Coraggio Consulting
Prince William Board of County Supervisors Meeting, Tuesday, December 16, 2025

Date: Tuesday, December 16, 2025
Place: Prince William County Board of County Supervisors, Virginia
Length: 9h 43m (video)
Official meeting video (Prince William County, Granicus): https://pwcgov.granicus.com/player/clip/3760
Official Board of County Supervisors page (Prince William County): https://www.pwcva.gov/department/board-county-supervisors

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 2026-10-28. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:07] It is 2 o'clock, and today is Tuesday, January 16th, 2025, and this is our final board meeting of 2025. So before we begin, let's take a moment for a moment of silence.

[00:00:31] Thank you so much. Please stand, if you are able, for the Pledge of Allegiance. The United States of America, to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

[00:00:57] All right, before we go through with our formal agenda, I would like to get a motion to waive the rules of procedure and approve a request to participate remotely through electronic communications means.

[00:01:16] So moved. Second. It's been properly moved and seconded. Any discussion? All right, let's go ahead and take our vote.

[00:01:35] Unanimous. Supervisor Angry absent from vote. All right, I see present on the screen. Supervisor Angry, sorry you're feeling bad, but I'm also kind of spreading out and we're going to be taking up some of your space.

[00:01:59] All right, with that, let's go on to agenda item number four. And, I mean, I'm woman spreading. I'm woman spreading. Get out of my way, Yasli. All right. So, first of all, we have 4A on the agenda.

[00:02:15] Unfortunately, Ms. Willen is not well. So, we are not going to be proceeding with 4A today. So, I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to do 4B and 4C separately. Oh, sorry. Thank you. I'm jumping way ahead.

[00:02:31] before i actually go over there let's do approval of the minutes from november 18th can i get a motion so moved second all right that was a race i'll give it to supervisor stewart in a discussion if not let's go ahead and take our vote supervisor angry vote unanimous all right now we are going to move on to accommodations and proclamations so again for a we are pulling that

[00:03:08] um as the recipient is not well um for b and for c i'm going to do those separately so can i get a motion to commend tenants and workers united second it's been properly moved and seconded any discussion all right let's go ahead and take our vote supervisor angry on 4b motion passes

[00:03:43] six to two supervisors gordy and vega voting name uh right and for c i would like to get a motion so moved second it's been properly moved and seconded any discussion all right let's go ahead take our vote thank you so for 4b um supervisor franklin if you can join me and then for 4c we have a very large group i would like to take a brief recess so that everyone on the day is can

[00:04:21] take a picture um maybe we'll find a way to photoshop you and victor i don't know but um you know we'll figure out something so all right supervisor franklin if you can join me for the

[00:04:31] first one you have anyone here from the united tenant workers you all can come on down good

[00:05:13] afternoon. Tenants and Workers United is a grassroots organization committed to building community power to win social and economic justice across northern Virginia. For over 39 years, Tenants and Workers United has been organizing low-income communities of color to build power through community-led campaigns for affordable housing, health equity, education justice, police accountability, immigrants' rights, and more. Tenants and Workers United has advocated for the creation of the county's Office of Housing and Community Development, the Housing Trust Fund, and the Affordable Dwelling Ordinance.

[00:05:51] Tenants and Workers United does a yearly Summer Youth Institute program in Eastern Prince William County for middle school and high school youth with the goal to provide leadership development, educational workshops, and guidance to ensure student success. Tenants and Workers United also provides education and leadership development to help people become change agents, and proactive civic engagement to secure sustainable systemic changes that advance racial, economic, and social justice all across Prince William.

[00:06:24] Therefore, today, the Prince William Board of County Supervisors hereby recognizes and commends the outstanding efforts that the Tenants and Workers United has contributed to Prince William County residents. So, good afternoon, Chairwomen, Jefferson, and supervisors.

[00:06:46] We're really grateful and honored to be commended today. Our organization has been around for many, many years in the community, working alongside families, communities of color, and youth, doing really impactful work.

[00:07:06] And we recognize that it's not easy work, so we really appreciate being recognized. And, yeah, thank you so much.

[00:07:15] all right the next one for 4c um if anyone associated with this presentation or with this

[00:07:58] um commendation wants to come down yes you can i'm gonna invite you come on down come on folks don't be shy i was wondering why we had such a large police presence and someone reminded me of this commendation thank you madam chair 4c commend fire and rescue personnel police department

[00:08:37] omni ride drivers who evacuated lake ridge residents on november 13th 2025 i'll wait until everyone files in. So I will note for the public, it's probably the safest building in the county

[00:08:54] right now. On the evening of November 13th, 2025, a major gas leak caused by a water main rupture in Lake Ridge necessitated the evacuation of 82 residents. At 9.39 p.m., Prince William County

[00:09:30] firefighters and rescue workers responded to the area near the intersection of Oakwood Drive and Cantonia Place to investigate reports of leaking gas and determined that a three-inch gas line was severely damaged during excavation work, putting residents of 65 townhomes in danger.

[00:09:47] The Office of Emergency Management coordinated with the Prince William Public Schools and Omni ride to provide immediate shelter at Woodbridge High School for 82 people, 11 of whom were children, with additional fire and rescue units providing evacuation and shelter support. The following groups also played a role in assisting the 82 Lake Ridge residents that night.

[00:10:07] The Prince William County Fire and Rescues Hazardous Materials Response Unit, Rehab Units, and Safety and Command Officers. The Prince William County Public Safety Communications. Prince William County Police Department. Prince William County Police, I'm sorry, Prince William County Department of Social Services, Washington Gas, and the Red Cross.

[00:10:24] Therefore, today, the Prince William Board of County Supervisors hereby commends the Prince William County Fire and Rescue, Police Department, Department of Social Services, OmniRide Drivers, and other groups that help evacuate and assist the Lake Ridge residents endangered by the gas leak in their townhouse community on November 13, 2025.

[00:10:42] Thank you so much. We have a number of speakers. I'm going to start with some of us closest. And Chief LaBelle, I'm going to have you take the opportunity to walk over here as well because I know you want to offer remarks. But I will start with you, Mr. Schneider.

[00:11:01] Come on up if you have a few words. Yes, for brevity's sake, thank you all for the opportunity. Unfortunately, our chair could not be here, Supervisor Angry, but I'm really, really impressed by the avatar of his remote participation, so we thank him for that.

[00:11:18] Our operators were about on their way home for the day. They had already put in a full day of work when the phone call came in, so I really want to thank our dispatcher, Kenny Tuitt, who was able to coordinate the resources. Supervisor Melvin Denton, you guys put your hand up as this happens. Melvin Denton, who led the team of Mohamed Mughal, Frank Cardona, and Patrick Daly to the scene.

[00:11:37] And they were able to provide the support. We're thrilled to do it. You know us for our services, but you might forget that we're a two-time Transportation Security Administration award winner for the gold standard, and we love supporting Prince William County. Hi, thank you so much for this honor.

[00:11:57] I'm Kim Stewart. I'm the deputy chief, and I was the acting chief on the day that this incident occurred. And I first want to say that as the closest representatives of the citizens, it's always a very difficult thing for us to make these types of decisions. And in the case of a gas leak, it's not what has happened already.

[00:12:16] The leak is happening. The incident commander is also responsible for what might happen. And that caused people to be in very uncomfortable conditions. We're very glad there was an injury or loss on this incident. But it's still very difficult to be told in the middle of the night, you must leave.

[00:12:33] and they don't get a whole lot more information than that. It's uncomfortable for our firefighters. They have wonderful protective equipment for fires, for blood-borne pathogens, for chemicals, but they don't have explosion suits. They don't have suits that protect them.

[00:12:49] So as they're going in to help the people get out of that dangerous situation, they are also in danger. So I do want to point out this is your amazing team that got that work done. The fire and rescue units, and here is the fire and rescue system. We had units from Noakesville, from all of the DFR, and multiple agencies were involved in this, obviously.

[00:13:14] HAZMAT had a critical role in making sure that we were evacuating and deciding what those distances were based on the science that they were able to provide us. This is a very small part. We had over 18 units dispatched to this. There's 40 personnel that were here.

[00:13:30] This is a very small representation of the number of people who actually were at work at that time. But they're amazing, and I really appreciate this accommodation for them. When they're working and working a large-scale incident like this, multiple agencies from OWL to Dale City are putting in the extra work at night to make sure that the 911 calls don't stop happening just because we're on this one.

[00:13:56] So it really is a system-wide event, and these people did a wonderful job. So thank you very much. Good afternoon. On behalf of the members of the Department of Public Safety Communications, I'd like to thank the board for this positive recognition and for your continued support of public safety professionals who serve the community every day.

[00:14:23] Thank you. Good afternoon. I'm not going to repeat what everyone has already said, But this is one of the reasons that I really enjoy working in Prince William County.

[00:14:38] And it's also one of the reasons I feel safe about living in Prince William County. If you look at this collaboration between OmniRide, the schools, community services, your fire department, your police department, emergency management, and then to have our elected leaders recognize it and say thank you means the world to us.

[00:14:57] So thank you for doing that. And hats off to our first responders who do this every single day. Good afternoon. Chair Jefferson, members of the board, Phyllis Jennings-Hope, Director of Social Services.

[00:15:17] So as you can see, this amazing group of people here. I was the caboose at the end. And so Social Services, when I received the call from Brian, got into immediate action to find shelter for the families. But that is part of the work that we do as a team. We have conversations in emergency management.

[00:15:39] So thank you for the accommodation, and I'm very proud to be a part of the team and to help shelter the families that evening. Thank you. I know that we've listed a lot of organizations. Does anyone, one representative from any organization want to come up?

[00:15:57] I don't know if Noakesville volunteer. All right. I just feel like saying this. Come on down. Don't be shy. No, shyness isn't one of my things. But it's nice to see you all. I know a number of you all were with us last night at Dr. McDade's event, so nice to see you all again here today.

[00:16:14] But I just want to say it's nice to be a part of a long-time collaborative relationship. I'm with the school division. My name is Ron Crowe with Prince William County School of Security. And I want to say thank you to all the people who came before us, because when I walked in the door 30 years ago, these relationships were already established and well-known, and we're fortunate that it continues to this day with everyone you see in the room.

[00:16:35] So when things go sideways, we know the most important thing is to take care of our citizens, and we appreciate the invitation here today to celebrate that. Thank you. I don't see anyone else coming down, so I am going to ask that the board, if we can come out just for a quick picture.

[00:16:57] I mean quick. I know some of y'all like to chat and linger. I know who you are. Hi. And I will come find you. All right, thank you. Let's everyone go out into the atrium for a photo.

[00:17:21] I really appreciate the work that our first responders does, and I really appreciate the people who've come back to the dais.

[00:17:46] we're going to go ahead and move on to the consent agenda. I would like to ask if anyone has anything they would like to pull. I'm going to pull 5J and 5K. Does anyone have anything from the consent agenda that they would like to pull? I don't see anything else, so I would like to get a motion from 5A. Oh, sorry, Supervisor Vega. Oh, I was just going to second. Go ahead. Okay.

[00:18:13] I'd like to get a motion for 5A through 5I. So moved. Second. It's been properly moved and second it. All right. Any discussion on those items? Supervisor Bailey. All right. So then let's go ahead and take a vote for those items. Supervisor Ingrid. Thank you, sir. Vote unanimous.

[00:18:51] All right. The next item is 5J. Can I get a motion to move it forward? So moved. Second. It's been properly moved and seconded. Any discussion? I'm sorry. Supervisor Vega, did you have something you want to say? Thank you, Madam Chair. I did plan on pulling this item myself um i guess my questions are for the county attorney since that is what's listed here on the

[00:19:27] agenda i understand that there are two appeals and an additional uh 17 property assessment cases is that correct madam county attorney madam chair members of the board there are two appeals on the rezonings that are currently before the court of appeals and i believe it is yes um 17 real estate assessment cases that are in circuit court at this time thank you and um where did we come up with the $400,000 number. Is it just an estimate based on the existing funds that have been allocated for other lawsuits, or is there a specific breakdown of how this amount is going to be used for legal fees? It's an estimate going forward for the rest of this fiscal year to

[00:20:07] defend the board's actions. The board voted to appeal the one case, and in discussions with our outside legal counsel, it all depends. There's many variables with the court system, whether the The Court of Appeals is going to remand it back, but this is a guesstimate with regards to litigation fees for the rest of the fiscal year.

[00:20:27] Understood, and that's where my concern comes from, understanding that we still have what seems to be a long road ahead of us. Would you be able to give me an idea as to the amount that has already been spent fighting the digital gateway? I can look into that and get back to you on that.

[00:20:43] Okay, so we don't have that at the moment. And I would just offer this to my colleagues that we are being asked to appropriate $400,000 while still having 17 additional items that are soon going to also probably more than likely need additional funding.

[00:20:59] And at some point, we have to have the tough conversations. Where do we keep going? Which direction do we take? And where do we draw the line in terms of how much are we going to continue to use tax dollars to keep fighting these lawsuits? I also want to know, and I don't know, Ms. Proble, if this question is for you or for somebody else. I'd like to know what the current balance of the Real Estate Assessment Reserve Fund is.

[00:21:18] Madam Chair, members of the board, in discussion with the Finance Department, that fund is used whenever we receive complaints or files against us, whether it's a workers' comp case, whether it's an allegation of excessive use of force by a police department. And that evolves from day-to-day claim to claim.

[00:21:37] And we can work with the county executive and get you an estimate of what it is. But it's very fluid. It changes from day to day based upon the allegations against the county. Those are all the questions I have for now, Madam Chair. I don't have so much any questions.

[00:21:53] You know, I've made my stance on this case clear, and I just want to be consistent. So I will be voting no. If there's no further discussion, let's go ahead and take our vote. Supervisor Ingrid, motion passes 5 to 3.

[00:22:18] Supervisors Gordy, Vega, and Chair Stewart voting nay. Chair Stewart? Thank you. Thank you. I've been Wheeler. I've been steward. I've been, you know. At least no one can say I don't have a good sense of humor.

[00:22:35] All right. So we are going to go on to 5K. Before we go on to this one, so I have had conversations with Manassas Airport. And they did have some concerns about the second part of this and supporting a name change for the airport from Stafford Regional Airport to Washington Executive-Stafford Regional Airport.

[00:22:58] airport so i would like to split the question i would like to go ahead and i would ask for a motion unless there's any discussion or dissension to approve the amendment to stafford regional airport authority agreement to extend the term of agreement to february 28th 2070 so moved any

[00:23:21] discussion all right let's go ahead and take a vote vote unanimous all right thank you so very much we are now going on to agenda item number six and that is the public comment time i'm sorry oh yes what's the question i'm sorry and then before we go on to that um we are going to have to take a vote um to support a name change for the airport authority for the airport from stafford

[00:23:59] regional airport to washington executive hyphen stafford regional airport now i should i should ask our proletarian, Andrea, if this is something we do not support, should I ask for us to deny it, or do we support it and just go ahead and vote it down? What's the claim?

[00:24:19] We can defer it, but we don't... I mean, it's going to be a date uncertain. I know a lot of people are uncomfortable with that. Okay, we can defer it to a... Madam Chair, I move to defer this to a date uncertain. Oh, discussion. Do we have a second?

[00:24:34] Second. All right. Now that we have to defer this to a data uncertain supervisor vega yeah i'd like to know the reason so i had conversations with some folks from um you know my appointee and some others from the manassas regional airport they are also looking to do a change um they had some feelings that this might be trying to get ahead of what they're looking to do and it really is that peace washington executive they felt that there might be some confusion i have not had discussions on with anyone from stafford airport no one has come to me about this but in speaking with manassas airport they had

[00:25:14] concerns and i would like to have time for all of us who want to have a discussion to have a discussion about that to learn what's going on with the manassas airport given its proximity and the changes that they're looking you know installing commercial service that's going to have a pretty big impact i think a more significant impact on our community so that is why i would like to go ahead and delay this i'll let tom elaborate or expand all right supervisor gordy yeah thank you madam chair um both uh supervisor beg and i uh attended a meeting with uh with uh

[00:25:50] county exec uh shorter and deputy county exec q um yesterday and and that topic came up about their name change as well and i think for personally i think we need before um uh you know again no one's come to speak to me about this particular issue um but we have been speaking with the manassas airport officials and i would like for us to get our ducks in a row as it relates to manassas airport and i think that's something that'll probably be coming sooner rather than later and then once we have that we we just we just want to make sure that we get our thing right before we

[00:26:29] kind of paint ourselves into a corner um with with stafford so um that's just my position and and that's why I'm happy with deferring at this time. All right, anyone else? And I appreciate it because I've actually had the opportunity to go out there and have discussions with them.

