's long-range plan because that's how you qualify for smart scale funding and the biggie because i'm always asked about this explore funding opportunities so in vta we can only fund [00:16:40] capital investments but what we're doing phase two we're working with the state we're going over federal requirements other regional requirements to try to make sure that we're not just saying okay we have the capital funding and you find the operations and maintenance that we do this holistically the last point you see all of these logos of course we worked with everyone in northern virginia but we also work with maryland we work with the district of columbia council of governments because when you're commuting you don't want to be hassled and stopped and delayed [00:17:15] by jurisdictional boundaries this is truly a regional system all of these agencies participated and continue to participate hopefully you will invite me back around this time next year a little later and we can continue these discussions about what land use changes and other things you may need to feel comfortable in putting this in your long your long-range plans or your transit plans and comp plans i conclude my presentation thank you thank you appreciate thank you for taking time to be here tonight council members any questions for miss batman you did good well [00:17:51] Well, thank you, and again, I do want to thank Madam Mayor and Council Member Smith again. They have really, really taken hold of things for the city as it relates to NVTA, and it just makes my job a lot easier, so thank you very much. Thank you, Monica. [00:18:07] I appreciate it. All right, moving forward in the agenda, next on the agenda is item 1.2, the Nexus 234 update, and I see Ms. Amy Adams is making her way to the front. She's the executive director of the Nexus 234 Innovation Project. district excuse me welcome ma'am thank you so much madam mayor manager burke council members really appreciate the invitation to come here and and share an update and for want to thank you for your partnership so really grateful to council member cena um theresa coast ellis as well as mark wolf who have been really putting their their hands in and helping us engaging through steering [00:18:46] committees and governance and finance task forces as well as marketing and branding to create Northern Virginia's first innovation district. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on background because I know that you've had that, but I wanted to include the slides so that you could really see where we have come from and some background. [00:19:06] But I do want to get to what we've done, which I think is the most important. What is this about? It's about creating new jobs. It's about creating startups in a community and ecosystems allows them to launch and grow and stay here in the area it's about training individuals to enter into the workforce through different non-traditional pathways as well as as the educational pathways as a matter of fact we had Juan Rivera at the campus today as well as the secondary school systems from City of Manassas Prince William County Fairfax Northern Virginia Community College and George Mason today thinking about the air aviation workforce and how [00:19:46] do we make sure that we have that pipeline to really allow that sector to grow this is a 6,000 acre innovation district when you think about an innovation district think about Research Triangle Park think about Cummings Research Park in Huntsville Alabama this is a you can see the city of Manassas is squarely within this and have some really phenomenal companies like Micron I see Delbert here in the back who we've certainly partnered with and as a founding member of the innovation district these are the the sectors that we have focused around these are based on the educational [00:20:23] strengths the research strengths as well as the existing companies that are here there are actually over a hundred high-tech companies within the innovation district acres but beyond that additional 600 businesses as well and we know that as an innovation district the tech companies grow there's actually a multiplier of the additional businesses that are impacted by that growth so what we are doing is through this we are creating the place making that makes this a vibrant place it makes it a vibrant place for people to work for businesses to thrive for companies to grow and scale [00:21:03] these are things that we are doing that not george mason would do alone nor is it something that the cedar the county would do alone this is truly a deep partnership with economic development as they are supporting businesses that are coming into the area and adding that additional components that again create those thriving businesses that will continue to impact our region far and beyond we are really focused on the commercialization piece and so one of those things that we offer [00:21:37] is connection to our tech mentors. And so to date, again, we just launched last year, they have supported 38 businesses in Princeton County, city of Manassas. And again, just from the year that they've started working with them, have helped to support those businesses, raised $2.3 million. And this is just the beginning. We've had one new company formed that again, came out of discovery and is landing and growing. And we have a lot more actually in the pipeline. We also have an international soft landing program. So now City of Manassas [00:22:11] and Prince William County are here on the international stage. Mark Wolf kindly joined us as we welcomed 10 companies from around the world that had applied to our international soft landing program and pitched in front of national investors. Again, putting ourselves on the map as that high-tech ecosystem that's really right for a company to thrive and something that they consistently said because they got to meet the businesses, they got to meet the researchers at the university, the students, was just how incredibly supportive this environment was for [00:22:47] them to grow and they're excited to come. What this also does is it allows us to partner with the other businesses, the law firms, the real estate agencies, the communications businesses, because these companies are going to need all of that, right, to really be able to grow and thrive. [00:23:04] And so we've just invited our top three companies and have opened up the next round. So 22 companies applied. We've down-selected and continuing to foster another six that we see really high potential. We also have delivered workforce programs. [00:23:23] And so, again, we're talking to companies to understand what are their needs so those are integrated into the school systems, but we're also delivering hands-on workforce programs. This is a nice example. Our nano-fab skills program gives students hands, actually not just students, transitioning workers, hands-on skills in an environment for a week to explore. [00:23:48] Is this something that they want to do so that they can move into the industry environment? Really proud of one of the graduates, Charles, who joined Micron as a Navy veteran who went into the data centers and was looking to get into the semiconductor field but didn't want to go for a whole degree program. [00:24:05] And so we were able to do that, connect him with Micron, take a tour, and not only did he go, he helped to advocate for another boot camp member that just joined the team as well. And so we really want to make sure that we're delivering results and creating opportunities for individuals. [00:24:21] Also, hosting programs. what we're hearing from the companies is they want a place for their individuals to learn, their workers to continue to learn, also to create that awareness that we have a lot of great companies and jobs that people don't necessarily know about it. [00:24:37] And so we've partnered with IEEE to host workshops where they deliver. This is an engineering society where they deliver certificates. The great news is this is getting on the radar of students at Auburn University and Georgia Tech and others that are seeing this because of that partnership and they're coming, but they didn't necessarily know it, but this is in their backyard. And so this is an opportunity for them, again, to connect with our companies to make sure that we're filling that pipeline. And then finally, I'm really excited to share that because of this unique ecosystem, because of the support systems, [00:25:13] because of the discovery to the startup spaces, to the medium-sized space, to the land to really grow and manufacture. Nexus 234, again, a partnership between Prince William County, City of Manassas, and George Mason University was selected as the top 10 life science investments in the world. The only other location in the United States was Research Triangle Park. So that's really where we want to be and really expanding this beyond the life sciences and into the other sectors. These are the founding partners that have really helped us to shape the innovation [00:25:51] district to make sure that this isn't government and academia thinking that we know what the businesses want and we know what the workers want, but really designing it to create impact. So I want to thank all of those members who have done that and let you know of next steps. So Council Member Osteena has supported us on our governance and finance committee. [00:26:11] What we have done is we've helped, we began to shape an MOU and board documents that we be sharing with manager Burke and others and then bringing that forward to make sure that we think about that partnership between all three entities and how the the community and businesses really play a role in that as well as a a budget ask in the fall as well we have you know decided that this for a sustainability plan that this should be a partnership between the city of Manassas prince william county george mason university and local business partners and so you can expect to [00:26:51] hear from me a little bit more in the fall and look forward to exploring that with you all thank you very much for the report very thorough and lots of good information council members any questions mr smith more of a statement your excitement and emotion and your delivery is reflected in some of the promises that's clearly in this report that excitement actually comes through and the results of where we are so far i just want