[00:26:48] I don't want to get into the middle of this because, again, we haven't spoken to Stafford Airport, and there is a lot of things happening literally right in our backyard, or maybe perhaps it's better to say the little donut hole within our county. And so until we have more information, yes, I definitely agree with delaying this to a date uncertain.

[00:27:10] Any further discussion? If not, let's go ahead and take our vote. Thank you, Supervisor. Vote unanimous. All right, thank you. Now we get to public comment time.

[00:27:26] I'm just so excited and enthusiastic. All right. And I've got a sheet. We've got a few people signed up. I see some new names. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to call everyone up in groups of five. Please state your name and the magisterial district where you reside.

[00:27:44] You don't need to give your address unless you want us to show up for lunch or dinner. Up there, you're going to see a screen. It's going to be a timer. You have three minutes. So I'm going to call the first person. I think it's Leslie Main, Carrie Lee Carrington, Deborah Madsen, Susie Morstein.

[00:28:13] You may begin. Hello, county supervisors. My name is Liesl Main, and I live in the Occoquan District. I'm a musician, and I play with 70 to 80 other musicians who live throughout Prince William County.

[00:28:34] The groups I'm in perform all throughout Prince William County, from Gainesville all the way down to Woodbridge. I'd like to speak today about item 11C, the motion to dissolve the Prince William County Arts Council. I'm deeply concerned that the action being taken is in haste.

[00:28:54] And I want to explain why the Arts Council matters, not just to me as a local musician, but to the volunteer arts groups that serve this county. My first and most serious concern is the lack of notice and transparency. According to the agenda history, item 11C was added on December 9th, just one week before this meeting, and I understand that even members of the Art Council's own board were blindsided by this proposal.

[00:29:23] I play the oboe in the Prince William County Band, and it's an all-volunteer, non-profit ensemble, and I also perform in a woodwind quintet called the Quinwins, which operates under that band's umbrella. The Arts Council supports groups like ours not just through funding access, but through coordination, promotion, partnership, and institutional knowledge.

[00:29:48] For example, the Arts Council has helped facilitate rehearsal and performance space, including discounted access to school facilities and community venues. Eliminating the Arts Council without a clearly defined operational replacement could make rehearsal space and concert programming more difficult and more costly for our group.

[00:30:09] It would also limit our ability to provide free concerts for the community. My quintet has performed over 30 free concerts in the past few years, and that's in addition to the 15 to 20 concerts that the Prince William Community Band has put on.

[00:30:27] And we've performed at senior centers, assisted living communities, churches, and also at county community events. One of our recent performances at the NEBSCO Community Day was facilitated directly by the Arts Council. These connections don't happen automatically.

[00:30:45] They happen because there is a central county-supported body making them happen. And Arts Alive is another example. This festival showcases everyone from small volunteer ensembles to large orchestras along with dance and visual arts groups from across the county.

[00:31:01] It takes months and months of planning and extensive volunteer coordination. The Arts Alive is a public asset built through long-term stewardship and turning it over abruptly to a private model risks disrupting continuity and eroding community trust.

[00:31:19] The Arts Council is also currently helping us plan a woodwind workshop for middle school and high school students, an educational opportunity that would not exist without their coordination. If improvements to the Arts Councils are needed, then they need to be addressed through reform and not sudden dissolution.

[00:31:36] There needs to be a viable replacement in place. Thank you so very much. Good afternoon, Chair Jefferson and members of the Board of County Supervisors. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak today.

[00:31:53] My name is Carolee Carrington, and I am the current elected chair for the Prince William County Arts Council. My role has also included being on the Arts Council board for the past eight years.

[00:32:09] I am also the founder and CEO of Read with Carolee. I want to state with the utmost respect that I am disappointed regarding the current proposal for the dissolution of the Arts Council.

[00:32:27] Neither I nor the membership were notified of this proposed resolution. This lack of engagement is concerning, particularly as I have for months sought the opportunities to meet with county leadership and discuss the challenges facing the Arts Council and possible solutions.

[00:32:49] Many of those requests have gone unanswered. While the resolution asserts that the current Arts Council structure is insufficient to advance the arts programming, I emphasize that dissolving the County Arts Council would remove public oversight, transparency, and equitable access.

[00:33:10] As a privately operated model, without county oversight inherently risks excluding artists, organizations, and community members who rely on the fair and inclusive process of the Arts Council.

[00:33:26] The Arts Council currently serves 69 dues-paying members, which includes private artists as well as many organizations, and manages an approved budget and supports the growing arts community.

[00:33:44] These facts demonstrate not failure, but the need for collaboration, guidance, and a thoughtful reform. Programs like Arts Alive and the Seafelt Awards have longstanding value as a public benefit and they deserve stewardship that includes accountability.

[00:34:05] I respectfully urge the board to pause the resolution and engage directly with the Arts Council leadership and its members. Reform is possible, but it needs to be done with the arts community around it and not excluding us from this process.

[00:34:25] The dissolution of the Arts Council at this time, without discussion or transparency, risks undermining the community and the creatives that we serve. - Thank you, next speaker please.

[00:34:51] You may proceed. - Do I speak now? - Yes. - Nobody points to me, okay. Good afternoon, I'm Debbie Madsen, and I am a former elementary through high school music teacher in Prince William County.

[00:35:10] If you're sitting and you can't see me and you want to turn around, that's okay because I'm used to being at the front of the room. So today we are dealing with the possibility of ending the Arts Council.

[00:35:26] And I know I have a lot of friends in the room today, and I'm sure you will hear various things from various people. My thought is that I'm in agreement with the first two speakers in that this proposal appeared very suddenly.

[00:35:44] When I was working on and was a board member of the Arts Council and the leader of one of our small groups, if I wanted to have a meeting, I had to announce it publicly a certain amount of time ahead of time so that anyone could attend the discussions of those at that meeting.

[00:36:06] or those meetings. As I was leaving the house today, my husband, who's also in the band, got an email that this was going to be brought up today. My proposal is that you listen carefully to all the people who speak. I think perhaps a pause is a good idea. I'm the mother of a ballerina, so I know some of the ballet stories. And if you don't know the story of Sleeping Beauty from having been to the ballet, you may have seen the movie as a child. Sleeping Beauty is supposed to

[00:36:42] die when she pricks her finger. But I think in the ballet, it's the Violet Fairy arrives and changes that to falling asleep. So I don't know if we can propose a little more time to consider what we're going to do with Sleeping Beauty here.

[00:37:07] I know your jobs are difficult, but I think you need to hear from people. You talked about the large presence we have here today. The bands, the choirs, the orchestras, the dance organizations, the arts organizations, the people putting on plays.

[00:37:31] We could not fit them all in this room, nor in that room, nor even throughout the building. We're representing a lot of people. So that's really all I have to say. Please think carefully about this decision today.

[00:37:48] And if there's a way to postpone it or get input or develop a small group that can help and advise you, perhaps that's a possibility. That's all. Thanks. Before you leave, just say where you reside because you didn't say that at the top.

[00:38:06] And then I'm going to have Carolee say. I'm from Mr. Angry's part of the world. I'm from Neabsco. Okay. And then Carolee, if you can just go say where you reside. I'm sorry, you have to say that again. I'm asking Carolee now if she can go to the mic and say where she resides, because she also didn't mention that. Okay. Well, we're just passionate, and we forgot where we were from.

[00:38:27] Thank you, Madam Chair. I am Carolee Carrington from the Gainesville District. All right, thank you. I've got to get better with that. That's one of my New Year's resolutions. All right, say your name, say where you're from. Originally, I was from Ohio, but I have lived in Prince William County since 1980, And I live in the Coles District, which has been there for 40-some years.

[00:38:49] My name is Susie Morstein. I have been involved with theater probably since I came out of the womb, or so my mother has said. But when I moved to this county, there was not very much to do when it came to theater. And so a few friends of mine, we got together and we created Prince William Little Theater.

[00:39:10] As of October, we are 41 years going. Right from the very, very beginning, the government of this county has had a grant system that has supported us. And up till just last year, we still continue to get great things from the Arts Council.

[00:39:29] And we have a lot of great programs that we have because of the grants that we receive. Now, I am here because I am a member of and the director of Prince William Little Theater. But I also speak on behalf of all the arts organizations.

[00:39:46] I agree with all the ladies who spoke before me. A little history. There used to be an organization called the Cultural Arts Federation. And they were sort of what the grants were funneled through. And it worked very well for many years.

[00:40:02] And then we got up to like 22 members, much less than what we have now. And the Arts Council, the Park Authority, decided that it was best that they take over the granting and facilitating. And from that then became the Arts Council.

[00:40:18] So it has been a continuous thing. I do hope that, as the young ladies that spoke before me, because I am the old person here, that you take time to think about it. Artists are very special people. We think differently.

[00:40:35] I am married to an attorney. He has the greatest left brain I've ever seen. But I am all right brain. So we kind of work together really well. So I hope that you will listen to some of these people who really believe in what they do because they are volunteers.

[00:40:53] Prince William Little Theater is a total volunteer organization. Most of these organizations, people do them because they love what they do and they don't expect anything out of it except some joy and to give back joy. And now I'm going to give you back your 45, 44 seconds.

[00:41:10] Thank you very much. Thank you. I don't know if Deborah Madsen wanted to speak, but if so, oh, shoot, okay, Deborah, okay. So then Leslie, okay, all right, just didn't mark you. Rom Thompson, Herb Williams, Don Lotharions, D-A-W-N, oh, Donnell, and Susan Dahmer.

[00:41:47] One of you may step up. Ready when you are. You may proceed. Okay, thank you, council members, for having us here today. My name is Bob Thompson. I am the current president of Prince William Little Theater.

[00:42:04] I work with Susie almost on a daily basis. We are members of the board. As she mentioned, Prince William Little Theater is 41 years old and growing strong. We have been, and I believe, an original member of the council going back 41 years.

[00:42:22] We are a dues-paying member. The process of this, again, I disagree with the fact that it kind of came up suddenly. I didn't know anything about it, being the president of the board and the company, that people started calling me going, Bob, did you know about this?

[00:42:40] This is happening tomorrow. Can you get there and say something for us? I was surprised. I look it up. I had someone send me the resolutions. I am surprised. Now, I know there has been problems. I've been to several of the Arts Council meetings, having a very good standing with them.

[00:42:58] I did find there were some issues and things that can be worked out. As a member of several boards, I've been a theater member for over 30 years, and I have been on corporate councils as a senior art director and a marketing person.

[00:43:14] So I know that there are problems, there are flow issues, there are communication issues, but I feel that this was, I don't know how far back this goes with you all, but for us to hear about it now is a little upsetting. My thought is I'd like to call for a delay so it can be properly discussed so that we, the arts members, can be included in this.

[00:43:39] As I see it, it's almost a done fact, and I'd like that fact to be researched. It would be very important. I'm told that the money will keep coming. The grant money will still be there, and we will still get it. My worry is when the council is dissolved, what's the process going to be?

[00:44:00] form a new one, start from scratch. I know it comes from the Park Authority, and I appreciate that. I know they're, I trust them, but I wonder if this process has been thought through enough because we depend a lot on this money, the grant money. As you said, we're volunteers. We're constantly begging for sponsors, patrons, anybody to come and help us overcome expenses and put on the kind of art that we like to put forward to entertain the county and its residents, and

[00:44:33] residents outside so on that point I feel I again like to call for delay and discussion on a public basis somehow to really look into this and avoid an arts meltdown in the county and again thank you for your time before you what magisterial district are you see I knew that was going to happen I live in Manassas but I am Nicole's district okay thank you thank you all right next speaker please. Hi, I'm sorry. I'm Susan Domer. I need to switch because I have a concert at 3.30. What's

[00:45:10] your name? Susan Domer. I live in Manassas, but I've been a Prince William County teacher. I was a choral director for 35 years. What magistral district, Manassas? No, I'm so sorry. City of Manassas. City, okay. Yes. I'm a member of the board member on the Arts Council. I'm also chair of the Arts and Education Committee, bringing arts to the students and students to the arts.

[00:45:31] In fact, we have Friday a group from Patriot High School coming in to Art Factory to do an art gallery tour and an acrylic art painting demonstration and make and take, if you will, with an artist from this area.

[00:45:47] I would like to thank you for your continued support of the work of the Arts Council for so many years. I've only been a member. This is my fourth year. Once I retired, Manassas Corral said, hey, you're not doing anything on Tuesday nights. Why don't you go? And I said yes, because I love the arts and I love the expression and ability to have for people to just grow as human beings.

[00:46:10] You give the many, many volunteers who love the arts an opportunity to serve and to share the arts in our community. I would ask that you listen carefully to the speakers today. I've heard some statements that I totally agree with about the Arts Council.

[00:46:25] I think that we have room to grow together, to work together as the board of the Arts Council, Board of Supervisors, and anyone that can help bring forward what needs to happen in order for the Arts Council to continue. Thank you. Next speaker, please. You can adjust it. Okay, thank you.

[00:46:55] My name is Herb Williams, and I am resident of Woodbridge. Chair, members of the board, and county executive and members of the public. Before I speak about the resolution to dissolve the Arts Council, I need to speak clearly and directly about myself because decisions like this are being made without the full truth of what happened and my name has been used without my voice on numerous occasions.

[00:47:28] My name is Herb Williams. I'm a professional arts administrator, educator, and performer with over 35 years of experience. I accepted the role of the arts recreation specialist in 2022 because I believe that Prince William County was ready to build an arts ecosystem that was equitable, visible, and intentional and not symbolic.

[00:47:53] I did not walk away lightly and I did not walk away impulsively. I walked away because remaining would have required my silence in the face of practices I knew were wrong. For early in my tenure, I began to encounter conditions that directly obstructed the work I was hired to do.

[00:48:18] Programs that were approved by my immediate supervisor were later removed without explanation. Volunteer leaders and Arts Council members were dismissed, talked down to, lied to, or undermined. Efforts to engage youth, emerging artists, and underrepresented communities were slowed and discouraged.

[00:48:39] I was repeatedly questioned for taking initiatives while being given no meaningful pathway to advance the work. At the same time, I was asked to maintain the appearance of progress. That, in this moment, I realized something critical.

[00:48:59] The issue is not capacity. The issue was not structure. The issue was will. I did not, with what I believe as a responsible county employee, should do. wasn't capable of doing in that situation. So I worked around it. I documented concerns. I raised questions. I reached out to supervisors, not to secure or to accuse anything, but to explain.

[00:49:32] I offered solutions grounded in professional experience. I worked beyond my paid hours. I represented Prince William County in regional spaces and returned those resources directly back through the Arts Council because integrity mattered to me. There were only two supervisors that I was able to have a listen to gain audience with. One by telephone, which was a 45-minute conversation with Supervisor Bailey. The next was Supervisor Angry, who sat with me on a Saturday,

[00:50:06] on a Sunday, and then previously after that on a Sunday, on a Saturday. There comes a point in public service when you must decide whether your role is to comply or to protect the mission. I was told directly by the director overseeing the Arts Council that it was his hope that the Arts Council would fizzle out. I apologize. Seriously, our timer went down, so I had to time you from my phone, so you've gone over the 30 minutes, but thank you. So I apologize. Thank

[00:50:39] you. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and Supervisors. My name is Dawn Horizons. I live in the Woodbridge District. I am elected on the Arts Council of the Vice Chair of Programming, also the appointee of Occoquan District Supervisor Kenny Bode. Today I speak on behalf of myself and my position as someone very involved in the arts and arts community with my own business, as well as being a poet, a writer, and an author, and have sat on the board for the past two years.

[00:51:18] I want to speak to the lack of notice and transparency of the request for this disillusion on the agenda. We were not notified as an executive board of the Arts Council nor as a member of the Arts Council.

[00:51:35] And having to participate as vice chair of programming in any meeting that we have with a small group or council group or any changes, the notification that is required with three to five days business days notice, we were not given any type of notice like that. I also want to speak to the lack of communication with us as a board regarding the Arts Council with whatever issues that have been going on to come to this point of dissolution. I do agree that there have been several issues with the Arts Council, especially within this past four to six months, but I never thought that it would be something that we could

[00:52:13] not work through, talk through, and come to some type of resolution. I would like to ask for a wait or delay in this dissolving of the Arts Council and see what we can do to bring it together. I think the roles and responsibilities need to be better defined and also to take a look at the charter as there were some mistakes in that. For example, the one that I have, it still said tourism, but it was being handled by Department of Parks and Rec. So I just want to request that there be a delay in the dissolution of the Arts Council. The Arts Council serves a great purpose

[00:52:52] in this community, and I have been working hard with the members of the Arts Council and Kenny Bodie to spread the word about the Arts Council because still so many residents in Prince William County are not aware of the Arts Council and the work that we do, but they want to be represented. I had the opportunity to participate at Victor Angry's Community Day.

[00:53:11] I did a tent in the park to let residents know about the Arts Council, and it was wonderful. So many people learned about the Arts Council, and I got to give away all the chachkas to the people in the community, and they wanted to know how they can be a part. So it would be very sad to see this go, and it is something that is definitely needed.

[00:53:31] I think that if we put our heads together, we can make it better than it ever has been. Thank you for your time. Thank you, and I'd like to have Kelly Hanklau and Jill Norcross. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members of the board.

[00:53:59] My name is Kelly Hanna-Clau, and I'm a Prince William County full-time artist and CEO of Minor Miracles, president of Art of Life Charities, an all-volunteer Prince William County-based nonprofit, 501c3, current secretary and Brentsville district appointee for Supervisor Gordy, and I have been volunteering with the Arts Council in several capacities since 2018, and I've been in the county in the Brentsville District since 1998.

[00:54:24] I am taken aback, as everyone here has mentioned, by the total lack of transparency in communication and plans, especially plans, regarding the motion to dissolve the Arts Council in less than two weeks from today. This is an important council that's been around for decades.

[00:54:40] The Prince William County Strategic Plan, which is mentioned in this motion, states enhance opportunities for engagement and communication between the public and the county government, Fostering dialogue, feedback, and follow-up to promote the shared goals of trust, understanding, and transparency, including formalized response time and metrics.

[00:55:00] This was not done. The Arts Council Chair and Executive Board were not consulted at all. The dissolution motion states, whereas the county arts community is growing at a fast pace. Question, where are the data and metrics provided for this statement?

[00:55:15] The motion also states the existing Arts Council is not conducive for nimbly advancing arts programming and education at the pace and scale appropriate for a community the size of Prince William. Did you know that each year the Arts Council is allocated only $65,000 for the entire county programs and is denied funding by DPR for proposed ideas recommended by the Arts Council?

[00:55:40] Each year, the unused money goes back to DPR for whatever non-art-related projects the director feels it should be used for. The motion states, creating an opportunity to explore a new organizational model to accelerate the county's strategic plan goals.

[00:55:57] Do you have a copy of the new organizational plan model? What part of the strategic plan are you referring to as you are accelerating by dissolving the council? The strategy or the strategic plan reads, innovate and localize how the county communicates, delivers, and engages the dissolution of the motion of the Arts Council states transitioning all county art events to a private entity.

[00:56:19] I could go on, but I wanted to say that I was recently voted as the public arts task force person as I've been on a track to try to get public art in our county for years, since about 2022. but I've learned from DPR that can't even happen until we have a public art policy in place. We can't even have public art, rather, until that public art policy is in place, which won't happen until at the earliest, 2027, which doesn't align with your strategic plan. As county supervisors, if you do not have the answers to these questions and more, which I don't have time to tell you about, then you cannot in good faith put this motion forward. This motion should be denied,

[00:56:57] and there should be discussion with the Arts Council team, DPR, and the board, and I wish that Director Seth Handler-Voss and the team were here today to address this important thing. Thank you. Thank you so very much. Next speaker, please. Yes, good afternoon. My name is Jill Norcross, and I'm the Executive Director of the Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance. So thank you for the opportunity to speak today and show support for Item 11B, which is the resolution to address housing attainability fast-track measures. As we know, the Board of County Supervisors passed the housing chapter of the comp plan just over three years ago today and we know you've been

[00:57:33] working hard to address housing affordability by approving the affordable dwelling unit ordinance and the affordable housing fund and the guidelines to support that fund which we know are two best practices but we know this work has been patient and slow and more is needed to be done so I commend your consideration to look at additional methods to fast track or green tape housing projects that address housing affordability. So before you, our seven initiatives ranging from using land owned by faith communities, to accessory living units, to tiny homes, to using county-owned land

[00:58:10] to help develop attainable housing. So just wanted, we are seeing this happen in other jurisdictions, so appreciate that Prince William County is also taking a look at it. I think it really has the potential to really help address some of our housing affordability issues here in the county so thank you for the time thank you so very much we don't have anyone signed up i do ask everyone to make sure that they have a seat if you're going to be in board chambers not my rule fire marshal um i'm now going to go to remote public comment time supervisor bailey thank you very much madam chair are we ready to start uh good afternoon yes we are good afternoon

[00:58:49] shall we begin yes ma'am our first speaker will be uh miss sarah viola miss viola you can begin please hello i am sarah viola and i reside in the brentsville district um i am current i am a braemar resident and my family and i are fortunate to own a home that backs up to the open wooded space within the community the proposed dominion energy blue line will destroy the land and place power lines incredibly close to my private backyard i'm here to say to ask you to exert your authority and tell Dominion Energy that you will not approve the easements for the Route 5

[00:59:29] blue line transmission. We need you to wait for Dominion Energy to file with the SCC in 2026, or it will be too late. 70% of projects filed with the SCC are approved. The best time to stop them is before they are filed. We know that you have said no to Dominion before. In fact, that has happened twice. The board stopped Dominion for the Carver Road project in 2017 and Hornbaker

[01:00:07] proposed routes forcing Dominion to find the other route. Route 5 goes through county protected open space in Braemar as well as goes through protective conservation area on Patriot High School grounds. Route 5 also goes through county parkland and this will destroy these areas whether they're above or below ground. If buried, these will cause even more devastation or place a line in between a natural gas and oil line, which is very, very dangerous. If above

[01:00:40] ground, these towers will cause approximately 30% lower property values as well as being extremely close to our backyards. Route 5 will also be very close to Kentridge High School and T. Claywood Elementary School. All of these areas listed above are under the county jurisdiction. In order to move forward, Dominion needs you to grant easements across these areas along the Route 5 blue line. You as the board do not have to grant these easements. You as the board can say no to

[01:01:16] Dominion Route 5 blue line now. Thank you very much. Thank you, Ms. Viola. Next speaker, please. speaker is katie gardner miss gardner please begin hi oh let me get my camera on sorry um good afternoon board county supervisors thank you so much for allowing me to speak with you today um so i am katie gardner i live in bristow so that's the brentville district and i too am here to talk about the uh urging you to just to stop dominion energy's proposed blue line

[01:01:54] I speak today with perspective as a mother of four and a proud military wife. My family chose to live in Prince William County three years ago was when we moved here after much research, and I've loved every minute of living here in Prince William County.

[01:02:15] I've lived all over the country, and honestly, I can say Prince William County to me is like the closest to heaven. It's really great, and I love it so much, but I feel like that vision is about to shatter if this proposed power line route gets approved, the blue line one. And I'm really worried about it even reaching the SSC.

[01:02:35] So as many have spoken before, behind where I live is a bunch of woods where my children spend their ages 4 to 11, spend their entire summers. They're often out exploring, building, simply experiencing childhood as it should be.

[01:02:52] But this blue line will destroy this natural habitat, eliminate their safe outdoor space, and put hazardous, noisy industrial eyesore right where they used to play. They'll kill the wildlife, slash our property values, and limit my children's option for outdoor play.

[01:03:09] We cannot allow our taxpayers' dollars to fund this expensive extension cord for data centers. This project prioritizes a corporation's temporary needs over a long-term well-being of citizens that you guys represent.

[01:03:25] I implore you to consider this long-term impact on our community. As of now, my family plans on extending my husband's four-year assignment with the Space Force to try to live here longer because we love it here so much. But if these towers are built, I see no other option than moving away once his assignment ends, which absolutely breaks my heart.

[01:03:46] I have recommended Prince William County to so many fellow military families, and I believe that this is a great place to live. And if corporate needs are deemed more important than citizens, then I feel like I can no longer recommend this area. Prince William County risks not just losing my family, but damaging its reputation and jeopardizing future military-connected school enrollment and funding.

[01:04:11] We believe that you have the power to stop this now before Dominion follows with the SCC, and we are desperate and can't do it without you. Supervisors, I urge you to vote no on the blue line and protect our community and our children and the high quality of life that makes Prince William County so special.

[01:04:27] Thank you very much. Thank you, Ms. Garner. Next speaker, please. Our next speaker is David Sandstrom. Mr. Sandstrom, please begin. Hi, I'm David Sandstrom. I also live in the Braemar, Bristow, part of the principal district.

[01:04:44] So, again, I'm here talking on the same line issue, the blue line. And I work from home several days a week. My window looks out on a beautiful tree line and the home's on Naughton Court behind me. And if Dominion comes in, they're going to destroy these trees and they're going to destroy the habitat.

[01:05:04] I walk, I run, my children walk and run along these paths and in the parklands and the roadways here, and it will be ruined. I get up in the morning, when I walk around in the morning, I see deer, coyote, fox, raccoon.

[01:05:20] We have endangered toads around this area. The blue line will destroy that. So I'm very concerned about that. I'm concerned about my neighbors on Naughton Court. I am from California when I went to high school and college. I've seen the devastation wildfires cost, but I've seen what happens after the fact when the vegetation and the trees are gone, the landsides, the homes on Naughton Court are on hills.

[01:05:44] And if the trees are gone, what's going to happen with the weather erosion there? When I went to a Dominion Valley meeting, they said, oh, the roots are still there. Dominion roots are biodegradable. Those will go away at some point. My final thing I want to bring up is we commended the first responders for the efforts they did in Lake Ridge with that gas leak.

[01:06:08] And I commend them. That is a dangerous, scary situation. But what we are talking about here could happen. Think about it. Dominion Energy wants to put a high-intensity power line right between two highly flammable gas lines.

[01:06:26] What if that same situation were to happen here in Bristow with all these homes, with these schools, and an ignition system for flammable gas? This is not safe for our families and our neighborhood.

[01:06:42] Now, I've been told that Dominion Energy will ask the recommendation of the Board of Supervisors, in particular our representative for the Brentsville District, I don't know if this is for or not, this is what I've been told, for recommendation of which line to take. Now, I don't like any of the lines.

[01:06:58] I know it affects everyone, including my supervisor, but we have the power to say no. As Board of Supervisors, you do have a power to either say no or not recommend, not give them the easements. And so I please, we need you to not allow Dominion Energy to move forward.

[01:07:18] I would prefer none of the lines, but I can only speak to the blue line because of my concerns about the effect on the environment and the safety issues, again, that we have. And then, you know, again, you commended first responders. I don't want them to have that risk here.

[01:07:34] Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Sandstrom. Next speaker, please. Next speaker is Steve Amato. Welcome, Mr. Amato. Please begin. Good afternoon, board members, Madam Chair. I'm Steve Amato from the Occoquan District. My remarks...

[01:07:49] Could you speak a little louder, sir? Sure. How is that? Can you hear any better? Yes. Okay. My remarks this afternoon are going to address item 7-A, the Adopt Local Foundation and Soil Management Fund Ordinance Countywide.

[01:08:05] Why is the board considering to use taxpayer money to support private and commercial foundation repairs? Yes, I understand the state has passed the bill and the governor has signed it this year. But this initiative needs to not be supported.

[01:08:24] The majority party on the Board of County Supervisors has been touting housing affordability for the past two plus years. So now, with the passage of this ordinance, if it's passed today, property owners will be taxed more to fund an additional initiative, this foundation's repair initiative.

[01:08:46] this initiative counters the majority party's housing affordability awareness because again property owners are going to be taxed significantly more to fund this initiative foundation repair companies typically have financed vehicles for property owners to have their repairs funded i'm familiar with this as i recently had foundation repairs completed on our home now the board is going to be a financial institute to fund private and commercial foundation repairs someone will have to manage this program. So now the county will want to add more FTEs in the

[01:09:24] future budgets to which is a permanent cost because there's going to have to be tax on property owners to pay for these new FTEs and their perpetual benefits. My additional concerns are why should the Prince William County government take on the role to be responsible for repairing the private and community commercial property in the county we can say no is this grant free money or is it a low interest loan how and what accountability safeguards will be established

[01:09:59] to ensure fairness transparency accuracy and inspection of repairs this is the draft ordinance and there's nothing in there about accountability and how to keep people accountable foundation repairs are the responsibility of the homeowners, developers, and insurance companies to fix, not the Prince William County. I urge you to vote no for item 7-A. I know this ordinance has been brought up three times in 2025 already before the board, so I urge you to vote no on this. Thank you.

[01:10:34] Thank you, Mr. Romano. Next speaker, please. Madam Vice Chair, there are no more speakers. Thank you very much for your help. Madam Chair, back to you. All right, thank you so very much. That ends our public comment time. We are now going to go on to agenda item number seven, and that is public hearing.

[01:10:54] Just waiting for the list. All right, so I'm going to go ahead and open the public hearing, so we do not have any speakers in person. Do we have anyone online? Yes, ma'am, and we have two people, so I see.

[01:11:14] Madam Vice Chair, we have nobody online at this time. Thank you. Okay, thank you so much. All right, so we have no one in person, no one online. I'm going to go ahead and close the public hearings for 7A through 7I. I am going to take, I'm going to separate out 7A because I know there's going to be a robust discussion on that, and I'll take that at the end.

[01:11:37] Does anyone have anything else that they want me to separate? Madam Vice Chair? Yes. Is the public hearing closed? I did not hear. Yes. It is closed. I'm sorry. There is actually one person online to talk, if he can still do so.

[01:11:54] I will go ahead and open the public hearing to accommodate the gentleman who is available online to speak. I can't hear. They're muted. I can hear you, Chris.

[01:12:11] I'm just... Hold on one second. Is he allowed to speak? I'm sorry. He is. Okay. Go ahead, Mr. Jack Waldman. Go ahead, Mr. Waldman. Hi. Can you hear me okay?

[01:12:28] I can. Thank you. Okay. For a second there, I thought I was going to be cut off. Yes, I'm Jack Waldman. I'm from the Woodbridge Magisterial District. Thank you for the opportunity to speak today. I appreciate the Board of County Supervisors and the county staff efforts to advance the ordinance to establish the soil and management fund.

[01:12:52] It's a meaningful and necessary step to help our community and others across the county address urgent soil instability concerns. In the conditions, if the conditions in our community are left unabated, they will continue to worsen.

[01:13:08] We have seen this before. The last time a similar situation occurred, the slope fell catastrophically and one home was ultimately condemned. It's important to extend that this is not an isolated incident. There have been three slope failures in the same vicinity of our common area.

[01:13:25] The first occurred in 1996 while a developer made some attempt to repair the damage. Neither the HOA nor the county was able to verify that the work was actually completed. The second failure occurred in 2007 adjacent to the original area, and today we're facing another failure in the same location first impacted in 1996.

[01:13:46] At the board's meeting on July 8th, we hear concerns about the use of public funds for what were described as private issues. I respectfully offer another perspective. Homeowners relied in good faith on the county's oversight and approval process, which reviewed and approved grading, stormwater systems, soils reports, inspection, and issued certificates of occupancy.

[01:14:11] Residents were not in a position to evaluate the complex geotechnical decisions or verify whether the developer properly repaired a known instability issue. That reliance is fundamental to the partnership between the county developers and the communities they serve.

[01:14:31] The current conditions, slope instability, inadequate compaction, persistent drainage failures are not due to homeowner neglect. Further, these deficiencies are causing erosion and uncontrolled runoff, threatening the watershed, public safety, and the broader community beyond individual properties.

[01:14:52] For these reasons, we believe the public investment in slope stabilization, foundation remediation, and watershed protection is not only appropriate, but necessary. We respectfully ask the board to consider some modifications to the ordinance, structure the fund to accept contributions from propers and grants or other mitigation programs, and allow for multi-year grants with an annual funding cap by the project limit.