to thank you for the presentation [00:27:25] but also thank you um for showing the potential and the impact that's already reflected here in our city and definitely in the area so thank you very much it's my pleasure i love this city i love this area and um it's truly an honor to get to serve in this capacity ms basket thank you for the update on for the report. Just one question. I remember back in the day, the maps included Old Town and I don't see it anymore. Has the priority shift different serving? So from the [00:28:01] map, so just really looking at the development, we shaped that 6,000 acres. However, what I can tell you is historic Manassas remains a very critical component. I would actually personally love to see our students and the community being able to have better transportation to the city and back, right? The vibrancy of being here is truly phenomenal, making sure that they can frequent the businesses, et cetera. So it's certainly not a lack of priority. And also the impacts of the innovation district go far beyond the boundaries. So we are certainly supporting [00:28:37] businesses beyond that, but really looking at those boundaries as the areas of development, redevelopment, et cetera, so really being that central component, but historic Manassas is absolutely a critical component, and happy to share that we hosted 65 research park directors and innovation district directors from around the United States, actually around North America in April, and was so thrilled to be able to bring them to the Manassas Museum for a dinner, a welcome dinner and they commented how incredible this city was and how vibrant it was you don't see [00:29:14] that in every single area right sometimes you see in mid-development but the the number of people and the great restaurants and the rooftops it truly is a place that is critical and component and you'll actually see it highlighted on the nexus 234 website thanks mayor yeah i just to To connect the dots, having sat in on the pitch session, it's astonishing the level of brain power and talent that wants to come to our community. [00:29:47] And where this is a win for our community is the job opportunities it's going to create. And part of the discussion we've had is workforce development, whether that's through NOVA or George Mason or the local schools, which we've talked about, and creating opportunities for these kids. [00:30:07] If they don't end up being firemen, we can create a job, something else for them, and keep them in the community. And that's the win-win scenario. So thank you very much. I couldn't agree more. We want you to stay here, and we want you to thrive here. Okay. Any other questions or comments? [00:30:23] Thank you, Amy. Thank you. I always appreciate the updates. Okay, next on the agenda, item 1.3 is the recognition of the fire and rescue summer campers for 2026. Chief Mills is going to come up and help with that. And after we do that, we'll take a 10-minute recess. Good evening, Madam Mayor, members of the City Council, City Manager Burke. [00:30:48] Thanks for taking the time to recognize these young men and women who thought it would be fun to spend a week with us and let us put them in heavy, hot, sweaty, protective clothing. You loved it. And they actually had fun doing it. As we recognized them, I want to give you a little bit about what they did that week. [00:31:11] they got to step into the boots of a firefighter and find out what the day-to-day life really is when we respond to emergencies. They spent the first day learning all about our personal protective equipment, how important it is, and how each piece of it served a vital purpose in protecting the firefighters that enter burning buildings. They also learned how to operate a fire hose under high pressure, and they learned to appreciate the teamwork, strength, and coordination that it took to operate that hose line and move it with water in it because [00:31:50] it increases the weight of it. They also experienced search and rescue not only in their PPE, but in a smoke-filled room. So they learned how important the communication, the teamwork, and staying calm was to being able to complete that task and how to follow a hose line and where the hose gets coupled together there's little notches on there they learn how to feel those notches because one of them will tell you if you're going towards the fire the other one will tell you if you're going out of the building [00:32:24] so they learn to understand for safety purposes which way went each way they also learn hands-only cpr they learn the value of being able to help someone they learn stop the bleed and how important it is to be able to utilize these basic skills to provide help to someone in need before the first responders show up and what a difference that can make in the outcome of that person. Some of the other highlights they had was climbing the 100-foot aerial. That's always challenging for [00:33:04] people, but they accomplished that. They overcame fears. They met every challenge we threw at them. They went and rode the ARF trucks, they learned how to operate the bumper turret, they learned valuable technical skills, they learned how important that teamwork across the board is, and they learned that no firefighter or paramedic is ever successful operating alone. [00:33:32] So after we put them through all that, we thought we'd do something fun with them and we culminated all week by taking them out to Topgolf and letting them continue to bond and have fun with one another and build those friendships that they made throughout the week. [00:33:53] So, you all did a fantastic job. We have a couple here that have been here for several years now, which probably could be teaching the class here in a few years. But none of this would have been possible without our dedicated instructors, River Odom, Mary Kenny, Joseph Kenny in the back, Mary's son, and she's affectionately known in the class as Mama Kenny. [00:34:24] All right. So with that, as we call each one of them up, we'll be giving you a certificate. [00:34:33] Aaron Sandefur, Ahmad Azam, Angel Rosas, Avana Diaz, Chris Thatcher, [00:35:09] Eric Moll, John Amador, Julian Ramirez, Luke Craig. [00:35:46] Three-time camper. Four. Okay. So that concludes our presentation. [00:36:11] Again, thank you to each one of you. Hopefully we'll see some of you next year. And you're more than welcome to bring a friend. If we can, Jeremy, can you get a group photo with them? Either stand there or come back up front. [00:36:28] We want to make sure we get a good photo of everybody. Come on back down and gather up front. And then we'll take a 10-minute recess. Thank you. Hello. [00:36:47] Come on, Mama Kenny. [00:37:12] We'll take a 10-minute recess and come back. Everyone, thank you so much for that. [00:37:32] Congratulations again to all of our campers. Next on the agenda is public comment time. At this time, we welcome residents and community members who wish to speak about services, policies, and affairs of the city of Manassas. Anyone who has not requested additional time four days prior to this meeting from the city manager, we have a timer, and your comments will be limited to three minutes. [00:37:54] We appreciate the time you have taken to be here. A reminder that council does not engage in back-and-forth conversation with speakers during this time. lack of an immediate response to your comments should not be taken as a lack of interest or concern as we have staff present taking notes and we will respond to your concern in a timely manner when you approach the podium please give us your name and we would appreciate it if you would state if you are a city resident and you may provide your address if you so desire it is not required we ask that you please be respectful when presenting your comments to not only council members but to those residents and community members who are also present with that i have [00:38:31] a sign-up sheet here and i don't have anyone signed up for public comment time but we will not miss anyone who wishes to speak at this time so please come forward if you desire to address council anyone for public comment time good evening good evening colin turner manassas city resident last week's joint inter-jurisdictional ad hoc committee meeting lasted about 25 minutes and one useful takeaway was that if a committee member wants an issue discussed they simply just need [00:39:06] to email the chair and request that an item be placed on a future agenda the committee's most substantive discussion centered on shared services and capital projects representatives particularly from manassas park asked an important question when prince william county makes decisions that expand services related to offices construct new facilities or otherwise increase shared costs what voices do manassas and manassas park have before those decisions are made the county explained that it fronts the capital costs and the committee agreed to establish a financial working group [00:39:43] with representatives from manassas and manassas park and the county's finance staff i think that's a positive step but the broader question of shared decision making remains and that's why i was disappointed that there was no discussion of the old bennett school or the judicial campus expansion preservation virginia requested a facilitated site visit so that qualified professionals could independently evaluate the building the county denied that request public comment or um sorry at the same time county officials have repeatedly stated that demolition has effectively already [00:40:21] been decided while others have questioned whether the board of county supervisors has taken the formal public action necessary to authorize demolition given the committee's discussion about shared governance i'd hoped that someone would ask for an update or request that the bennett school be placed on a future agenda and that didn't happen so tonight my request is simple if all it takes is an email i hope one of our city representatives will send one please ask that the old bennett school and the judicial campus expansion be placed on the next joint inter jurisdictional committee agenda regardless of what people where people ultimately stand on the future [00:40:57] of the building this is exactly the kind of inter-jurisdictional issues the committee was created to discuss. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Turner. Anyone else wish to come forward? Good evening, Ms. Brady. Thank you. Ray Brady, Manassas City. There has [00:41:26] becoming a huge problem at the corner of Forestwood and Plantation. Many cars now are starting to park at that corner, almost directly up to the curb, as it were. Even our, you know how much I love, the 18-wheeler truck that goes to the right onto Forestwood delivering our mail. [00:41:58] they can't even turn now. Shame, shame. Because cars are parking, there's been numerous cars now just always on Forestwood. We can all have our own suppositions as to why, but we pretty well know that many of the cars that are now parking on plantation sit there and sit there and sit there. [00:42:27] one particular car is known to rev their car up or their engine more than 25 30 minutes at a time minimally unfortunately by the time i were to call about it you know the time has passed we are having a big parking problem on plantation now um and it's spilling over to forest wood as i said the truck cannot even take that right and people are more and more if you're coming from stow mall [00:43:02] down forest wood whether you're turning right or left onto plantation people are not able to see because of cars that are parking literally at the corner. I have asked in the past and I would like to plea one more time, could we maybe get the stop sign that is there to be A, larger, and B, have maybe the red flashing lights. [00:43:32] I'm seeing them more and more, so it's not a matter of the one or two I saw were, you know, test pilots, as it were. Supposedly, it has something to do with traffic and accidents and everything else, but surely we're going to be answering more calls for accidents soon, because I can't tell you how many times I hear honk, beep, and, you know, tire squealing. It's not just one particular car that's [00:44:07] parking there. They flip and flop. I've had obvious sight line of people who are doing whatever car to car new cars are showing up and all of a sudden there's been meetings back and forth and then they're gone so um i would like to ask them to look into this pretty pretty soon there's going [00:44:36] to be a problem thank you thank you ms braden anyone else good evening ms plebniak good evening janet plebniak city of manassas resident um first off i would like to thank chief keen for the meeting that we had concerning the incident at the park and us not to let our guard down that our children need to be kept safe in the community and even a little incident is a is an incident [00:45:14] especially for children but i appreciate him taking the time with the citizens and listening um i didn't even realize i was at the city of manassas meeting tonight hearing all this innovative business going on i guess that's why we're going to have 167 buildings apartments in the city to accommodate all the people that are going to come and work at these businesses. [00:45:38] I don't see the kids from our low-level school system qualifying for these jobs. Our schools need some attention. So Heavenly Father, we pray for those in positions of power who may have strayed from integrity. Give them the courage to recognize their mistakes and the humility to repent. Soften their hearts to listen to wise counsel and to lead with honesty, justice, and mercy in all their decisions. Father God, bring harmony and understanding to our government. Remove [00:46:14] the spirit of division and self-interest from our leaders. Grant them a receptive mind to collaborate peacefully and a compassionate heart that cares for the most vulnerable among us. I pray this through your son jesus christ amen thank you miss platniac anyone else anyone else okay all right if not we'll move forward to item three on the agenda is the consent agenda i'll call on vice mayor sorry i'm looking at mine [00:46:50] we have the motion by vice mayor will seconded by councilman basquez luna to approve our consent agenda any discussion thank you I just wanted to reference on the agenda the parks and waterfront plans I've had several inquiries from the community and also some people in the media that pay close [00:47:26] attention to what we're planning in the city of Manassas since we're a beast in USA with six years running of the Manassas Bee Festival which is named one of the most unique and also one of the top summer festivals in Northern Virginia people are paying attention to us delivering the product that we are pushing and it is to plant native plants so it's very important to plant native plants on this plan it does say potential plant materials but some of the plants on there we you know should be substituted for native plants for zone 7a they should be installed [00:48:05] not they should install not just pollinators but our native pollinating plants ground covers perennials shrubs trees in the park and waterfront plans at kind of branch landing we just want that on the record thank you thank you any other discussion points mr. Smith please call the roll vice mayor Yes [00:48:36] Thank you very much. That moves us forward to item four in public hearings We have a sign-up sheet. I don't have any names here But for any of the anyone signed up that we will call will allow anyone that wishes to address us for public hearing a Reminder it is separate from the public hearing. So I mean from the public comment time um i'll go over the procedures for public hearings i'll read the newspaper ad certification for public hearings and staff will present the issue for consideration and council then has the opportunity to ask questions i will then open the public hearing for public comments we'll make sure not to miss anyone who wishes to speak regarding a public hearing item and then the [00:49:13] public hearing is then closed or continued and action is scheduled to be taken by the council at the next regularly scheduled council meeting so with that i'll now read the newspaper certification which says as the mayor i certify that newspaper advertisements for the public hearings listed on tonight's agenda were published in conformance with the requirements of general law and city ordinances as the mayor i further certified that an affidavit of publication is before me which is signed by an authorized representative of the prince william times newspaper which states that the advertisements appeared on the required dates and mr arcieri is here to help [00:49:52] us with item 4.1 is the public hearing for a proposed franchise for the purpose of installing operating and maintaining telecommunications conduits facilities and equipment in the public rights of way within the corporate limits of the city of manassas virginia your honor members of council good evening the city has received a request to grant a non-exclusive franchise for installation of fiber optic cable in the public right-of-way following the bid opening in june this item has been scheduled for a public evening this evening public hearing this evening the [00:50:27] initial proposed alignment for this conduit takes the starts at technology drive goes up nokesville road and then goes down wellington road into prince william county so again this is another uh potential franchises service data centers um this is a public hearing this evening the request would be to reward a 40-year franchise to ITG Communications LLC doing business as VTR Fiber LLC for the purposes of operating a telecommunication franchise. There were no competing bids received, and staff recommends holding a public hearing this evening. Stand ready for any questions. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Garcia. Any questions? Okay. Now, open the public [00:51:05] hearing. Is there anyone who wishes to—Napley is not here, but if there's anyone who wishes to speak on this item, please come forward at this time. Okay. Is there a motion? Madam Mayor? - Yes. - Thank you, Madam Mayor. I move to close the public hearing and that action on ordinance O-2026-914 be scheduled by city council after the city attorney has been able to make some technical amendments and report back. [00:51:37] - Second. - We have the motion by Councilman Ossina, seconded by Vice Mayor Wolfe to close a public hearing and move this to another council meeting. Any discussion hearing and seeing none, Mr. Smith, please call the roll. Council Member Ocina? [00:51:53] Yes. Vice Mayor Wolf? Yes. Council Member Ellis? Yes. Council Member Smith? Yes. Council Member Vasquez-Luna? Yes. Council Member Hudson? Yes. The motion carried. Thank you very much. Item 4.2, the public hearing for resolution number R-2026-1119, Kingdom Ambassador and Ministries, Inc., Children of Light Daycare, 8802 Sudley Road Special Use Permit. [00:52:17] Mr. Samples. Thank you Madam Mayor, members of the council. Tonight I'll be making the staff report for SCP-2026-5. Oh, it's a, it says now, isn't it? Okay, there we go. So, the property's location is at 8802 Sudley, at that intersection as you see on the screen. [00:52:35] The applicant's proposing a child care center at the location. Parcel's 1.18 acres, it is Zone B1, and the comprehensive plan is Sudley Medical, Gateways, and Corridors. So, the child care center is actually proposed within the second and third floors of the existing building. the first floor will retain its existing office uses. The operation is proposed Monday through Friday 7 30 a.m. to 5 30 p.m. with drop off and pick up entirely on site. There was a previous special use permit for adult daycare but that expired in 2023. They did not occupy the building or take action so that use never went forward. There are existing proffers on this property but [00:53:12] they do not preclude this use therefore they do not interfere with it. The vicinity map before you you can see the subject property, the Manassas Community Center, and the Manassas Baptist Church, which is up Sudley Road. Single-family residents are behind it, and then across the street is the main post office and retail and office uses. The GDP is before you. It's a standard GDP that's been used in the past. They're not making any changes to the exterior of the building, so they've requested to use this GDP. From a land use perspective, child care has a very minimal impact on the surrounding area. It is a use that is in demand in the community, and so this would [00:53:48] help fulfill the need for that in the community institutional uses such as childcare centers are inappropriate land use in