[01:15:23] We thank you and appreciate your leadership for a recognition of the challenges we face are not private failures, but the result of processes that did not fully protect our community and a developer who failed to properly repair a known issue.

[01:15:41] Thank you, Mr. Walden. Vice Chair, we have no speakers this time. I apologize. Oh, no apologies necessary. Thank you for your help. Madam Chair, back to you. All right, I'm going to go ahead and close the public hearings for 7A through 7I.

[01:15:59] What I'm going to do, because, again, I know 7A is going to have additional discussion. Does anyone else have, and I'm going to pull that off, and we can get that to the end. Does anyone else on the dais have anything else they want to pull off? Yes, Supervisor Bailey. I'd like to pull item 7G.

[01:16:20] Is this something that you're going to vote against or something you want to highlight? I had some questions. You have questions? Okay. Yeah, I do. All right, so I would like to get a motion for 7B through 7F and 7H and aye.

[01:16:36] So moved, Madam Chair. Second. It's been properly moved and seconded. Any discussions just on those items? All right, if not, let's go ahead and take a vote. Supervisor Angry. Aye.

[01:16:51] Thank you, sir. All right, I'm going to go out. Vote unanimous. Sorry, I am going to go back to 7A. First, may I have a motion, or are there any questions? Does anyone have any questions?

[01:17:07] No, for our staff. All right. Supervisor Bailey, I'm sorry, Vega, you have questions for us. Yes. I'm not sure if Ricky or who's going to answer questions. If I can't get it right, we'll get one of the others to get up here and give it a try.

[01:17:31] Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. While I understand the reasoning behind the request here before us, I obviously have concerns. I've raised those concerns from the very beginning. I do appreciate staff working to answer some of my questions, not all of them, because this is very much fluid.

[01:17:48] And while I still don't believe that it's ready for primetime, here we are today. The first question that I want to ask is, does the county currently regulate soil for soil suitability or geotechnical standards and land use approvals? Yes. It does. It's a short answer. Okay. I can get to some more background if you want a more technical answer than yes.

[01:18:08] I do. Thank you. Madam Chair, members of the board, Kitab Shamud, Director of Public Works.

[01:18:23] Yes, a geotechnical report is always required as part of the submission. And what does that consist of? I want you to elaborate a little bit more in terms of what it consists of. The soil conditions, the stability of slopes, the water table of the soils, the characteristic of the soil, all of that is important for the design of a retaining wall, a structure, or something like that.

[01:18:48] Those are very, very important information. Thank you. And then since when has the county been practicing this? I have to go back to, I think, 2003. 2003. And what criteria specifically, refresh my memory again, was used for the arbitrary decision in terms of which homes qualify for this?

[01:19:22] You mean as far as the ordinance? Yeah. Which home qualifies? We're still working on that, But we're looking at, you know, foundation, impact to foundation, impact to slopes that may impact other structures such as a road, such as a stream, such as other development maybe.

[01:19:41] And, you know, those are the criteria that we'll be evaluating really to make decisions on later on. No, no, no. I'm referring to the decision that was made that the eligibility is for homes built between 10 and 40 years old. What's that criteria? You said you're still developing it?

[01:19:57] Well, the time frame of when we are going to consider evaluating proposals, is that what you're saying? It's 10 to 40 years. The 10 years is because, go ahead. I'm sorry. Yes, Supervisor, thank you for the question.

[01:20:15] So as I recall at the last hearing, there were a lot of questions relative to what data we had in relation to this. So after that board meeting, we went back and did an ad hoc report. we look back 10 years and over the 10-year period we had approximately 74 foundation repairs done across all magisterial districts in the county so an average of 70 a year the average age of those 74 permits was 37.1 years so the justification to go to 40 is what we're really talking about

[01:20:52] as latent defects and who would be responsible or who would help. And so based on that ad hoc data, the conclusion was over 10 years, the average age is 37 years. It would be appropriate to go 10 to 40 years. So that's how we got to the 40 compared to our previous recommendation was, I believe, 10 to 20. Thank you for that. And your position is, because you said in terms of responsibility for repair? Your position is here today that the county bears responsibility in assisting

[01:21:29] homeowners to repair this matter? I would say that's your decision. Well, staff is recommending approval and for the board to move forward, and so I'm asking staff if that's the recommendation, is that your position? The position is we have a state law in place that allows you to make the decision to adopt an ordinance. Correct, and that's where I'm going. It is a recommendation, and that's the reason for my question okay madam chair members of the board I don't think anybody is saying that the county is responsible for any defects out there for these various properties I think what staff is recommending is that the general assembly allowed the state code as a discretionary

[01:22:07] alternative for the board to do and if that's the board's prerogative as mr. Mays said to go forward with it but I don't think anyone on staff is saying that the county is responsible for any issues involving these properties thank you madam chair and i understand what the general assembly passed um would you like your next block of time supervisor vega yes okay however it is my position that um we are being guided in a certain direction and i just want to make sure that we don't blur the lines and that we're very clear as to what this board may get ready to approve um as you all know um i conducted a survey because

[01:22:45] it is important for me to understand where people in prince william county are not just in the Coles District in regards to this. My position doesn't stem in being in opposition to this initiative being moved forward because I understand the intent. Prevention, and I offer this to my colleagues and to those here in chambers and watching at home, is in fact a public responsibility, which is why I led with the opening question that I did. However, fixing private property matters is a private one, and that is the issue that I take with this, that I believe that this is a private matter and while the general assembly has granted localities the ability to enact such an ordinance

[01:23:21] i do not believe that it is in the best interest of the county to use uh tax dollars to pay for private matters it gets uh very muddy very quickly in regards to where the where do we draw the line um are we then you know going to be subsidizing roof replacements uh hvac repairs uh who knows driveway crackings if the argument can be made that it is deemed to be structural i also want to offer to my colleagues that when we were going through the situation with the great oak community a request was made a request was made that the county pay and purchase equipment to measure noise

[01:23:55] and it was quickly shut down because of the precedent that it would set i asked my colleagues are we going to open that door for a similar matter if we deemed that it was not appropriate then how do we justify an issue that has clearly been pushed on county residents by decisions made by this governing body um not appropriate then appropriate now and so madam chair for for those main reasons i would ask that uh if perhaps we can table this matter for a later time um or if we can just flat out in my opinion uh deny this request altogether i don't think it's appropriate

[01:24:31] for for the county to be using public dollars uh to fix what in my opinion is a private matter i think that the approach that we need to take is an approach where we are working with the developers and where we're holding them accountable to ensure that these problems don't continue to happen. And if they do, that they then pay their fair share of the pie in addressing these concerns and paying for these repairs down the road. So are you asking for a, suggesting that you'd like to make a motion to defer this or to table this? What is it that you are asking for? I am willing to meet halfway. I don't mind tabling it so that we can have further discussions and make sure that

[01:25:09] we certainly tie loose ends but um if that's not uh something that's agreeable to then i would certainly well then make the motion let's see if you get a second i move that we defer that we table this matter madam chair second all right we're probably moved and seconded in a discussion supervisor franklin i just want to clarify that we've deferred this before we've been working on this for several years and i'm not in favor of deferring madam chair if i may supervisor vega Thank you. And the reason for the deferral was because it was not ready for prime time.

[01:25:41] And again, my position is that it's still not. And I would ask the majority of my colleagues to support my motion to table this. Supervisor Bailey. Yeah, if I could, please. I just need clarification again on this because we have talked about this over and over again. Before we take the vote, I just want to make sure that I clearly understand what this is.

[01:26:00] This is alignment with the state code that has been put forth that we're trying to achieve. But we're not voting to say that we are actually going to make a final decision on this matter. Ricky, can you just kind of explain it?

[01:26:18] I don't know that part that you just said. Well, let me rephrase my question. We were given a directive to look at the new state code that was passed in the General Assembly. That's the alignment. We were given a directive to look into that to propose an ordinance for Prince William County to be able to use this.

[01:26:35] So that's the alignment I'm talking about. That's how we got here. Okay, and going forward, what are you asking for now? We have now brought the ordinance forward for your vote in consideration. For the alignment, but it does not say that we are going to take care of everybody's property if we vote on this today.

[01:26:53] That's what I'm trying to understand. It's an application process, the scoring criteria, so on and so on, and then those applications will come to the board, and the board would vote finally on who was funded and who wasn't. Okay, that's clarity for me. OK, was was available to be used. OK, that's clear. I want to make sure that I'm clear here.

[01:27:12] So the board is voting on an ordinance today. Yes. So and there's later on in the agenda, depending on how the board reacts to this ordinance, a request to transfer funding to a fund.

[01:27:28] So we are now what will come after is an application process where individual homeowners will essentially apply. We will, based on this ordinance, come to the board when it is time to make a decision. But the action that the board is taking right now is in ordinance.

[01:27:46] So we are creating an ordinance. So this is the final. So Supervisor Vega, did you have something you want to say? Because you're still in my queue. Okay. Well, there is a motion, but I don't know if you want to speak on it because we are doing discussion. Okay.

[01:28:02] So does anyone else have any comments or discussion? If not, I will go ahead and take the vote on motion to table discussion. Anyone else? All right, I'd like to call for the vote, please. Madam Chair, just to clarify, this is to defer the item. This is to table it.

[01:28:18] Yes. It is Supervisor, yeah, you have Vega and Gordy. Supervisor Angry. Supervisor Angry just told me that his computer is shutting down automatically, so he may have to log back on.

[01:28:42] So he may miss this vote. Yeah, he messaged me as well. The motion fails two to five.

[01:28:59] Supervisors Bailey, Bodie, Franklin, Stewart, and Chair Jefferson. All right. So the motion to the table has failed. Would someone like to make a motion to move this forward? It's been properly moved in discussion. Any, I mean, properly moved in second. Any further discussion?

[01:29:19] Madam Chair. Supervisor Vega. I just want to go ahead and enter into the record that we had over 300 people partake in our survey from every single magisterial district and that everybody that partook overwhelmingly opposes their private tax dollars being used for this private measure.

[01:29:35] And I do want to let my colleagues know what that looks like. And so you have people that participated from Brentsville, Coles, Gainesville, Neabsco, Occoquan, Potomac, and Woodbridge. We do have the purple there listed. Those are folks that did not want to share what their magisterial district was.

[01:29:51] But, again, it is our responsibility to ensure that we put good forth public policy. And although the General Assembly may have allowed localities to do that, I do not think that it's in the best interest of the taxpayers of this county. And when we get to the actually allocating of the funds, I'll be discussing more about that and my reasons for that as well.

[01:30:12] Supervisor Franklin and Gordy. You were in queue. You're gone. All right, Supervisor Gordy. Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, Supervisor Vega. You completely agree. I had a meeting with the community last night about roads and about their private road failing.

[01:30:35] Are we now going to open up the door to going into communities throughout the county and paving private roads? Because when those roads were built, the rules that the county had at the time were very different than they are today. And it's not just the roads.

[01:30:51] We're talking about the culverts underneath those roads are failing. That's now a health and safety issue. Can the fire and the police get into those communities? So I think we're opening up Pandora's box, and this is going to end up being something that we're going to have more and more people come in for different types of assistance because of things that we learn things over time.

[01:31:13] but i will tell you when i moved to prince william county in 2007 my realtor said stay away from the potomac the soils are not good down there this has been known for 30 40 years no no the soils the soils yeah the water's good good fishing the soils below the the fall line um you know you get above the fall line a lot of rot below the fall line a lot of sediment and that and that's why it moves uh and it shifts and so um but but none nonetheless uh just the very act that the fact

[01:31:50] that we are going to offer government uh uh funds to address a private matter is i believe we're opening up a pandora's box here uh and i don't think that's the right direction that we ought to be going and so i will not be supporting this thank you all right i don't have anyone else in

[01:32:13] MOTION PASSES FOUR TO THREE. SUPERVISORS GORDY, STEWART AND VEGA VOTING NAY. THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH.

[01:32:38] WE ARE NOW GOING TO GO BACK TO 7G. SUPERVISOR BAILEY, YOU HAD QUESTIONS? I DO INDEED. MADAM CHAIR, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ACKNOWLEDGING ME. OH, THERE YOU ARE, ALEX. I JUST HAVE A QUICK QUESTION, AND IT'S BECAUSE I DIDN'T TALK ABOUT THIS WHEN THE PRESENTATION was given to me i want to make sure first of all i'm very excited about this and i will move forward the vote but i want to make sure that as we are establishing and building this drive-through that this will not interfere with the traffic flow that we've been talking about as it relates to

[01:33:15] the school forest park and then the new fire station this has nothing to do with that interest way that we're working on as well? Supervisor Bailey, Chair Jefferson, Alex Venegas from the Planning Office. Supervisor Bailey, we did work with the applicant and did look at the any potential traffic impacts. All of them are being mitigated either through the conditions or the route that they chose through the development. So we're confident that it should not impact any of the

[01:33:50] development and outside of the flow okay the the SUP we just look primarily at the special use permit area for this application they did provide conditions we worked with the applicant and the applicants representative and we're comfortable with the conditions okay I appreciate that yes ma'am okay with that

[01:34:18] I'd like to move forward item 7G, please. Second. All right, it's been probably moved and seconded. Any discussion? Any further discussion? Seeing none, let's go ahead and take the vote. And Supervisor Angry, are you back up? Okay. Unanimous. Supervisor Angry absent. All right. Thank you so very much. We are now moving on to agenda item number eight, and that is county executive time. Mr. Shorter, the floor is yours. All right. Thank you very much, Madam Chair, members of the board. Good afternoon. I want to start this afternoon's CXO time off with a brief

[01:35:03] demo um as many of you probably know our office of planning uh and i want to invite director washington down uh or she's already there to talk about this did a very uh creative uh job with building an online dashboard for build-out analysis so i wanted to have her demo uh that analysis of the dashboard today just really to show again the board and the public really what what sort of work is happening in the planning office.

[01:35:34] So with that, Tanya, I'll turn it over to you. Thank you so much. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the board, Tanya Washington, Director of the Planning Office. We are very excited to be here today to provide this demo of the build-out analysis, the updated build-out analysis. The build-out analysis estimates how much residential and non-residential development could be built in a county under the maximum extent allowed under zoning.

[01:36:00] And one of the particularly exciting things about this build-out analysis is not only do we have updated data from the last time we completed the build-out analysis in 2021, it is now in an online dashboard format. Our previous build-out analysis reports were done annually as written reports with illustrations and tables, but they were basically a snapshot in time.

[01:36:24] And in preparation for doing this update, I asked our team, can we turn this into a dashboard SO THAT WHENEVER THE BOARD APPROVES NEW LAND USE CASES OR OTHER ITEMS ARE UPDATED THAT AFFECTS THIS DATA, THIS DATA CAN BE UPDATED THROUGHOUT THE YEAR.

[01:36:39] AND SO WE NOW HAVE, AGAIN, THIS FULLY ONLINE DASHBOARD IS VERY INTERACTIVE WITH DATA TABLES AS WELL AS MAPS. Mr. David McGettigan, who's our deputy planning director, will walk us through the demo, but first, before we do that, I'd like to give a shout-out in appreciation to John McCleary and Frank Hunt on our GIS team, which is part of our county-wide planning division.

[01:37:04] They are here to help answer any questions as well, as well as a shout-out to Dewitt, who worked with us to build out the build-out analysis dashboard. So, take it away, David. All right, thank you, Tanya. And our build-out analysis is a publication that we've done for many, many years.

[01:37:26] It was a PDF document, very colorful, static, though. And this is an opportunity to bring it into more interactive format where we can get to interactive maps and download data. And it's also a lot of automation and programming went into maintaining this.

[01:37:47] Thanks to Frank Hunt of our office. And so this is much easier to update and will be updated on a regular basis now when zonings are approved and when existing units, occupancy permits are reported out so that we can, on a quarterly basis, update the existing construction.

[01:38:17] So, this is the main page of our build-out analysis. You can get to it from the planning page. It also has its own URL, pwcva.gov/buildoutanalysis, all one word. And that will get you to a page that will lead you to the build-out analysis.

[01:38:35] This was done in ESRI's ArcGIS platform, online platform. And we have, first on the right, several things that tell you what the build-out analysis is, how to use the site, terms and definitions, some frequently asked questions that we'll build out as we get those questions in.

[01:38:54] And we encourage the public and everybody who uses this to let us know if there are any questions, anything that needs fixing or tweaking or additional things you want to see.

[01:39:09] Again, this is our first use of this product. We do hope to expand it to track more things as in later phases of development. There is an email address at the bottom to submit any comments about the build-out analysis, and we welcome those.

[01:39:29] The build-out analysis is in three buckets. I like to think of it in three buckets. We have the existing information, existing dwellings construction. We have the zone but not built yet.

[01:39:44] So this is something that has zoning approval. We know how many units or approximately how many units or how many square feet are going in for commercial or retail or industrial uses. And so this is a list of cases.

[01:40:00] We call it sometimes the residential inventory, the non-residential inventory. So that's the zone but not built yet. And then the third bucket is things that are planned but not zoned yet. So the comprehensive plan is a guide for growth and development, and it has areas that we're looking for redevelopment or new development that haven't been zoned yet to the appropriate zoning.

[01:40:23] So those are the three buckets. And as something gets rezoned from bucket one, the planned and not zoned, It automatically is going to show up in the zone but not built. And then once it's built, it will be quarterly updated with that information.

[01:40:43] So we can see off the bat that there's 160,000, 170 existing residential dwelling units in the county right now based on our occupancy reports. There are a potential remaining to be built, based on the comprehensive plan, 54,542 more units.

[01:41:04] In terms of non-residential gross square feet of building area, we're currently at 92.8 million square feet. And the potential build-out of the comprehensive plan is 148.8 million square feet.

[01:41:20] Now, that doesn't mean that by 2040 we'll have all of this. This is just the total capacity shown in the comprehensive plan that could be built. There's no timing associated with this from that standpoint.

[01:41:38] The build-out analysis also has then some charts and pie charts and graphs to show you percentages of the different types of lands that make up the build-out analysis. pipeline and build out capacity we also have as well we have an interactive map that has polygons of these and this data is available on the county's portal data portal for use so gis users could

[01:42:13] download this data if they wanted to read it and manipulate it we can zoom in on the map and click on activity center areas there's different layers that you can turn on and off from activity centers to residential inventory cases where things have been zoned but are are not built or currently have still things to be built on there's a table associated with all this table it can be exported to an excel spreadsheet and has information not only of the zoning district the number of units

[01:42:51] that have been approved how many are built so far how many are remaining to be built this is useful to developers and others to find out where our land is that they could maybe purchase and and develop or that's already has the zoning available or or to to rezone they can by being able to download this you can filter and sort it and summarize uh you can sort by magisterial district and look up the case numbers so if you wanted to find out more about that case

[01:43:30] you could go to county mapper and look up that particular case and with that i'll be happy to answer any questions all right supervisor vega thank you madam chair uh first off i think this is great i was actually thinking about issuing a directive so directed directive avoided um but i did want to ask where do these numbers places in regards to cog projections because i know that at one point um a big push if you will for not just the affordable housing component but just housing in general in Prince William County was driven by those cog numbers so where are we in regards

[01:44:07] to those numbers and and where we are today so um in relation to again this is a a shows our capacity so in relationship to the capacity of the county's comprehensive plan to accommodate our growth we can accommodate our growth out to 2050 based on the cog projected growth out to 2050

[01:44:30] Um, that is, um, maybe the extent of the relationship, the COG projections, uh, were, uh, most recently, um, updated, but they are, uh, give a timeframe to when our growth is, and, um, that is not in relation to the build-out, though it does guide, uh, the build-out does guide our, uh, distribution of population in the COG model that's used for transportation.

[01:45:01] modeling and used for air quality monitoring and other kinds of planning exercises, including regional water supply planning. So there's many uses for the COG data, and this is something that helps us develop and refine those projections and where the growth is going to go in the COG model.

[01:45:23] Okay. Thank you for that. I've been playing around with it as you've been talking up there, and I'm looking at the non-residential inventory summary. do we have anything specific, an interactive map specific to data centers in the county? No, but that certainly is a phase two that we can look at adding to the build-out analysis to show where data centers are, and I know that we are working to that end.

[01:45:51] Great, another directive avoided. Can you talk to me about the timing of that phase two interactive map for data centers only in the county? Supervisor Vega that is an effort that requires coordination with other departments Such as development services, which again for the planning office, you know, we handle the entitlements But when it comes to building permits, what-have-you that's under development services, and so there's already conversations underway working with deputy County executive Wade Hugh and other departments towards producing an interactive map that and that includes all of the data center related

[01:46:28] data that we have but we don't have a range in terms of timing the time frame at this point we would have to get back to you on that okay i look forward to it thank you supervisor gordy um uh also just applaud for this uh for um for this tool i've been playing around with it for the past few weeks looking into it and uh trying to manipulate some of the numbers uh to try to understand, you know, uh, at least from the Brentsville district perspective of, of, you know, what the potential is and what, you know, even just taking a look at like a one land, the 10

[01:47:06] acre lots, um, and trying to understand, you know, how many of those could get built. Um, and so, you know, just looking at how we can, um, uh, you, uh, leverage it for calculations for trying to understand within a, within a certain area, what is the build out potential for that? Um, I've just really been enjoying learning how to use the tool, and I know I've got to spend more time on it.

[01:47:31] But the one thing I did want to go back to was the affordable housing, because in each and every one of our developments that we have, most of them have affordable units that are part of it that become entitled. Are you, including in your phase two, kind of helping us track through that the number of affordable units that were approved and that we're part of the process and sort of helping us track how we're working towards meeting that goal?

[01:48:01] Because that is going back to COG and as we were going to the comprehensive plan, you know, we set a target. And then how are we doing to meet that target? So will that be embedded in this as well? That is definitely something that we are considering. And there actually have already been discussions with the housing office, our office, and development services.

[01:48:20] In fact, we had a, for the planning office staff, we had a training this morning on the affordable dwelling unit ordinance that all three of our departments provided that training because we all play different roles in implementing that ordinance. And as a part of that, using that as a way to really kind of get our ducks in a row to be able to track the different ways that the county gets affordable housing units.

[01:48:44] So again, you know, we track it through the entitlements. have that data but looking at the other mechanisms through buy right projects you know other existing projects and so that is something that again we've we've already been discussing and the build out analysis is certainly one place where we can map that and there are other venues where the county is asked to provide that data so we will be looking at you know how we can put those tracking mechanisms in place so that we can track the various ways we get affordable units moving forward which ones have committed affordable units because, again, that's another sort of distinction,

[01:49:23] which ones actually stay affordable for a period of time so that we can continue to track it and then to figure out whether it's through the build-out analysis and or other venues where we can provide that data so it can be transparent. Okay. And then my last question, and this may be more of a phase three,

[01:49:43] But as we update the targeted industries list, don't get too excited, Christina, as we update the targeted industries list and we start looking at, you know, the types of zonings that work for those targeted industries, sort of having an overlay to know what's available for those targeted industries and kind of pulling all that together as a tool to help us as we're talking, you know, it's like, look, we know we have X amount of acres for this type of industry, this type of zoning, whether it's M2, M1.

[01:50:12] in order to meet that need of whatever that targeted industry is, I think that would also be a great benefit. But, again, looking at probably more of a phase three approach. But that's all I have. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Thank you so much. Supervisor Bailey.

[01:50:28] Thank you, Madam Chair. I applaud also. This is great, excellent news. It also enables us to create vision. And as interpartementally you get together, it helps us create vision for the future for our county.

[01:50:47] But the question that I had was something that you mentioned, Director Washington, about buy right. Does this help us also to better assess or better predict with buy right, the buy right pieces of property that we have?

[01:51:03] How do we, because that's always an opportunity for us. So thank you for the question, Supervisor Bailey. Yes, the residential inventory then is a list of everything that's zoned and not built, and that's what the buy right is.

[01:51:22] It's been zoned. It already has the ability to develop in however many units or however many square feet through the zoning process already, we call them the entitlement for that piece of property. So you can look at each rezoning case, how many units are left to be developed and see what that by right number is for all those rezonings in the county that can be developed by right.

[01:51:55] And will that be compatible with the data center information that Supervisor Vega asked you about? Will that be integrated in that also? Well, there is already a non-residential inventory that lists all the rezonings that occurred and how many square feet are left to be developed on those cases.

[01:52:14] So we can look at now what can be developed. The data centers can go in lots of different districts, but other uses can also use this tool to look for land that zoned appropriately for their use.

[01:52:31] But when you look at an individual case and look up an individual case, you'll be able to tell what the data center is, how many square feet it is, if it's a data center, or if it's not associated with any data center as well.

[01:52:49] You can tell that from looking up the rezoning case. For a majority of the cases that are listed in the non-residential inventory, Some cases were from blanket industrial zonings that were done in 1958 when they created the zoning map.

[01:53:07] So those types of cases you're not going to know other than the total floor area ratio and therefore the square footage that would be allowed in that zoning district. But as far as a use, it can be any use that's in that zoning district.

[01:53:24] Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Supervisor Bode. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Ms. Washington. Thank you to the planning team for putting this together. I know that I've also been someone who's been asking about the build-out analysis for a while, so thank you for doing this. I appreciate the conversation about there being future phases.

[01:53:41] Now, I was playing with it earlier, and I'm going to just say this right now, is in the mixed-use T6 Potomac Mills activity center, there's a dwelling potential of 6,342 units. That makes me very excited. I'm sure it makes Christine excited, too, what we can do there. My actual question is, and David, you probably remember this, when we adopted the comprehensive plan a couple years back, we allowed there to be some residential allowed in the office mixed-use designations.

[01:54:13] However, as I at least look at it right now, in the office mixed-use T's, county-wide, in all of them, right now the dwelling unit potential is zero for all of them. So could you talk a little bit about how that jives, knowing that we did add some residential allowances in there?

[01:54:32] Yeah, I believe it was a small percentage. Certainly, we've wanted to be consistent with the comprehensive plan. So that's something we'd go back and look at and see if we should assume some residential growth in the OMU.

[01:54:50] But again, it was a smaller percentage of that particular designation. But certainly we can go back and look at that. Appreciate that. Thank you so much. All right. I don't have anyone else in queue.

[01:55:06] Thank you so very much. I mean, this is exciting. It's fun to kind of geek out and play around because there's so much data at our fingertips. And, I mean, it looks really good. It looks very, very good. So thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you, Director Washington. To you and the team, the GIS team, thank you all for the great work.

[01:55:24] Two directors issued, Madam Chair, last week when we were together, staff was directed to research, review, and evaluate the provisions of the state code section, which allows for the creation of local economic revitalization zones, and the section which provides a partial tax exemption for properties within the designated redevelopment conservation areas or rehabilitation districts, all with the purpose of providing recommendations on the establishment of a local economic development revitalization zone ordinance. This directive was assigned to the Department of Economic Development and Tourism. The staff was also

[01:56:02] directed to bring a resolution to the board to dissolve the Arts Council, which we did today. That resolution, that directive was assigned to the Department of Parks and Recreation, and it will be closed today, given the agenda. There were no directives closed during the week between last meeting and this meeting. Madam Chair, I wanted to take a moment, if I can, just to recognize Michelle Serdom. She is retiring this month. She served as the county's director of

[01:56:37] public safety communications and has served this community for 36 years. 36 years. I want to just recognize her, thank her for her service to Prince William County and for seeing us through really a generation here in the county. All kinds of technological changes and other changes in the County, and she has been here. I would like to say she's the voice behind the voices, those who call 911. I'd also like to take a moment, because this is his last meeting with Prince William County,

[01:57:10] I'd like to recognize our Deputy County Executive, Dan Alexander. Dan has been appointed, as you know, to be the next City Manager for the City of Fairfax. We are going to miss him here. I appreciate all his service and work. He has been a pioneer in that he served as the first deputy county executive for the Safe and Secure Community Quadrant. So, Dan, thank you. Thank you for all that you've done for the county. And I want to thank, I want to make sure that I recognize,

[01:57:47] let's see who else, if there's anything else. All right. Well, finally, I want to make sure that I think and recognize, Steve Austin. Steve has come out of retirement to serve as the acting Deputy County Executive for Safe and Secure Community while we search for permanent. And he has done this really, he has served in this community for a significant amount of time. I personally called to ask him to come back and really appreciate that he has taken the opportunity

[01:58:27] to come back and continue to serve this community. So, Steve, thank you very much. And with that, I will close, Madam Chair. All right, thank you so very much. And let's move on to agenda item number nine, and that is county attorney time. Madam Attorney, the floor is yours.

[01:58:44] Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the board. This afternoon in closed session, we will have several items. The first is consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members pertaining to the discussion or the consideration of the disposition of publicly held real property, along with the accompanying consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members regarding specific legal matters requiring the provision of legal advice by such counsel pertaining to land use and electric energy, electric power regulatory law, to include legal advice on proposed energy projects, including but not limited to the Dominion Energy Noakesville to Bristow 230 kilovolt project

[01:59:21] and the Morrisville to Wishing Star 500 and 230 kilovolt project, where such consultation, discussion, or briefing in an open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position, negotiating strategy, or litigating posture of the public body. We will have consultation with legal counsel, briefings by staff members pertaining to the discussion concerning an economic development item regarding an expansion of an existing business or industry where no previous announcement has been made of the business or industry's interest in expanding their facilities in the county, along with the related discussion or consideration of the investment of public funds for economic development matters where competition or bargaining is involved

[01:59:57] where if made public initially, the financial interest of the county would be adversely affected, along with the discussion or consideration of the disposition of publicly held real property. All were discussed in an open meeting would adversely affect the litigating posture. bargaining position, or negotiating strategy of the public body.

[02:00:13] We will have consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members pertaining to the discussion concerning an economic development item regarding the discussion or consideration of the investment of public funds for an economic development matter where competition or bargaining is involved, where if made public initially, the financial interests of the county would be adversely affected, along with the discussion and consideration of the disposition of publicly held real property, all where discussion in an open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position, litigating posture, or negotiating strategy of the public body, consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members pertaining to the discussion concerning an economic development item regarding an expansion of an existing business or industry where no previous announcement

[02:00:53] has been made of the business or industry's interest in expanding their facilities in the county, along with the related discussion and consideration of the investment of public funds where economic development matters, where competition or bargaining is involved, where if initially made public, the financial interest of the county would be adversely affected, all where discussion in an open meeting would adversely affect the litigating posture, bargaining position, or negotiating strategy of the public body.

[02:01:18] And finally, personnel discussions and considerations relating to the hiring of a new director for the Office of Human Resources, work consultation, briefing, or discussion in an open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position, litigating posture, or negotiating strategy of the public body.

[02:01:34] These items are appropriate for closed session pursuant to 2.2-3711A13568 of the Code of Virginia. Move for approval. Hold on, Supervisor Gordy. Madam Chair, before the Board votes on authorizing and holds the closed meeting, I need to declare a personal interest regarding the Dominion Energy Noakesville-Bristow 230-kilovolt electric transmission project.

[02:01:58] My home is located in the vicinity of the project study area. As property owners in proximity to the project study area, my wife and I are members of a group which is affected by this matter. I will be participating in this matter because I am able to do so fairly, objectively, and in the public interest.

[02:02:15] All right. Thank you. We have a motion. Now, can we get a second? Yes. Move for approval, Madam Chair. Second. All right. Let's go ahead and take our vote. Aye. Thank you, Supervisor Ingrid. Vote unanimous.

[02:02:30] All right. Thank you so very much. Dang, Victor. I appreciate you for staying in there. All right, we're going to go to Mr. Shorter for agency time. Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. So with item 10A, we just talked about it as the board adopted the ordinance for local foundation and soil management earlier in the meeting.

[02:02:56] This is the transfer budget and appropriate item, and we are asking for the board's consideration. All right, I don't know if there are any further questions for staff. If not, I'd like to go ahead and get a motion to move 10A forward.

[02:03:13] Second. It's been properly moved and seconded. Is there any further discussion around this? Supervisor Vega. Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to, again, reiterate that the staff report explicitly states that reoccurring costs for the Foundation and Soil Management Fund that will need to be included in the annual budget are unknown at this time.