this area the comprehensive plan the trip generation report provided showed a minimal trip generation so TIA was not required so we do have the standard conditions of approval for a childcare center on the screen so pretty standard stuff I won't necessarily go over it we do feel that the proposed the proposal mid with mitigating conditions it sufficiently mitigates negative land use impacts and this Planning Commission unanimously recommended approval at the June 3rd [00:54:26] hearing and while staff is recommending approval of the requested special use permit we are recommending that the City Council not schedule well do this public hearing close the public hearing but not do not schedule decision on the matter until the outstanding tax liability has been resolved with the Treasurer's office with that I stand for questions thank you thank you mr samples any questions council members any questions okay and um applicants not here and i'm sorry i don't think so i don't see the applicant okay um so now i'll open the public [00:55:01] hearing on this um item if anyone i don't have anyone signed up but if there's anyone present who wishes to address this item please do so at this time okay is there a motion From staff of the fulfillment of the tax obligation. [00:55:23] Second. I pray the motion by Vice Mayor Wolf, seconded by Councilwoman Vasquez Luna, to close the public hearing and move this item forward when the item has been satisfied by the Treasurer's Office. Any discussion? Hearing and seeing none, Mr. Smith, please call the roll. [00:55:39] Vice Mayor Wolf. Yes. Councilmember Vasquez Luna. Yes. Councilmember Ellis. Councilmember Smith. Yes. Councilmember Osina. Yes. Councilmember Hudson. Yes. The motion carries. Thank you very much. item 4.3 the public hearing for ordinance number 0 2026-1094 zta 2026-0003 zoning ordinance annual updates technical amendments Audra is here to help us with that good evening all right thank you madam mayor and good evening council members so before you tonight I will be presenting zoning tax [00:56:13] amendment 2026-0003 for the annual zoning ordinance updates so every year we complete review of the zoning ordinance and draft changes that relate to the improved customer service, technical corrections, enhancing our enforcement capabilities, and then also compliance with mandatory state code changes. We're going to kind of go through all of those in those separate sections this evening. So first up are customer service related. So these are typically requests received from residents or business owners throughout the year. And these are the proposed ones in front of you tonight. So first up relates to accessory structures. And we are proposing to [00:56:51] pergolas as an exempt from location and lot area requirements, and that we would also have accessory structure separation of 10 feet from the main structures in those zoning districts there. For temporary uses and structures, those are going to be like a temporary tent that's placed at a restaurant. We've had some requests that the 90 days is not long enough, so we have looked at extending that to 120 days, and that is with a permit. For temporary signs, we are proposing to assembly and institutional uses to place temporary banners without permits for up to 14 calendar days as of right now that is not permitted at all in the ordinance [00:57:28] and then the last one is the request to ensure that our driveway modification we have standards in there that relate to ADA compliance so accessibility to people's properties next up our technical corrections and these are things that staff has identified through through the year we always have definitions that are adjusted to the definitions have minor changes in them to address things like the airport name changing. We have created a new use category term and definition for [00:58:02] residential facilities and separated that from group homes. We have also proposing to remove the requirement to cover vehicle signs that are associated with home occupations and home businesses motor vehicle sales and rentals we are proposing that the requirement for the vehicle loading or unloading or any deliveries occurring at those businesses occur on-site and they cannot park on a on a roadway for a manufactured home park we are proposing to add in size and location restrictions for accessory structures and then we have additional technical [00:58:41] amendments that are just clarifying language so such as the height standards for fencing and removing duplicate language for submission requirements. So, proposed amendments related to our enforcement capabilities in the city, we're proposing to add driveway language, driveway maintenance language, excuse me, to ensure that driveways are maintained in a safe and working order, and if they are not, our code enforcement team can now pursue that for a maintenance violation, and then also adding driveway violations to our civil penalties. [00:59:15] Unfortunately, driveways are only permitted underneath a criminal penalty, and this would give our code enforcement team again another avenue to pursue those violations. And then adding accessory dwelling unit as a civil penalty also. And last up, we have our state code requirement changes. [00:59:32] So these are things that the state has mandated that we add into our ordinance. So first thing is temporary support structures. We have created a new term definition in use for this, and these are related to wireless, temporary wireless facilities. So this would be related to if we need it to increase our communication coverage due to an existing tower going out or a large event. [00:59:54] We could permit these to be placed to provide that type of coverage. As you all know, housing is a hot topic now, and there are many revisions related to it. One of them is that manufactured homes are now to be permitted in single-family detached residential districts. [01:00:11] So we are now permitting manufactured homes in the A1, R1, R2, R2S, R6, and R7 districts. And then the last one is for designated areas. So the state has created something called a designated area, which is properties within a half-mile radius of mass transit or public transportation stations, so our downtown or broad-run VRE stations. [01:00:35] And this is allowing for a reduced parking requirement for residential and mixed uses. In addition to that, they have also required us to include language that allows for an administrative parking modification be submitted for a property outside of those designated areas. [01:00:55] So the Planning Commission did hear this at their June 3rd meeting, and they did unanimously recommend approval. Staff recommends holding our public hearing tonight and then taking this to City Council work session on July 20th. And with that, I stand ready for any questions, and I also have Matt and Christian here in case we need them, too. [01:01:16] Thank you. Thank you. Any questions? Thank you, Madam Mayor, and thank you, Audra, for the presentation. On slide two, I guess it is, without three, if you count the title slide, temporary signs, what is an example of that? [01:01:32] And are they size restricted? Like, yeah, just what is an example of what that's permitting? So it would not require them to get a permit. The example would be a church or religious institution that wants – that has a special event of some type to place that banner sign up on the property or for the schools to place banners on the property to announce that kind of special event. [01:01:58] But on their own property? Yes, on their property. Okay. All right, thank you. Mr. Smith? I think some of this will be addressed at our work session, so I won't go too far into the weeds. [01:02:14] But does this language in the General Assembly, this bill that's been signed in, I know they're mandating that the cities and localities come up with some kind of zoning to accommodate the bill. [01:02:32] It's not something we can just walk away from. We have to address it. Does the language permit, is the language allowing for some avoidance of our existing codes and regulations and so forth? [01:02:48] For example, there's a couple of statements in there and in the draft that I reviewed that talked about the modified parking. And one indicated that perhaps even without much stretch of the imagination, front yards could be modified to allow parking for the accessory unit. [01:03:08] jurisdiction do we retain some some symbols of our existing codes are we going to have to create some new codes to have exceptions or my modified codes anything so with the state code changes what we've proposed typically does address what they have required us to change because of what they have changed as far as the parking goes the the off-street parking and designated areas just reduces the parking requirement so for example as of right now as a single [01:03:45] family detached residents in the city would need a minimum of two parking or two parking spaces this would reduce that to one for the state code it does not change the location requirement for parking I'll have some additional questions later the other part is whether or not there's been any any any guidance or directions, directives reflecting unofficial existing ADUs. [01:04:21] Are they grandfathered in? Are they subject to any special rules? For accessory dwelling units? Accessory dwelling units that exist in reality. They're not official or formal of an approval, but there are maybe one, two, ten. [01:04:38] So in the next public hearing item for accessory dwelling units, Christian will go over that and there are provisions for for grandfathered accessory dwelling units put them to be adapted into this to that Legislation or are they subject to the same new rules or that's something that's going to be up to the local jurisdiction To regulate so it's up to us to regulate it and we have included it in our non-conforming uses for accessory dwelling units Florida but I'm just concerned about the impact on our existing codes and ordinances and whether you know [01:05:17] Enforcement is going to be the issue And what's how tight the definition of an AC ADU really is [01:05:40] Okay On this session on the 20th, the state law of change within a half mile of transit, is mandating one parking space per unit? [01:05:58] So it requires us to set a new minimum, and that is, yes, a new minimum of one space per single-family residence, and then it's a half space for mixed-use or multi-residential use. But it's a minimum? It's a minimum, yes. [01:06:13] Okay, I wanted to make sure. Thank you very much. Okay. Any other, Ms. Ellis, and then Mr. Osima. Question about manufactured homes. I'm just reading the ordinance, but maybe you can give me more information. [01:06:33] So manufactured homes, do they specify more details about what that is? Yes, we have a definition in the ordinance already for manufactured homes that largely comes from the federal guidance on that. We did not need to adjust that definition, and so it is the same standard for that. [01:06:54] It typically is a residence that has a HUD-manufactured stamp on it that would come in as one piece. Do they talk about the pitch of the roof? Not to my knowledge. Or the width or the nothing, just it comes manufactured? [01:07:12] I don't believe we have dimensions in our ordinance for them. Is that something we can look at? Because there's all kinds of manufacturing. There's like kind of a broad. So, currently, our definition of manufactured homes is that it is a structure that is transportable in one or more sections. [01:07:36] Is 8 feet or more in width and 40 feet or more in length in the traveling mode? Or is 320 or more square feet when erected on site? So, there is a provision for that. How many? What was the square footage? 320 or more square feet when erected on site. [01:07:55] Maybe, what's the height? I do not have a height. We find that out. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. [01:08:13] Going back to the technical corrections here. So, I am clear. So, on the first set of technical corrections, we had home occupation and home businesses. [01:08:37] Remove requirement to cover signs on vehicles associated with home occupations slash businesses. So, what would that actually cover? Like Tom's accounting in front of my house or what? [01:08:54] So for home occupations and home businesses, an applicant is allowed to associate one vehicle with their business that can be parked on site. With that, this covers them not needing to take a blank magnetic sticker or a car cover when they park it at their house at the end of the day and cover up their business sign, their business information on it. [01:09:22] The requirement to cover vehicle signage is only associated with the home occupation and home businesses. So if you are an employee of a contractor or another business and you have a take-home vehicle, you can take it home and you're not required to cover the signs on it. [01:09:38] So that's kind of what this is designed to mitigate is requiring somebody who has a business at their residence to cover the signage on the vehicle. And the impetus for this correction came from requests from residents? [01:09:56] This came from staff, mostly largely from staff in our enforcement division. From code enforcement? Yes, code enforcement. All right, very good. And just following up on the one about temporary signs that Councilwoman Hudson was asking about here, Are there limits on the size of such banners, temporary banners, length, height, width, whatever? [01:10:28] I do not have the specifics, but they will need to meet what is in our sign ordinance already. So they will have to meet whatever those requirements are for banners. And the origin of this request also came mostly from zoning? [01:10:46] It was a request from the business owners at churches. Okay, gotcha. And then going to driveway, enhanced enforcement here. So, added provisions to set minimum maintenance standards. So, give me some examples of what those minimum standards were, like, what, asphalt, concrete, I mean, you know, there's a variety of different kinds of driveways, aren't there? Concrete ones, asphalt ones, even gravel ones in some cases here. So, what would be some of those maintenance standards there? [01:11:25] So we're giving that it needs to be in a safe and operable manner. So if you have a driveway with a giant pothole in it that could harm somebody when they drive over it, that would be something that would be considered in violation of the maintenance of the driveway requirement. [01:11:42] If you have a little bit of chipping or, you know, some cracking in your driveway, but it is still a solid surface on which you can, you know, drive and park a vehicle, then that would not meet that maintenance. That would not extend over that maintenance requirement. very good okay thank you very much thank you any other comments or questions if not the public hearing is now open on this item i don't have anyone signed up but if there's anyone that wishes to speak on this item please come forward at this time hey mayor and council lynn for cal green [01:12:20] manessa city resident um i know that you're going to go into your work session so i'm happy to hear some of these questions the driveway maintenance one to tom's point i think it needs to really be looked at um you know your driveway attached to your home is your homeowner's insurance also and so for the city to force maintenance on a driveway in a very vague manner is not good for our residents i would want that to be very um very much clarified and then secondly with regards to the accessory dwelling units um the grandfathering i know we have another public hearing on it so i'll [01:12:59] say most of that but when you grandfather these items that prevents the enforcement that's already not happening so I think what most residents I've been talking to recently are really advocating for is consistent enforcement and it would be really great if when all of this is put together after you've had your work session that has been approved if there could be resources provided for residents on how they can go about having something enforced because I think sometimes people come up here and they talk about it and maybe something comes out of that maybe it doesn't but they're never really taught [01:13:37] or told the process to push for that enforcement so I think the grandfathered buildings is going to create a little problem when people can start to have units that are actually approved so I would really encourage special attention [01:13:52] to that. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Green. Anyone else? Is there a motion? Madam Mayor, move to close the public hearing and schedule with staff after the July 20th work session. Second. We have a motion by Vice Mayor Wolfe, seconded by Councilwoman Vasquez-Luna to close the public hearing and schedule this item after the work session. Any discussion? Hearing and seeing none, Mr. Smith, please call the roll. Vice Mayor Wolfe? Yes. Councilmember Vasquez-Luna? Yes. Councilmember Ellis? Yes. [01:14:24] Council member Smith. Yes. Council member Alcina. Yes. Council member Hudson. Yes. Thank you Item 4.4 the public hearing for ordinance number. Oh 2026 - 1093 ZTA 2026 - 0002 Zoning ordinance annual updates for accessory dwelling units. Mr. Samples. Thank you madame and members of the council accessory dwelling units. Here we go So some background on this so the comprehensive plan strategy 4.5.4 does recommend the city consider accessory dwelling units to allow an additional [01:15:01] housing type to provide new small-scale housing opportunities. As you may be aware, the General Assembly passed an ADU bill in 2026 of this year that will require jurisdictions to allow them as a permitted use in single-family residential zoning districts. The purpose of this ordinance is to bring the city code into compliance with the Code of Virginia and to enable regulation where the General Assembly law allows it so I'm gonna walk you through Senate bill 531 and then I'll walk you through the proposed ordinance so the Senate bill specifically defines the ADUs and it requires them be permitted as an accessory [01:15:38] use in single-family residential districts the city can require the following you can do lease terms of 30 days or longer so you don't have to like for Airbnbs for example you can regulate it to where you can't use as an Airbnb parking replacement due to adu construction so if a parking space is removed to put in an adu you can regulate it to where they have to replace the parking somewhere on site the city can regulate the number of parking spaces for an adu the city can place limits on floor area lot coverage and impervious area the city can require compliance with health and safety codes owner occupancy at the time of permit application the city can require an adu [01:16:18] distance from the primary dwelling not to exceed 500 feet the limits on the number of 80s per lot and then the city can also regulate the non-separation or the sale of the adu from the primary dwelling property but jurisdictions cannot do the following they cannot require setbacks greater than the primary dwelling unit or of accessory dwelling units or accessory structures as well units whichever is greater restrictions on adus that are more restrictive than the single-family dwellings for height rear inside setbacks lot size and coverage or building frontage the city cannot require a [01:16:53] restrictive covenant for an adu on a property zone for single-family residential dwellings the city cannot require public additional public street improvements such as sidewalks street improvements things like that except to repair what was damaged during the construction of the adu and that cannot require co-sanguinity or affinity between an adu resident and the primary occupant resident hoas can separately restrict or prohibit adus so regardless of you know the law going forward if an hoa collectively wants to prohibit them or put additional restrictions on [01:17:28] them they are free to do so independently of the city this law does take effect july 1 next year but jurisdictions are authorized to implement the provisions prior to that date which is why this is before you now but the city does have the option that certainly can wait till july 1st of next year so i'll walk you through what the proposed ordinance does so it creates the terms adu and owner occupancy and defines them the definition for adu is right from that bill we do not make any additional changes to it we copied it and pasted it right in because that they've already prescribed that to the jurisdictions we define owner occupancy for the purposes of what's [01:18:06] required at the time of permit and i'll walk you through that in just a moment it authorizes adus in the a1 