[02:03:32] Also, the report warns that annualized programs costs will be driven by community interests in the program, which could significantly be more than the initial $200,000 transfer that is being asked from the contingency fund today i think that we can all assume that that's just to kick this off but that the ask is going to be much much greater than the 200,000 and lastly the ordinance clearly states that the board is not required to budget in or appropriate funds to the fund each year relying on voluntarily annual appropriations could lead to the fund being empty or unable to meet demand if the community interest is high again madam chair to my colleagues I don't think that this is ready.

[02:04:13] There's a lot of unknowns and a lot of things that, in my opinion, we can still figure out and make sure that there is true transparency and accountability in how these funds are going to be administered once that time comes. Lastly, I do have one question, and the question is, assuming that this will pass, which more than likely will, when do we anticipate that the fund will be semi-operational or operational altogether to start receiving applications?

[02:04:42] We are into, oh, Ricky, please. I'll try this again from Madam Chair, members of the board, Ricky, Deputy Director of Development Services. We're looking to, if the seed money is appropriated, the applications would start May through July of 26, with the applications then coming to the board, all the applications that are submitted coming to the board in September of 26, because August, I think you're on recess.

[02:05:16] So that will line us up to bring everything to the board in September with our scoring and then top score wins kind of thing. Thank you. All right, anyone else? All right, if not, let's go. I'm sorry.

[02:05:33] If not, let's go ahead and take our vote. Supervisor Ingrid? Aye. Aye. Thank you. Motion passes 6-2.

[02:05:49] Supervisors Gordy and Vega voting nay. All right, Mr. Schroeder? Thank you. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Very excited to invite Christina Wynn and the Economic Development and Tourism team up, Madam Chair. Consistent with the strategic plan presentation that the Board saw the last time we were together, just very excited about the completion of the Workforce Development Study and all the work that has happened up to this point.

[02:06:18] So whenever we can get the presentation up, I will turn it to Christina Wynn. Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair Jefferson, members of the board, Christina Wynn, Economic Development and Tourism.

[02:06:34] I'm really excited to be here today to talk about our workforce presentation. As you know, economic development, our main mission is to create jobs and attract businesses and retain those businesses.

[02:06:52] And when we look at what companies, their main criteria, their initial criteria when they're looking for a new location is always about workforce. That is top on the list.

[02:07:07] And as skills and demand for workforce has become even more competitive amongst companies, it's been more important to focus on workforce in economic development.

[02:07:28] And so, as Mr. Shorter mentioned, workforce is spelled out within our strategic plan, And this study is going towards being responsive to that.

[02:07:44] Last year, well, I'll put it this way. During the pandemic, we had to quickly stand up a lot of workforce-related programs because employment had gone quickly, had gone high. And we were doing that. We did not have any existing staff people that were focused on it.

[02:08:04] So everybody was kind of doing workforce development. And, um, but in this fiscal year, the board, um, thankfully had given us a position. And so now we will, we're in the process of hiring our work, a new workforce position that will be dedicated to, um, workforce and which this is super crucial, um, for moving this forward as background, um, in August of 2024 with the ARPA monies, um, we went through an RFP process and we hired tip strategies to perform an analysis of workforce development in Prince William County.

[02:08:43] And so why did we do this? There are so many workforce players in this landscape. Everybody does a little piece of, whether it's on the training front or with attraction or skills development, and all of these organizations do just pieces of this.

[02:09:06] And so we allocated the $100,000 from the ARPA fund to get this study. We hired tip strategies, and we were focused on, okay, if we're going to be in this space, what should we focus on? We didn't want to duplicate services.

[02:09:22] We knew that we were not going to have a lot of resources that was going to be available for this. So what are those areas in Prince William County that we could carve out and do really effectively and optimize whatever resources that were provided?

[02:09:39] So the scope of work was looking at those strong partnerships and key stakeholders. It also did an extensive demographic analysis, really looking at our labor force, our skills, what's in demand, what is oversupply, and it looked again at our barriers that affect our employment and career advancement, and then most importantly, it made strategic recommendations on how we could implement a workforce program here in Prince William County. And so with that, I'm really

[02:10:17] excited to introduce Tom Stellman. He is the CEO and co-founder of TIP Strategies, and he's joined with Erica Colston today, and then Clarice Grove, you all know her, she's my senior business development manager, and she's been managing this project, so with that, take it away, and you can raise this up if you need, and thank you very much, everyone, as Christina mentioned, I'm Tom Stillman, and we as a firm are an economic development and workforce development

[02:10:56] strategy firm. They're fortunate to have been in business for 30 years. And we do work all over the country. And I happen to be based in Austin, Texas. And Erica, who is with me, I was principal on this project. And Erica was our lead consultant and project manager. And she is actually en route moving from Texas to Chicago at the moment. There she is. There she is. So, but we're very excited to be back in prince william county and it's been great to work with everyone i want to say thank

[02:11:31] you to christina and corice and uh alicia who's not here who's kind of the research guru but within that department uh we're all very helpful um and we're going to present a kind of an overview today and just know that there's going to be a there's a full report and document and there's also a couple of data sets, kind of dashboards that if you guys would like access to that, I'm sure that that'll be given to you guys.

[02:12:01] All right. I touched the wrong button right off the bat. That's okay. And then you can just roll it. Oh, roll it? Oh, roll it. Oh, okay.

[02:12:17] Just do the big button. All right. We'll try that. All right. So just a reminder, the actual goal of this was to analyze the workforce development land You know, who's doing what within the county and identify where there are opportunities.

[02:12:35] And as Christina pointed out, the ultimate goal here is to give kind of a game plan, sort of a roadmap for the program within economic development and tourism. I will say before I hand it off to Erica that it is important for us to be reminded that the workforce sort of ecosystem includes a number of parts.

[02:13:00] And many of them, actually, the county itself has, you know, great influence over. But you can see up there is the orange. That's really where the department and where this program will live. But, you know, employers are a big part of it.

[02:13:18] Obviously, the residents of Prince William County are a big part of it. And then there are multiple agencies, Virginia Career Works and others who are in the business of doing workforce training. And then there are a number of what we call wraparound services.

[02:13:36] People have to have access to transportation. They have to have access to good child care. There has to be affordable housing. There are a number of things that you as a county have a great influence over that are outside of the Economic Development and Tourism Department and the role here. And then there's obviously the University and Northern Virginia Community College and others that are providing some direct education and service.

[02:13:59] So just a reminder of sort of where all of this lives. And ultimately, the goal here with so many players is to really hone in on what is the role for the county and specifically what is the role for this program within economic development.

[02:14:16] And with that, I'm going to hand it off to Erica and just push this button here. All righty. Here we go. Thank you, Tom, and thank you to the board for having us here today and giving us the opportunity to present on the study of the results of the study. One task we wanted to highlight was our review of the county's strategic plan.

[02:14:36] One we mentioned earlier kind of not being duplicative of existing recommendations and in terms of current work that's ongoing in the workforce ecosystem. And we found as we went through the strategic plan for the county that there are three different goal areas that related specifically to the work of the Workforce Program and the Department of Economic Development and Tourism.

[02:14:57] Those three goal areas, and there are a handful, there are more objectives within each of these goals, but we only highlighted the ones that were directly relevant in some form or fashion. Those three goal areas are education, quality of life, and smart growth. What we've done is we've highlighted in that far right column there, differentiating between where the workforce program offers a contributing role, meaning they're part of day-to-day implementation.

[02:15:23] They're not necessarily the only actor or entity that's advancing this objective, but they should be considered a key contributor in terms of implementation for your strategic plan. The plus sign is more indicating a supporting role. You know, the workforce program might be called upon in some instances specifically to support there, but isn't necessarily part of the day-to-day responsibility for that strategy.

[02:15:46] I mentioned technical reviews. That's an example of one document that was reviewed. We also reviewed, with the help of Carice, the previous workforce development program called Elevate. That work kind of generated a lot of momentum coming out of COVID in terms of leveraging ARPA dollars to implement a workforce program.

[02:16:05] And I'll talk a little bit about how that relates to this work. We also reviewed plans from your partners in the workforce ecosystem. We conducted a number of interviews and focus groups with stakeholders. We conducted as well a comprehensive data analysis where Tom mentioned that we've provided some data tools to the staff.

[02:16:23] Those particular tools are a workforce analysis of the demand in a supply landscape, as well as a job quality and access tool. You can actually dig into different occupations and see the relative quality and access of those jobs across a couple of different factors.

[02:16:40] And we mentioned, you know, the staff has access to those links, so we can be sure to get access to those later on. Those three tasks built into the strategic direction of the study's results, and I wanted to highlight that there are two sets of recommendations that came out of this study that kind of differ in terms of the responsibilities and players involved.

[02:17:01] I did want to kind of highlight some findings, though, before we get into the recommendations about what were the key results in terms of from the stakeholder engagement as well as the data analysis. In terms of what we learned from stakeholders, and we list on the right the different interviews and focus groups we conducted throughout the study, who all was involved, who all we talked to, to make sure that we were accounting for the overall landscape.

[02:17:23] One thing when we talked to stakeholders was they actually spoke a lot about the previous workforce development program and how there were some gaps left behind in terms of the relationships, the efforts that were ongoing, just in terms of as kind of momentum fell off in terms of the existing program.

[02:17:40] in terms of where that specific lane is for the economic development department. For example, in terms of workforce, they helped kind of clarify where they saw the particular value. And in this case, the second takeaway is about how having access to those resources from the economic development perspective will help in terms of business attraction, retention, but also help the educators understand what's coming down the pipeline to prepare for in terms of program expansion, in terms of where the demand is.

[02:18:11] On the flip side, in terms of engaging with employers, in terms of what this program will do will help engage employers from the perspective of what existing resources are in the community. Maybe there's not a need for a new program, maybe there's a need to help promote an existing program to employers in the area.

[02:18:28] And then vice versa, in terms of supporting educators, making sure that they have connections to employers as they're designing programs to make sure that the end result is in mind. The last takeaway I'll mention, when we talked to education training providers, they highlighted a trend towards short-term training that hasn't really been present in the area previously.

[02:18:49] So that's kind of a new trend for Prince William County's workforce development ecosystem. Historically, it's been very focused on higher education, four-year degrees, that type of education level. But in the short term, there's been a lot more of a focus in terms of certificates, short-term job training, and so on.

[02:19:08] And that will help increase access to jobs. I also want to highlight a couple of quantitative data points that helped validate a couple of the things that we heard from stakeholders. And y'all are probably very familiar with this as a commuter community. That's kind of the first thing that we saw in the data was that is definitely still present in terms of how the workforce development ecosystem operates, in terms of where the workforce goes, in terms of accessing jobs.

[02:19:33] That being said, though, in terms of local employment growth, y'all are actually outpacing the region. So we take the long-term view on this. We looked at the last 15 years. In terms of local employment growth, y'all have grown 36%. The next closest benchmark would be the overall Northern Virginia area, which grew at 12%.

[02:19:50] So just so you know, you're growing in that regard. I mentioned earlier new programs for technical skills, short-term training, and we did see evidence of demand for that in the short term so we looked at a two two-year sample of job postings for the area and we noticed that over half of those job postings actually required education below the bachelor's degree level so kind of we mentioned like the mismatch between demand and supply that's definitely an area of opportunity we saw in terms of middle skills jobs which I'll talk about in a second and I mentioned middle skill jobs that demand is actually present across a couple of different industries. So I wanted to highlight health care,

[02:20:30] skilled trades, and some manufacturing jobs as well are present in terms of the growth in the industry. And getting into the recommendations for the study, one kind of alignment piece that we brought together to help connect the dots between those two different sets of recommendations are some principles of success that we've seen in other communities. These are also informed by what we heard from stakeholders as well. But what we wanted to make sure what we were solving for in terms of designing the strategies were sustaining that job growth I mentioned, making sure that there

[02:21:05] continue to be economic growth opportunities for residents, making sure that the workforce itself is resilient. That's very much impacted, and we talked about kind of COVID and responding very quickly. That's very much dependent on the networks that exist between different partners. The third piece is data, making sure you have access to effective data sets for storytelling and decision-making, making sure that you are a leader in terms of representing Prince William County's workforce needs. You know, what are the needs of your specific employers? How are you accounting for the challenges in the community here specifically versus the overall region?

[02:21:40] Barriers reduction, so addressing those challenges that job seekers face when they're looking for a job, when they're looking for job training. You know, each individual is at a different point in their career journey in addressing that. And the last piece is ensuring that the overall talent pool competitive to ensure that your economy is resilient. This is the first set of strategies and recommendations. These are designed to help move the needle on those principles themselves, but they're necessarily delivered. We talked about earlier the overall ecosystem, the different players involved. These are necessarily meant to be delivered in partnership and collaboration

[02:22:15] with different workforce development entities. So in terms of wraparound services and employer HR efforts, that's really focused on addressing barriers to employment and improving job quality. The second one's upskilling and reskilling. You might not be familiar. That's in terms of helping incumbent workers, people who are currently working either advance in their existing industry area or maybe even switch industry areas. That's reskilling. Industry sector partnerships are bringing together the public, the private, the nonprofit sectors in specific industries. So for example, picking an industry like health care to focus on improvements to different certifications

[02:22:53] or programs, bringing new people into those careers. The fourth one's getting really specific in terms of supporting the service providers that provide that direct assistance to individuals. There are some existing entities that do this, especially the Workforce Development Board, Northern Virginia Career Works, but sometimes they have some limitations in terms of how they can deploy their funding. And then in terms of talent attraction retention, making sure that you are retaining highly skilled talent so that way you have people who have those skill sets they can continue to teach those skill sets kind of having people in the community who have have to have the

[02:23:28] skills that are needed by employers from both an attraction and a retention standpoint the last piece here this is the last slide we've got this is focused on in the short term what the county's workforce development program in the economic development department should be doing in the short-term as they hire on the new position in terms of how what the primary functions should be relating to those strategies I laid out earlier from the ecosystem so notice we use the same colors so they actually like are parallel to each of them but these are more short-term and they're more focused on the current level of resource in accounting so for being a workforce data expert providing that internally and externally through publications and

[02:24:07] different different presentations in terms of communicating what the demand is to residents in terms of marketing resources to employers you know partnering with chambers partnering with different business organizations on actively marketing of those resources in terms of convening stakeholders so that kind of relates to industry sector partnerships in this case there are lots of existing convenings that the position should be involved in when we spoke to stakeholders they actually kind of gave us a list of different councils the positions that sit on and then in terms of increasing career awareness, partnering with different entities to launch a communications campaign in terms of what are the jobs out there that don't necessarily require a bachelor's

[02:24:46] degree, where you might need just a little bit of additional training. Those are opportunities for upscaling and rescaling. The last piece is very much acknowledging the tourism component of the Aircraft Development Department and Tourism. Promoting that the county is not just a destination for tourism, but an ideal place to live and work. So incorporating those workforce development assets like George Mason University, in terms of innovation district, into the reason why you should stay here after visiting.

[02:25:13] And that's it in terms of our presentation. Again, this is an overview of a 36-page document. So in terms of reviewing the study, we highly encourage you to get in touch with the team on that. But otherwise, that's it for a formal presentation. We are here for questions.

[02:25:29] Thank you so very much. Does anyone have any questions? Supervisor Bodie? Thank you, Madam Chair. Do you have more? I'm sorry. Sorry, I apologize. That's okay. I just, thank you. I just, real quick, wanted, Erica had outlined the four core functions that they were recommending.

[02:25:52] The first two, we are already doing, they're existing, and so we continue, we're going to continue to be ramping those up and performing those better. But then, just like we did with the barriers, For success, small business, we're going to slowly start to work on implementing these other opportunities, but they are more in the long term, and they may require future resources.