r1 r2 r2s and r7 so the single family districts as an accessory use it limits adus to one lot one per lot it requires owner occupancy at the time of permit meaning the owner has to live on site at the time they apply for a building permit for the adu which is why an owner occupancy definition is included the state code did not include one we're proposing a limit of rental to a minimum of 30 consecutive days more like a standard apartment or standard lease [01:18:43] we're proposing to prohibit the separate sale of an adu from the primary dwelling and proposing to not count ADUs against the zoning district maximum density because the state code is now requiring that you have to allow it if you potentially require that against the maximum density you are effectively prohibiting the accessory use so we're forced to put that in the ADU continuing so it allows ADUs to meet primary or accessory structure setbacks it limits ADUs to no more than 500 feet away from the primary structure [01:19:18] the height limit is set to the zoning district limit the minimum square footage which is right from the code state code is 500 square feet working with the planning commission they have recommended a maximum square footage of 800 square feet so a typical one bedroom type apartment or 40 of the square footage of the primary dwelling but that it would be limited to 800 square feet 80 recommending that adus can occupy the entirety of a basement in the primary dwelling the idea behind that was not to have an ADU where you have half a basement half an ADU just to go ahead and allow it within the entire basement regardless of the square [01:19:57] footage the ADU parking would be set to one space per unit and that the conversion of non-conforming accessory structures to ADUs would be authorized so this provision is one that has already come up earlier and I'm happy to talk to and I'm happy to answer questions about it as well the idea is twofold so number one you do have it within the city quote-unquote I guess grandfathered 80 use or they're just there right so effectively they're inside a non-conforming structure so they may already be inside an unconforming garage this provision would enable them to bring that into legal compliance which [01:20:34] means that they would have to meet the rest of the ordinance other than the setbacks because typically non-conforming structures they're typically non-conforming because of setbacks that's usually 99% of the time is what we're dealing with number two it does open the door for people that do have an existing shed garage and whatnot to convert them into an ADU so it does open that door as well so adopting these provisions does allow the city to regulate 80 use in conformance of the code of Virginia keep in mind that the bulk of what you see in there is taken from the code of Virginia it's taking [01:21:11] advantage of the powers that the General Assembly has given the jurisdiction the city to act on if a jurisdiction let's say hypothetically decided to do nothing then on July 1st of next year they are we have to allow them as a jurisdiction and those provisions that allow some limitation they would not be there the Planning Commission did unanimously recommend approval of this proposed ordinance we do recommend holding the public hearing and adopting the ordinance but we do also recommend discussing this thoroughly at the next week's work session so with that i stand for questions thank you thank you christian council members some [01:21:48] questions mr smith it probably seemed like i was talking about this item prematurely by talking about it before but there was a method to the madness other than me then right the order of it so i repeat my question i'm not i'm not going through all of that but do we need to have technical amendments to our to the ordinance uh that we talked about up here on the 4.3 to accommodate some of these, I think, mandates that are very typical for us to implement? [01:22:21] Do we need technical amendments? Are we covered? So is it simply that we just make the changes that the law dictates and then we're going to be smoothly operating ADUs on down into infinity? Or do we need to take a look at our ordinances and see, well, we can't do this on the ADU, but we can do this pre-ADU? [01:22:43] Maybe there are none. I don't know. That's my question. Are there things that we start talking about? Maybe you can't do this. Well, then you may not be able to deny the guy from person, the family, from parking on the front yard because it can make special. [01:22:59] I just don't know. It's a new law. Of course. So have we looked at our ordinances to see, or are we going to look at our ordinances to see if there are some peculiarities from this bill that we'll be able to get, that will get done, and we won't have any. [01:23:18] And even if we had demand power and all of that for zoning enforcement, but we just can't, because of this law, go at it. My concern is that we created some new headaches for zoning enforcement, not we, the General Assembly created any. [01:23:36] So, Council Member Smith, those are great questions. And when we looked at both the technical amendments and the ADU amendments, we looked at them together. we fully understood that there are when we looked at the technical amendments that there may have needed to be additional changes what we found particularly with parking is that our parking standards are very robust as they are so we do require for surfacing we do have location standards things like that so the adu ordinance doesn't change that it what it does is for example with parking requires that they have a parking space okay that's fine and like i said i don't need to [01:24:15] We don't need to belabor it tonight, but I just want to make sure we're addressing it. Parking is just one of the many things that this well-intended legislation raises questions about. But with regard to the parking, I think we have some restrictions on how much paving can be done to a front yard now. [01:24:35] But every time I ask somebody about the ADU and the pavement, no one mentions that they're limited. So we allow one, we allow one car, do we allow two cars? Then do we widen the yard to get two cars? Those kinds of broader questions, I guess we have to look at our existing problems and our existing issues with our housing and our communities today and see what issues are going to be compounded by adding an additional type of housing in a neighborhood. [01:25:06] Of course. Other than, I mean, I know we can talk about it being 40 feet. We have some right now that are two bedrooms, so do we make them go back to one? I don't those kinds of things how much enforcement can we do are we going to be restricted to do given the money that we need to have to [01:25:25] are that much of a staff I'm done that is correct [01:26:06] Are we saying you're seeing the family at home? Got a requirement of two. Now I have a requirement of three. Yes. And this vision of set parking is still subject to all the other provisions that we have in our code. [01:26:30] Yes. So you just can't table your front yard. No. All right. Great. Thank you. Any other questions? Ms. Ellis. Yeah. The grandfather ADUs. I just want you to explain that a little more. [01:26:47] so if there's adus that are in the city now that have kind of like for example if someone has a garage and they had an apartment over it but it was never went through the permitting but no one ever reported it is that considered a grandfathered adu okay so what is a grandfathered adu so typically a grandfather grandfather in general is what we call non-conforming uses and so what that is is if a use was done prior to a change in the zoning ordinance or even the adoption of a zoning ordinance then that use would be allowed to continue [01:27:26] provided that it's maintained and not expanded effectively so in the downtown area we do have 80 use that predate the zoning ordinance and so those are effectively grandfathered in so they can continue to operate provided they're maintained it safely if someone ten years ago or five years ago just converted their top of their garage into an apartment they're not they still have to would have to come in and get permits for it if they came in today we wouldn't be able to give them a permit and they'd have to take it out but under if this were passed then they would be able to come in and get permits and they would have to meet current code so if they built it to building code ten years ago they're gonna have to make some changes so so zoning could approach them [01:28:05] and say this is not compliance even though it was grandfathered you have to now get everything up to code yes okay so what kind of inspections would be required typical inspections would be the ones for building and zoning so setbacks water and sewer inspections because they're gonna have to tie into the system power inspections building inspections fire safety all the typical inspections for a residential home to your knowledge would there ever be a [01:28:44] a case where an ADU might not be allowed because the water slash sewer capacity wasn't adequate? So typically with any development, no matter what the scale, if you're proposing it, you're going to have to make the upgrades to bring that capacity. [01:29:05] So if your ADU requires a larger line, you're going to have to fork out some cash for that. If you want the ADU. Right. Okay. And lastly, I'm looking at these minimum square footage for instance like 500 so what kind of occupancy requirements so by setting it to a fixed amount like this you're effectively deferring to the building code so an 800 square foot is typically a one a larger one-bedroom apartment or very small two-bedroom apartment is typically what you see this case of 500 [01:29:43] square feet that's typically a medium to large size studio type apartment so when the Planning Commission was looking at this they did consider things like hey why don't we just type to building occupancy but ultimately what they recommended was hot adopting the minimum from the state code which is 500 feet but also enabling a larger unit so that it could be more useful and more practical to develop but it was still deferred to the building code at the end of the day so however many people could be inside a accessory dwelling in it and [01:30:15] And so going back to the parking discussion here, so let's say the single-family