[02:26:20] The other piece is I am excited to announce that Michelle Weatherly is coming back as our workforce development manager, so she will be our first official workforce development manager and um and we're really she'll be leading this effort and looking at um helping to bring back elevate and look at how we can um have more resources um towards that as well as putting back on a lot of those job fairs and uh career fairs and just really connecting the whole entire

[02:26:51] workforce uh okay i don't know how i did that okay there i guess that's what i get for talking with my hands anyways uh but we're we're looking forward to um implementing that and with that we'll take questions thanks all right thank you does anyone i'm sorry supervisor trying to get out the presentation i know supervisor bode yes thank you madam chair thank you christina thank you clary thank you tom thank you erica appreciate the work that you've all done on this and appreciate what you just added there that you got michelle weatherly back from where she was richmond right

[02:27:26] she was in richmond thank you for poaching her back from richmond yes um to thank you for the work but i just had a couple questions so um you had a timeline here you also had a timeline near the beginning of the presentation for the actual study itself what was the the time period that the study took place um well we procured it in august of 2024 um but that takes a while and so we are just finishing it so it was almost a year long yeah august of 2025 i appreciate that because i would say that whether you're talking about covid because i know this was arpa fund that

[02:28:03] went into it but covid post covid but frankly with all the uncertainty things that are happening on the federal level right now each one of those i say is a snapshot of certain workforce trends that can't really be correlated to even just two or three years before that so i think that the moment you actually took was actually probably the best one because right now and we've talked about as a region as a county really becoming more fiscally and and financially resilient against shocks the federal level right we see the point of reskilling a lot of folks that have come out of the federal workforce have to reskill upskill things like that or lateral skill frankly in certain circumstances

[02:28:41] so i appreciate that and so i guess then my my overall question is how much of that is in the report because as a region as a county it's so dependent on the federal the federal as a federal government as an employer contractors what have you how does how does that trend look and how does that look play into the the report so i'm gonna i'm gonna turn it over to erica in just a second to answer that the piece that erica touched on it um so after after this meeting um tomorrow we will be sending out um the full report as well as the link to the data dashboard so very much the way you guys were getting very excited over about the residential build-out

[02:29:20] analysis this is the same thing but it's all about our workforce and the skills and the education and it's and it's really interesting data and so I think that will be helpful also to continued to help us monitor what's going on but with Erica do you want to respond to the what's the federal yeah in terms of the data in terms of where we looked at in the time period for this data set I hadn't quite hit. One thing that I recall when we talked to Phyllis with the Social Services Department is she kind of mentioned expecting to see a bump in terms of accessing social services

[02:29:59] related to folks who are either transitioning out of federal jobs in terms of people looking for different opportunities. That was something that we heard throughout in terms of the stakeholder process. In terms of the timeline, though, in terms of the data itself, I don't know that we saw it necessarily in that dataset, but there is the regional dashboard that has been tracking the area in terms of how the jobs have been impacted in the area.

[02:30:23] In terms of the recommendations of the study, we were looking at a couple of different partners. The Regional Account Development Partnership has worked on an initiative with also Northern Virginia Community College on NOVA Next in terms of reskilling federal workers and picking on different certifications.

[02:30:39] One of the key challenges that we've heard of is there are kind of niche specialized skill sets that people kind of coming out of the workforce have, and there can be some challenges with that. But that is one of the areas, when I mentioned career development and navigation services in the ecosystem, that is very much where we have a recommendation about kind of pursuing some collaborative opportunities on the whole.

[02:31:00] Appreciate that. My last one, I'm not sure. And on that note, appreciate, perfect segue. How involved was your work in engaging with the school system? did they play a role in this yes they did we talked to the director of career and technical education and they were also included in our focus group study as well excellent thank you so much all right i don't have anyone else in queue so thank you very much for that thank you very much

[02:31:32] madam chair and christina to you and the team uh to tip strategies thank you very much uh and Madam Chair, we'll now hear from Matt Villarreal to talk us through the longer-term expansion at the Judicial Center and the work that the FFM team has been doing to plan for that work.

[02:32:09] All righty. Chair Jefferson, members of the board, Matt Villarreal, Director of Facilities and Fleet Management, and I'm excited to come speak to you about the Judicial Center projects, both the current and future expansion projects that we have going on right now.

[02:32:33] We were asked to provide this presentation by you to provide this information to you and to the public. So our current projects. Here are some pictures of some of the projects that we have completed since fiscal year 2018.

[02:32:50] We have refurbished five of the six elevators, and the sixth elevator is scheduled to be completed over the next year and a half or two. So the three public elevators that we had lots of issues with reliability, those have been resolved. We refurbished the judge's elevator, and we've refurbished one of the prisoner transport elevators.

[02:33:12] We've also completed renovation work of the clerk of the circuit court's public counters. That project was completed probably around 21, 22. Courtroom number seven, which used to be the jury assembly room, we repurposed that room into a new courtroom, and that project was completed within the last 12 months.

[02:33:35] Public restrooms. We have renovated the vast majority of the public restrooms in the courthouse. So those look a lot nicer, a lot more convenient to use for the public. Next project, the sheriff's conference room. It used to be a small conference room.

[02:33:50] We enlarged it so that he can now do kind of press conferences and things of that nature, have larger meetings in that space. It's a real nice space. We moved the law library up to the third floor into a new renovated space.

[02:34:09] it looks really nice and as part of our HVAC replacement project that's ongoing we've replaced the boilers in the facility. So we've done quite a bit of projects and we've got a lot of things going on still. Right now since FY18 we've initiated and completed 52 projects in the courthouse. Right now we've got 15 ongoing projects and that totals to 23.5 million projects completed and then 21.3 million projects in process right now. Those projects that are in

[02:34:46] process right now include updating the AV systems in 18 courtrooms, also doing restoration work in the courtrooms, replacing the generators for the building, roof replacement, carpet replacement, LED lighting upgrades, constructing JD&R courtroom number seven, doing an HVAC system replacement.

[02:35:11] We're waiting until, I think, January before we replace the air conditioning part of the HVAC system. Next, like talked about, is the future expansion project. And this project came about based off of the 2023 Judicial Center Master Plan that we brought forward to the board.

[02:35:34] This was completed by Mosley Architects. They worked with all the different parties in the Judicial Center complex. So both occupants of the Judicial Center and also the different agencies that work in facilities around the Judicial Center. And what they had found is that in a 20-year build-out, we identified that we need 15 circuit courtrooms.

[02:35:56] In 20 years, we're going to need 221,000 square feet of additional space needed for all three courts and their support function areas. And we identified the need for a 950-structured garage there as well to complete it in two phases over 20 years.

[02:36:18] And then the current space challenges that we're seeing right now, jury surveys, specifically secured jury assembly room, deliberation rooms that are easily accessible, secured restrooms for the jurors, and kitchenette areas for them to, when they're on their lunch breaks, be able to sit down in a comfortable place and have their lunch.

[02:36:39] Another big concern that we have there is kind of related to the security of the court system in the circuit court. In the area behind the circuit court courtrooms, we have a hallway. In that hallway right now, we don't have complete segregation of the prisoner transports and the judges and the jurors.

[02:36:58] So there are some courtrooms where we bring up the prisoners up and they have to traverse in the hallway, in the same hallway that we have jurors and judges. And there's practices in place to keep that segregation, but if you make a mistake, you potentially could open up ourselves to a pretty serious issue.

[02:37:15] So that is a big concern that we're working on developing a resolution to within a new design of the new courthouse. Next, I want to share just some renderings of what potentially the courthouse could look like. It may look like this. It may look completely different, but I've got to stop talking with my hands.

[02:37:36] So it may look like this. It may not. but we wanted to give you just an idea of what it could potentially look like in the space in front of the courthouse. So that's a front look of the potential courthouse and that's the side view of that courthouse. This slide shows you exactly where we are planning on putting the judicial center expansion project. As you can see up top you have the new parking garage which is essentially across the road from the adult detention center adjacent to the Woodbridge or the Manassas Senior Center. And then we have the Judicial Center expansion area, which is essentially right next

[02:38:16] door to the ADC and the Judicial Center. But you'll notice that that is located where the Bennett School currently resides. So I want to give you some overview about the Bennett School. It's been shuttered for the past 40 years. You see that picture in the top right and bottom right? That's what it's looked like for the last 40 years. We know that the inside of that building, no work has been done on it we're pretty concerned that the integrity the structural integrity is in question we i'm not comfortable sending my staff inside that building to do any work at this point

[02:38:51] so we're we just don't know what what we're going to find inside there um we're pretty sure that it contains uh asbestos lead mold there's probably water damage and termites we know that in um i believe it was in 2019 we had done a report or an assessment on it potentially looking at it to use it for a share of space and that those are some of the findings that that study had came up with it's not currently listed in the Virginia landmarks register it's not listed in the National Register of Historic Places it is listed on the historical marker database and it has been it is a historic site by the

[02:39:29] Prince William County Department of Parks and Recreation under the Historic Preservation Division due to its age before we can take the building down we will have to get permission from the Virginia Department of Historic resources. We'll have to get their approval before we can move to raise the building. We also understand that we'll have to do it at minimum, and we're sure we'll have to do more than this, is a level one archaeological survey, and then we'll have to deal with whatever findings may

[02:40:00] come up as a result of that survey. This building dates back to 1909, and it was last used as a school in 1969. After that, it was kind of used either with the sheriff's office or the police department we got conflicting information about that but it has not been in use for at least the last 40 years we did look at you know how could we potentially incorporate the bennett school into the expansion project and so we did a we did have a company come in downy scott which did a rough

[02:40:36] order of magnitude estimate on renovating the existing bennett school and the number they gave us was 37 million 500 000 it's a lot of money we anticipate that we would need to budget a large contingency because we don't know what we don't know with that building and we can kind of guarantee that we're going to run into stuff that were unanticipated and so totally speaking we think a budget of at least 46 million 875 thousand is what we're at least looking at we wouldn't this is just rough over magnitude until you got in there and really started assessing things you

[02:41:13] know we'd be able to get a better number but that it's going to be a big big item if we were to try to renovate that facility and if we tried to renovate we would have to try to connect it to the new facility, and that would create more variables that we would have to solve. And I don't know if our current estimate really factors that in, to be honest with you. We've been asked what it would cost and what it would take to move the facility. In 2023, we had done some preliminary research, and it was about $2.5 million to pick up the building and move it. What that doesn't include is that when you pick that building up, it's on a rubble foundation. And to pick it up

[02:41:50] and drop it somewhere, you're going to have to build a new foundation to put it on. So that's another additional five million dollars that we anticipate you would have to you you know spend in order to move that building and you have to figure out where you'd put it you have to hook utilities up to it and get it in service and also you know i don't know if we'd want to move it you'd have to kind of keep it in that area and we wouldn't really want to move it and just drop it somewhere else and then let it sit for some more time but we'd have to make that commitment at that time to do the work and so our current estimate was a rough order of magnitude which

[02:42:21] includes the contingency is 56 million 250 000 so it's a big number so we thinking that you know we want to memorialize the bennett school in whatever future project we do and we reached out to do very and asked them if they could provide us some ideas of what potentially we could do we have not made any decisions on this at this point but there are ways to maybe try to remoralize the bennett school and then some of that is repurposing some of the um, uh, the salvage materials. So whether it's taking the front columns of the building

[02:43:00] and somewhere in that complex developing kind of a little area where it shows the columns from the Bennett school with, with the informational marker, it kind of talks about what the Bennett school was to, to the, uh, city and to the area. Uh, we could potentially take some of those repurposed materials and incorporate them into the new facility in somewhere within the interior of the building we could take some of the brick or some of the rubble's foundation and incorporate that into the building as well and in the bottom right you kind of see like an outline we could also put take and create an outline of where the Bennett school was and denote that with like

[02:43:38] having a different color floor or different style or material floor to kind of just denote that this used to be where the Bennett school sat and then create a informational panel of sorts to explain the history of the Bennett School and have that available so the public can see that. So information about the actual expansion project. We're talking about a construction of a five-level building, one level underground and then four levels above ground. This facility will be dedicated to the operations of the circuit court, and that would include the circuit court's clerks

[02:44:15] operations as well. We anticipate that it would have 12 courtrooms in this facility, which meets the expectations of the circuit court judges. We were designed to lead gold standards. So we would try to incorporate different lead practices like solar arrays, LED lighting, whatever we need to put in there to get to that qualification for lead gold standards.

[02:44:42] One of the things with this, the way we are proposing to move forward with this, it's the most efficient use of the site. It allows us to expand in the future beyond that 20-year mark. We can add additional courtroom space just north of the building adjacent parallel with the ADC.

[02:44:59] What it doesn't do is that the existing courthouse is not renovated as part of this project, and that's going to be something that we'll have to come back and develop, probably have to develop a CIP project in the future to renovate the existing courthouse after circuit court and the clerk move out to reuse that space more effectively for the growth of other functions that are in the courthouse, in the old courthouse.

[02:45:23] we projected the timeline with all the different things that we're going to have to do it's about six years that's i think our worst case scenario but and we'll try to beat it but that's kind of where we're at i don't want to give you a number that's not realistic though a rough estimate of cost for this project 4.8 million to demo the bennett school 43.5 million to do the parking structure and then 151.7 million for the judicial center expansion. The parking structure, that process will be done sooner than the judicial center. It'll be going up sooner than the judicial

[02:46:02] center expansion project, so that'll be a good thing. And that's kind of the kind of costs that we're looking at, and that's within the $200 million budget that we have right now. I wanted to give you kind of just a potential layout of the facility. This isn't set in stone, but it's just to give us a visual of what potentially we could have. And what you notice on here is that there is separation between the different functions. You notice that the public is separated from the prisoner transport and they're also separated from jurors and from the judges. And the judges and the

[02:46:38] jurors are separated from the prisoner movement in the facility. The orange space is where the prisoners would come up from the basement and then they would be brought right into the courtrooms for their cases. So there's not any worry about what we currently have as a security risk behind these current circuit court courtrooms so this would be on levels two three and four it's pretty much going to have the same layout you notice that they have judge chambers you'll have space for jury deliberation you also have areas for support staff to support those operations the

[02:47:18] first level is where we would have the circuit court clerk's office where in that currently the performing of marriage licenses probate and will civil motions land records criminal processes that they manage currently on the third floor of the circuit court building we'd also have space for jury assembly and just for point of reference you see where we have the outline of the where the bennett school would exist if we were literally dropped this building right on top of it and then

[02:47:54] this is the lower level of the facility and you can see the orange pathway you can see that it's connected to the ADC that develops a secure prisoner transport from the ADC into the courthouse into holding areas that can be directly taken upstairs via elevator and not have to have any interaction with anyone other than the sheriff's office. We also see in the basement being an area for historical archives, land records, the law library, and we know that we're going to need maintenance space and mechanical space for the building. Now this is just pretty much names on

[02:48:32] board right now so when we get further into design obviously we'll be able to get more detail as to where the different things will be but this is just a give you a general idea of what potentially it could be um and we talked earlier i talked earlier about the potential for expansion and as you can see here on to the north of the building we have the potential to add additional floors which would be uh two courtrooms set up similar to the four courtrooms on each floor on the original building We'd have the same setup, but it would just be for two courtrooms per floor.

[02:49:09] And we could add, I think, two to three levels there before we start running into the height restrictions that kind of we have on that property. So our next steps are this, is that we're going to begin the process with the state on the Bennett School.

[02:49:25] We're going to continue the design process on the expansion of the building. We've made some good progress with doing all the programming discussions. Now it's time to start getting into the details of the design, and we'll start working on that. And then we're going to continue the design process for the parking structure.

[02:49:42] So with that, I'd be happy to take any questions. All right. Thank you so very much for this presentation. Supervisor Gordy. Thank you, Madam Chair. Matt, thanks for the presentation. Could you go back? There was one little thing I saw right there.

[02:50:01] Go back. Well, so the prisoner, the orange dot under the central holding. That's the elevator. But how do you get to it? Well, like I said, it isn't done, but the central holding area would be an area where you'd have cells down there, and they would bring the prisoners there, and then they would escort them to that elevator or take them down the hallway to the other elevator.

[02:50:22] All right, all right. Now, going up to the next level, you mentioned the clerk's office. We have the clerk here with us today, and I know there's been a lot of discussions going between the judges and then the clerk's office, and to what extent is the clerk's office able to – I know that there's been discussions on who's in control of what, but my understanding is that the judges control the courts and the rooms, but not the clerk's office.

[02:50:50] And I want to make sure that we're getting that right as it relates to who's got what authorities over what areas of the judicial center. Madam Chair, members of the board, the building is the county's building. So the county owns it.

[02:51:06] Those areas that are necessary for the use and occupancy of the circuit court, are under the authority of the circuit court. The board is required to provide office space to the clerk with a fireproof for the files, and that space is required to be provided within or outside the courthouse.