home had a requirement of two parking spaces, and with an ADU, now there's a third one. That third one is not street parking, that's a third one on the property. [01:30:36] Yes, they have to find a space on the property. And the way they could do that is, A, the existing, we'll say, driveway is wide enough, big enough, I'll say. Big enough to accommodate three vehicles and or what we talked about, the last item there, making a driveway modification or applying to make a driveway modification. [01:31:04] Is that correct? So it could be expanded. Potentially, yes. If they meet the code, it could be expanded, yes. and so the if if the driveway could not be expanded let's say in my example three three vehicles or three parking spaces are required they're currently only two and the driveway could not be expanded therefore a adu would not be permitted that is correct yes for for that very reason then they would have to meet all the standards of the ordinance including the parking [01:31:40] space on site yes has staff given uh consideration not so much the specifics but this is a big education process process here and unfortunately as you say there's a year uh you'd be adopted earlier but to to just learn all this along the way what what thought has been given by by staff [01:32:07] As to how we would educate and inform residents in single family dwellings, you know, whatever is adopted, you know, how it works. [01:32:24] So something of this scale and this significant change would definitely require some kind of outreach campaign. Something that we do outreach campaigns frequently, so we are, you know, prepared to do them. Online outreach, we could certainly hold, you know, public meetings and whatnot. So that's something we've done in the past for other ordinances and something we're prepared to do if this passes. [01:32:46] Ms. Ellis? I don't see anything about, is there like a minimum lot size in residential to have an ADU? The General Assembly does not allow the city to do that. So what do you mean? [01:33:02] So any lot? So how they do it is this. They're very clever about it. So if your lot is 2,500 square feet or less, you can have an ADU up to 300 square feet. So 0 to 2,499. [01:33:18] 2,500 or more is the 500 square foot. Our analysis showed looking at different properties, we couldn't really find a single-family home under 2,500 square foot lot size. So that's why we did the 500 square foot minimum. Okay. What percentage of the residential districts named on here, A1, R1, R2, R2S, and R7, what percentage do you think qualify for these ADUs? [01:33:45] anyone look at that because i know the hoas are going to restrict they're not going to allow this right so what is single family homes that are not an hoa right that has parking on site that's something we'll have to give you at your work session um okay purely off memory um we have i believe roughly 1700 units that are in an hoa out of the 5 000 single family units in the city so just while parking it we can certainly get you a more exact number next week Yeah, I'm just trying to see what the scale is on this. Yep. Thank you [01:34:20] Any other questions for mr. Sample? Thank you. Thank you. I'll now open the public hearing on this item 4.4 if there's I don't have anyone signed up, but there's if there's anyone that wishes to address Please come forward in a plebniac city of manassas about 30 years ago My neighbors wanted to build a garage And so we had a hearing and it had to be 25 foot set back from the property line because of fire [01:34:58] Or I know you're not answering but these questions need to be asked you got all these ADUs in the backyards Which I live in the Williams district and we have many houses now that have more than one adu It has been brought to the city's attention there has been tours of the city people are aware of it and nothing's been done about it So what makes the public think this is all going to be done properly that it's going to be enforced If there's limits on how many can live in that, aren't there limits on how many can live in a single-family home? [01:35:34] This is, there's a lot of questions here. And this is a public hearing tonight. I hope there are more public hearings on this so that the public knows about it. It's not safe for people to be living in a unit out back there behind their house with an extension cord running because I see them in my neighborhood. [01:35:54] It runs from the main house to the ADU and plugs in. Sewer, what's going to happen with the sewer system? Do they have a bathroom? This is the destruction of Manassas happening right in front of our faces. But we want to build 167 luxury apartment units in Old Town. [01:36:14] I hope you all take this very serious and consider if we have to do it, it's from the state. But things need to be talked out. The public needs to be made aware. And we need to be able to have an opinion on it. [01:36:31] But the ones that are currently there, before this law goes into effect, where is zoning? Why aren't they being taken care of? Why isn't it being addressed? It's not fair to the people that are living in there. And you don't have one person living in a little studio apartment. [01:36:48] You have a family living in there. We have a problem in this city that nobody wants to talk about. Seventy percent of the kids in the school are undocumented. The parents cannot report incidences that happen because of that situation. [01:37:05] We are creating trafficking of children. You can't say children have disappeared. This is a huge problem, and it's the destruction of the city of Manassas. You can bring in innovation, whatever. That's not taking care of the problems we have right here, right now in this city. [01:37:22] Everybody here is a human, and they deserve to be treated fairly. So I hope the work session has some good conversation and then the public is made aware. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Clabinette. Anyone else? Good evening, Mayor and Council, Olympica Green, Manassas City resident. [01:37:51] As promised, I'll make my statements here as well. There are some concerns with this. I actually am for ADUs. I've been for ADUs for a while. I'm a little disappointed that we didn't already have this in place. So now we are where we are because the state is doing what the state is doing. [01:38:08] for those who don't know we are a dylan rule state so we cannot do something um that the you know we have to follow what the state law is this is why we're doing this right now but i would say to some of the points my main concern tonight listening to some of the changes and mark i would really appreciate if you would make sure we get this information at that work session does this change regarding the parking if you're in that transit area where you only have to have 0.5 because I would wonder about that and then I would wonder much to Teresa's point about [01:38:47] how many homes does this actually affect outside of a you know HOA and to Ralph's great point about what you can do with parking in your front yard I don't think many folks even know that you need to get a permit to extend your driveway now so there's going to need to be a fair amount of education with this before it's actually passed. So I know that you're going to close this public hearing, have your work session, but I would actually ask that you wait a couple months to, you know, flesh this out a little bit further. In particular, for me, I think it's important to [01:39:26] know about the utilities, especially with the utility problems we're having now. And I've talked to some neighbors who are interested in an ADU. I personally live in a neighborhood that does not have an HOA. So as a neighbor of somebody who might want an ADU, I would want to make sure that there is not a fire situation with electricity and that there is not a situation with people using the backyard as a bathroom. So I think we do have a fair amount of questions here. But generally, I'm for an ADU ordinance. I would want there to also be a resource information [01:40:02] graphic on the website of what should be available to folks if they're interested in having one or putting one together make it very easy for them to follow the rules and then I would again please please please decide if you're going to do real enforcement for the ADUs that are here before grandfathering them in because there is a safety issue at play and we can maybe disagree on some [01:40:30] of those things but safety shouldn't be one of them thank you thank you anyone else evening tim plebniak um personally i'm against these but the state has already made our decision um my question is um the basement occupancy there's many homes in our city already um you see people one family [01:41:06] walks in the front door another family walks in the back door so okay that's going to be adu so do we grandfather these people in that are using their their house for two dwellings and how do we and once we this takes effect next year do these are these people required to register their house with an adu are they to to try and do this or do we you know where's the enforcement for this and the is it grand are they grandfathered there are many many houses i see them they're in my [01:41:43] neighborhood. I see them around the city. There are many houses where there are several families living in that condition. By definition, then, it's an ADU. So right away, the first thing is ADU is a small building behind the house, but now you're allowing the basement as an ADU. So my question is, we have to decide, are they existing now? Do we grandfather them? Or how do we enforce it? Once this takes effect and we know these people are, these homes are set up like this, Does enforcement go and knock on the door and say, you know, you have to file for an ADU or you're not allowed to do this? [01:42:22] Or is this the whole problem with what is the definition of a family? And that takes us back to a lot of other problems. So that's a big question. I think that has to go to your work session because everyone's talking, ADUs, and like I said, you think it's a little building behind the house, but now you're adding the basement. [01:42:42] So I think you have to really look at what's going on now, what we have, and how that pertains to what we have. I'd appreciate if you would do that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Plovniak. Anyone else? You can come down. [01:43:01] You don't have to sign up. Come on down. Good evening, Madam Mayor and Council. I'm Carolyn Malnick at 8913 Early Street, Rob Nell. I've heard of the ADU. [01:43:18] I knew of it when Richmond was looking at it as a model from Texas when I was flying back and forth. I know of it also where there could be migrant workers, immigrant workers, oil riggers. So conceptually, it's great. I've heard some of the comments, and I'm still dealing with enforcement of issues from bamboo, chickens, water, a legal document on whether I have an easement or not. [01:43:44] So part of my concern, and I think wording really matters here, having dealt the last two to three months with a lot of El Salvadorian churches and kids out of schools, fulfilling my mother's wish in the county and in the city where she taught, and as she spoke here over a year ago, that she had the United Nations. [01:44:03] Sometimes family or families are generation. That's how it was also in West Virginia. You might have your grandparents, you might have your son, you might have your grandchildren. So in some cases, I don't even think we can say it could be families, three or four families. What is the definition of family when it comes to generational and what even what biblical or history or how it used to be with how the family unit was? [01:44:28] So I would just ask also that there be a lot of definitions in time to flush out the codes because I pulled the bamboo code this past week because I got a new species of bamboo. when we allowed where there was bamboo and many of you all on the council did site visits even pam sebesky hal parish was mayor you you madam mayor deferred to pam and we you and i had a wonderful conversation on the phone about the bamboo and there were seven or eight families that all gathered together and we did it the right way now i've got four families contacting me in the last week as well as when carlos was out there to deal with an enforcement code of tall grass [01:45:06] we got a new species of bamboo because we allowed and there was flexibility in the Richmond state code as to whether you had to dig the roots out or spray for seven years and spraying would still be one more year to go but now I've got a new species that I found it from two streets two more houses up because water and seeds and erosion flow downhill so I just say coding enforcement how we define this yes we need to follow state law what richmond set in place and i remember when this model was taken because i was doing a lot of work in texas when richmond started looking at [01:45:42] this but definitions matter commas matter enforcement codes matter and with that i thank you all for allowing me to come late because i'm still taking care of my 90 year old dad and dealing with a water and erosion issue that once again we'll be back in touch and i look [01:45:59] forward to meeting the new legal counsel as well. Thank you, Madam. Thank you, Ms. Miller. Anyone else wishes to come forward? If not, is there a motion? Madam Mayor, move to close the public hearing and having a discussion with staff and rescheduling after July 1st. Second. Motion by Vice Mayor Wolfe, seconded by Councilwoman Vasquez Luna to close the public hearing on this item and schedule for discussion at a later date. Any discussion? Hearing and seeing none, Mr. Smith, please call the roll. [01:46:34] vice mayor wolf yes council member vasquez luna yes council member ellis yes council member smith yes council member lucina yes council member hudson yes promotion period thank you item 4.5 another than last final public hearing for the night amending the fiscal year 2026 budget by budgeting and appropriating seven million dollars of additional sales and connections revenue for electric purchase power costs resolution number r 2026-1098 miss bergeron yes good evening thank you madam mayor members of council we are currently happy new fiscal year in fiscal [01:47:13] year 2027 you'll see that we have a couple of items that are necessary for budgeting to close out the fiscal year 2026 fiscal year this public hearing being one of them state law requires that when you need to amend your budget by more than one percent of the total budget a public hearing is needed the electric fund is in need of an amendment of seven million dollars it is administrative really in nature we have the sales and connection revenue already received and needs to be budgeted [01:47:47] and appropriated officially to pay the purchase power costs and miss davis can answer any further questions on that but we do need to have a public hearing on this item for FY 2026 thank you council members any questions on this item if not the public hearing is now open on this agenda item 4.5 I don't have anyone signed up but if there's anyone who wishes to address council on this item please come forward at this time if not I'll entertain a motion [01:48:27] we have the motion by vice mayor will second by councilman vasquez luna to close a public hearing and vote on this item later in the agenda any discussion hearing and seeing them mr smith please call the roll vice mayor yes council member vasquez luna yes council member ellis council member smith council member of cena yes council member hudson yes motion carries thank you next on the agenda item five ordinances and resolutions item 5.1 is resolution number r 2026-1098 amending the fiscal year 2026 budget by budgeting and appropriating 7 million dollars of additional sales [01:49:04] and connections revenue for electric purchase power costs is there a motion may i move to approve resolution r2026-1098 second hear the motion by councilman vasquez luna seconded by councilman osina to approve this resolution any discussion hearing and seeing none mr smith please call the roll council member vasquez Yes, Councilmember Ocina. Yes, vice mayor wolf. Yes, council member Ellis Councilmember Smith Thank you item 5.2 ordinance number Oh [01:49:39] 2026 - 914 proposed franchise for the purpose of installing operating and maintaining Oh, we did. Oh, we did that right. I'm sorry. Thank you vice mayor. I don't 5.3 resolution number R 2026 - 1099 amending the FY2026 budget by transferring $348,000 from general fund contingency to the social services fund for CSA-mandated expenditures. [01:50:09] Is there a motion? Madam Mayor, I move to approve our resolution R-2026-1099. Second. We have the motion by Councilwoman Vasquez-Luna seconded by, I think, did I hear Ms. Hudson? Or seconded by Ashley Hudson to approve resolution number R-2026-1099. [01:50:28] Any discussion? Hearing and seeing none, Mr. Smith, please call the roll. Council Member Vasquez-Luna? Yes. Council Member Hudson? Yes. Vice Mayor Wolfe? Yes. Council Member Ellis? Council Member Smith? Yes. Council Member Osina? Yes. The motion period. All right. Thank you. Moving forward to item six on the agenda is authorizing a closed meeting, and I'll call on our attorney Mr. Dawson for that resolution. Good evening, Madam Mayor and members of council. [01:51:00] The next item on your agenda this evening is the closed meeting of the council. This item involves the discussion of qualifications of applicants for amendments to city boards and commissions. In accordance with Virginia Code section 2.2-3711A1, this item is eligible for discussion in a duly convened closed meeting of city council. [01:51:25] To convene a closed session, recommend for your adoption resolution r2026-1123 resolution authorizing a closed meeting of city council don't move second we had a motion by councilman osina seconded by councilman vasquez luna to approve resolution number r2026-1123 authorizing a closed meeting any discussion hearing and seeing now mr smith please call the roll councilmember osina yes councilmember vasquez Yes, vice mayor wolf. Yes council member Ellis council member Smith council member Hudson. Yes motion carries [01:52:00] Thank you Mr. Don So immediate immediately following a closed meeting of City Council the Virginia Freedom of Information Act [01:52:37] Requires a certification of by City Council that such closed meeting was conducted in the manner required by law council must certify that to the best of each member's knowledge and only public business matters lawfully exempted from open meeting requirements under the freedom of information act were identified in a motion by which the closed meeting was convened and were heard discussed or considered in the closed meeting of the city council in order to certify the closed meeting this evening i recommend for your adoption resolution r 2026-1124 resolution certifying [01:53:14] a closed meeting of city council madam mayor moved to approve resolution 2026-1124 second we have the motion by councilwoman hudson seconded by councilman osina to approve resolution number r 2026 1124 certifying a closed meeting any discussion hearing and seeing none mr smith please call the roll council member hudson yes council member osina yes vice mayor wolf yes council member ellis council member smith yes council member vasquez yes the motion carried thank you very much mr osina items well we have 6.2 r 2026-1089 making appointments to city [01:53:49] boards commissions and committees thank you mayor uh that uh resolution uh is that the city council approves the following recommendations appoint jan alton to the architectural review board as a regular member for a partial term beginning july 13 2026 and ending june 30th 2029 appoint eric godwin to the northern virginia workforce development as regular member for a term beginning july 13 2026 and ending june 30th 2030 and send the following nomination to the prince [01:54:26] william county circuit court to reappoint jeremy rude to the board of equalization as a regular member for a term beginning july 1 2026 and ending june 30th 2020. second second we - We have the motion by Councilman Osina, seconded by Councilwoman Hudson to approve resolution R-2026-1089. [01:54:51] Any discussion? Hearing and seeing none, Mr. Smith, please call the roll. - Councilmember Osina? - Yes. - Councilmember Hudson? - Yes. - Vice Mayor Wolf? - Yes. - Councilmember Ellis? - Yes. - Councilmember Smith? - Yes. - Councilmember Vasquez-Luna? - Yes. - The motion carries. - All right. Thank you so much for that. [01:55:06] Anything else to come before the council? If not, we are adjourned. Thank you, everybody. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Coraggio Consulting · aguyonx.com