[02:51:28] - Within or outside, okay. - Correct. - All right, thank you, Madam Attorney. You know, when we, you and I talked about this, you know, I've given my opinion of, as it relates to the Bennett School, I personally don't think it's worth the investment to save it.

[02:51:51] But I do think maximizing, you know, the stone that that Bennett School is made out of, I mean, it's kind of unique to this area and unique to particularly that part of Manassas with that red-colored stone. And so finding a way to be able to incorporate that somehow into whether it's the promenade outside or even just some markers like you said, I really appreciate the effort you're taking to memorialize the building.

[02:52:18] But personally, I just don't see the value in trying to save a building that even when we're done saving it, we're not really sure how we're going to be able to use it when we really need this space to be able to expand our judicial center.

[02:52:34] And the only other thing, you mentioned that you were going to move on the parking structure. And so just look forward to whatever design, you know, so that it doesn't just look like a parking garage, you know, with a concrete, you know.

[02:52:49] Because, I mean, this is, and, you know, for all intents and purposes, downtown Manassas, but, you know, it's surrounded by residential and it's right next to the courthouse. Something that has a facade on it that looks really good. And so we just look forward to seeing what you guys are able to come up with on that.

[02:53:06] So that's all I have. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Before, and I apologize, Clerk Smith, I just want to recognize that we have you with us today. I'll turn it over to Supervisor Bailey. I didn't know she was here either, Madam Chair.

[02:53:22] Well, she is. She's hiding. Matt, thanks for the presentation. Yes, ma'am. And it was, the more we see it, the more we digest it, the more we understand it. I've got two things. One is we, in Prince William County, Manassas, Manassas City, we're dealing with a lot of old infrastructure.

[02:53:39] And the Bennett Building is an example of that. I agree with my colleague about when you talk about investing money, $46 million is a lot of money. It's a lot of money. Oh, $56 million, excuse me. So that's still more than a lot of money.

[02:53:58] As we talk about preservation of the old and incorporating that in the new, I just encourage you as you go forward to kind of think about it that way as we get grants or whatever.

[02:54:13] Similarly, what they did with that museum in Manassas City, but just putting that out there. But the thing that I wanted to ask is, going back to something that Supervisor Gordy mentioned about the collaborative input between the clerk's office and the judicial system and the explanation that our luxurious county attorney gave us, as we move along with this, that is incorporating, or it has been incorporated.

[02:54:44] Yes, we will. Did you kind of highlight that for us? How would that look like? Part of our design process when we construct a new building is that we bring in the customer and they participate in the process and they identify what their needs are and they identify kind of how the business that they run will run effectively in that space because I don't run the clerk, you know, the circuit court's clerk space.

[02:55:06] I don't run the circuit courts, so I need their input. They work with our design team and they work with our facilities construction management team and they incorporate their needs into that final design and to have the opportunity to provide the feedback as to whether or not the design is going to be sufficient for what their needs are.

[02:55:27] So we anticipate, we kind of expect them to be part of the process for designing whatever facility that we construct. So inside of the design and all, and this may be a tangible or intangible, do we have to do any additional digitizing with documents and things like that as we are building?

[02:55:49] There may or may not be that need. But that doesn't involve this? Not necessarily. In terms of cost? Yes. We've done a lot of work with the clerks here recently with the renovation work. I think we've had some pretty good success on digitizing a lot of records that free up a lot of space to be repurposed.

[02:56:10] But there also are the legal requirements that she must follow, And, you know, obviously we'll be taking that into account and making sure that's, you know, taking account into what we design. Yeah, and just mention it because it has to be, because it hasn't been in a long time.

[02:56:26] So that's what I was mentioning. But I do, just as a comment, really appreciate the hard work that when it relates to our judicial center that you're putting into this because it hasn't been done in a very long time. So the security piece as well, when we talk about elevators, those little boxes, is that incorporated, the security piece in that?

[02:56:50] Oh, absolutely. Yeah, and what does that look like? Well, as far as, I mean, the whole building will have a significant amount of security systems, access control, video recording, lots of different things that the sheriff's office needs.

[02:57:08] My team, the security team, will be part of the design process to make sure we have the right infrastructure into the facility so that it meets the expectations of the sheriff's office for what they need to do to secure the building. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair.

[02:57:25] Supervisor Boudin. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Matt, for the presentation. And I know we've talked about this at various times, and I appreciate, and we talked about it last time, your thought of designing this in a way that it can be expanded later to that north section. because as we know right now, it's so tight in the existing center.

[02:57:43] They're cannibalizing space, frankly, from other offices, one of which is in the chambers right now. So I wanted to highlight that. I guess my two questions is, one, I think I may have asked this of you maybe last or the time before that, Matt, but is there going to be space contemplated for the Public Defender's Office?

[02:58:03] That decision, to my knowledge, has not been made, but I don't think that there is in this new building. Whether or not we make space somewhere else on the complex, that's a decision that will have to be made later. Okay. I wanted to raise that again because I feel like I've raised that before.

[02:58:21] My second question, and it goes back to something that Supervisor Gordy said around the parking garage. Obviously, there's a very utilitarian ones that there's no bells and whistles, nothing. There's also ones that have no more amenities, what have you. As you continue to go down the road of looking at that, is there going to be a sort of a thought about the fact that you're going to have sort of different ecosystems of folks that will be using the parking garage?

[02:58:50] Some of them will be coming because they work at the judicial center. Other folks will be coming because they're a patron. Other folks will be coming because they may be having their day in court. So have you thought about the functional design and how that may feed into the secure infrastructure there? Quite honestly, we've really just focused on how the garage will work physically.

[02:59:08] But as we get further on to this process, we understand that the city of Manassas and that area, there's a lot of history there, and it's being used to support the court. So I'm assuming that in the design process, we will try to weave that into the design of the exterior of the building so that it blends in a little bit and it's not a utilitarian concrete building.

[02:59:32] Appreciate that. And I'll also say on that, if I can, just to reiterate the point Matt made, as we engage the sheriff's office, who escorts in some cases, I think the input will certainly be there in terms of how we might design the garage in a way or make sure that traffic is flowing in a way that is safe for all involved.

[02:59:56] Absolutely. Appreciate that. And my last one, Madam Chair, it goes back to what you mentioned earlier on LEED and some other things you'll get for the new building. You talked about solar, and I appreciate that. Remind me, is this part of Manassas in the Novec Territory or the Indominion Territory?

[03:00:12] It's in the City of Manassas Territory. Right. So do they have interconnection fees for putting solar? I don't believe they do because we're going to be putting solar on top of the ADC and the current courthouse. Good to know. Appreciate that. Obviously, significantly less costs when there's no interconnection fee.

[03:00:28] So thank you so much. You're welcome. All right. Thank you, Supervisor Vega. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Matt, for always answering questions to staff, for taking the time to meet with me one-on-one also, and also want to acknowledge the Clerk of the Court, Jackie, for her candor in expressing challenges that we've had. It's been a long time coming, and it should come to no surprise, I care about the dollars, and we talk about the $200 million that is needed for this expansion. Where are we at right now with current investments in

[03:01:01] existing building? So in the current facility, to date, we've spent $23.5 million on different projects and $21 million we have ongoing projects. So in total, we have about $45 million worth of projects that are either completed or ongoing right now since 2018. And that total is not included in the $200 million or is it? No, it's not. It's not. Okay. And then what is the timeline in terms of completing the outstanding work?

[03:01:41] The one that's going to take the longest is going to be do the AV work because it all has to be done at night, and we have to shut down a courtroom at a time. So we're looking, I think, another two years at least. Okay. And then speaking about the challenges and problematic corridors, can you go a little bit into detail how we solve those challenges in the future building, specifically when it comes to the jury deliberation room or jury assembly room?

[03:02:11] Sure. So as you see here, the jury assembly space would be segregated out on the lower level or on the first level of the building. It would have in those two blue squares would be dedicated elevators that are only to be used by the jurors and judges.

[03:02:33] They wouldn't have to be getting into the public elevators once they're in that jury assembly space, and then they would be taken upstairs to whatever courtroom they're assigned to and to their process. On the levels 2, 3, and 4, you know, you can see where the blue space, that's only for jurors and judges, whereas the orange space, which is completely separated from everybody, is the prisoner transport area.

[03:02:59] And then the green space is completely segregated from the blue and the orange space as well. And is there a reason why we – is it out of convenience? And this is maybe something that I don't know. Is there a reason why we want to keep the jury room next to the, can you go back to the other slide?

[03:03:21] No, the other one. Sorry, my apologies. Yeah. Is there a reason why we want to keep it next to the circuit court clerk's office? Because we're using the levels 2, 3, and 4 just for courtrooms. If you were to put that up on another floor, you're losing courtroom space.

[03:03:38] So our thought process was if you have it here, they can pull there, And then from there, the circuit court clerk's office would be able to take them up to whatever court they're assigned to. I just want to avoid current issues in terms of being able to maximize the space and not always having to go and take more and more and more, especially if we're talking about growth in the coming years and, you know, highlight the fact that we can do a better job in regards to how we split up space, in particular with courtroom seven, which was a huge investment and how much we're utilizing it.

[03:04:13] And so for us to take those things into consideration, learn from them as we're planning, and to ensure that we don't keep making the same mistakes over and over again. And so just wanted to highlight that. And then the last thing that I wanted to bring up was in the presentation, you identify that the master plan calls for 15 circuit courtrooms.

[03:04:32] However, there's only 12 being included. Is there a reason? The feedback we had gotten from the circuit court judges was they were originally looking for 10, and then they told us they needed 12. And not that I'm pushing for more courtrooms. Of course, I'm going to ask for the data to justify the ask.

[03:04:48] I just wanted to make sure that it wasn't a typo. I just wanted to be consistent, but thank you for the clarification. And then lastly, Madam Chair, we're not approving anything today. Today is just a presentation. I understand that we've had some challenges, but there is opportunity to continue to work through those challenges and make sure that we have all key stakeholders be a part of the conversation to include our constitutional officers.

[03:05:10] Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Supervisor Stewart. Thank you so very much for your presentation. I really appreciate it. A couple of questions, you know, because I really agree with, you know, the points that Supervisors Gordy and Bailey brought up about just how expensive it would be to redo the school for such a tiny space.

[03:05:39] But a couple of things, right? So this archaeological study, is there a plan? I mean, Manassas is such an old and historic place, right? It would not surprise me if you found something there, right? Is there a plan as what to do, or does that kind of branch off into opening up perhaps another issue of some sort about preserving that space, maybe working with a museum to remediate and move things?

[03:06:13] Is there a plan around that, first of all? So there is a process that we'll absolutely have to follow. It's in accordance with, I believe, the state laws, and we'll absolutely follow that. Our A&E firm, Dewberry, has a lot of experience with doing these types of projects.

[03:06:31] And when we come across something, obviously then we'll have to make some decisions on what it is that we've come across, how do we deal with what it is and deal with it moving forward. And until we get to that point, we really don't necessarily know what it is that we're going to find.

[03:06:48] If it's artifacts and things, we can look to incorporate that into the new facility as part of the displays or things that we're memorializing the Bennett School. If it's something else, then obviously we'll have to follow that process and deal with it.

[03:07:05] Right, yeah. And speaking of which, I really like Supervisor Gordy's idea about that brick, the column you know it's you know just kind of a touchstone of the past yeah bring you know bringing that forward the other question i have and so what what's happening now to ensure the safety of jurors if they don't have the proper spaces for deliberation or for assembly um what's what's being done to keep them safe the sheriff's office in the hallways has a process for making

[03:07:42] to do their best to keep the judges or other office staff from popping out in the hallways when they're transporting the prisoners back and forth. They provide the security for the jurors when they're moving them en masse throughout the building.

[03:08:00] And there's more to it, I know, but I obviously couldn't provide you more details, but the sheriff's office does have processes in place to provide security for the jurors. All right, thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. All right, we don't have anyone else in queue, so thank you so very much for this presentation thank you appreciate it all right you don't have anything else mr shorter agency time we're good we're done all right so we are going to go on to agenda item um 11 supervisors time before we go around the dais there are three um outstanding

[03:08:36] items and i would like to take the votes for them separately because a couple of them i think will have significant discussion um so can i get a motion to move 11a forward so move second it's been properly moved and seconded any discussion all right i'd like to call for the

[03:08:53] vote supervisor angry aye thank you sir not displaying but i have the vote unanimous

[03:09:39] supervisor franklin absent from vote all right thank you we are now going to move on to 11b and that's housing attainability fast track measures supervisor bodie i don't know if you have anything that you want to speak to sure thank you madam chair um i didn't know if you wanted me to make the motion then talk about the discussion or if you just want me to sort of preamble a little bit because i know you had so no preamble if you want to go ahead and make the motion we can have discussion within that because i do have a couple i have one question it's

[03:10:10] something i would like to amend gotcha so i move 11b for approval thank you so it's been properly moved and seconded so discussion i'll kick it off um on the second page i'm going to ask for the clarification first um the second bullet residential development waiver reform and any other elements within the scope of work of the zoning ordinance update related to housing can you clarify what you mean by waiver reform sure thank you for that madam chair so um as anyone in the planning department will tell you quite a few uh times now whenever anyone comes through

[03:10:49] for development usually residential they have to request a lot of waivers um so i i have you know examples recently we have thomas farm in the brinsville district um some other ones where whether it's unit type setbacks things like that unfortunately because of when the zoning ordinance was was was updated last when it was originally created it speaks to a much earlier time we had much more suburban and large-scale development um it doesn't speak to where we're trying to go in terms of these annoying or zoning ordinance update we're trying to have more compact design uh you

[03:11:26] know taller buildings are more walkable in in thought um things like that um and even unit types right so right now a lot of the folks that come in if you want things like duplexes triplexes fourplexes things that we really want to go to to make more types of housing stock unfortunately a lot of the zoning districts right now don't really allow that so people have to ask for waivers ask for variances ask for these things um and again you know we have a lot of good concrete examples in the brinsville district where i know supervisor gordy has done a lot of good work trying to push developers have more unit types rather than just single family homes or townhouses especially but right now our zoning ordinance doesn't really speak to that and so if we want to get better

[03:12:05] outcomes we need to have in our zoning ordinance this more flexibility for this because otherwise if a developer has to come in and request waivers over and over again for these certain issues it costs time it costs money it costs more negotiating with with the with the supervisor frankly it causes more staff time too because they'll review every single waiver that comes in if these kinds of waivers were baked into the zoning ordinance we would have probably better outcomes and have a much wider variety of unit types or compact design all the things that we like to see such as we talk about urbanizing certain important areas of the county all right does anyone else have questions because i have one more thing and i might have to do a friendly

[03:12:44] amendment does anyone have anything else i want to say supervisor gordy yeah i just um i want to add you know when we we look at um the opportunity for like accessory living units um uh particularly in areas where parking is not a problem larger lots could have like a garage apartment or a basement apartment or a um um you know in in it would give the opportunity for uh affordable housing on an air in an area for you know like for instance for folks who have 10 acre lots or five acre lots you know they could have an opportunity to have an apartment provide rental

[03:13:20] housing um it's incidentally i've got a neighbor of mine who's actually renting a room a bedroom to a marine um you know uh and so you know our you know when you're looking at uh some of the folks that we're trying to support here who who may be it may be temporary housing or it may be uh but a starter apartment i know my wife and i when we we started our jobs right out of college we lived in a garage apartment 600 square feet that was our first home and um and so um you know

[03:13:49] The opportunity to move that forward and get that done, I think, it will also serve to help us address affordability without actually having to go and have rezonings or go through all these challenging applications. All right. Thank you. So I don't see anyone else. So my concern is the first bullet, removing barriers to the creation of smaller dwelling units, such as tiny homes, including under certain circumstances, reducing or eliminating minimum lot sizes, setbacks, and other requirements. You know, I've been trying to do some reading to catch up. I know tiny homes in some places have taken off,

[03:14:28] but from what I understand, there's not the same regulations as there are for manufactured homes or mobile homes and that gives me concern i have concern about the long-term impact about maybe having tiny home communities and are there better ways of creating more diverse affordable housing stock um so that was something that i could not um i couldn't make peace with i guess for lack of a better word so if you are okay i would like to amend this and remove that first

[03:15:01] bullet point that i read on the second page sure and i guess then and i appreciate the the context there madam chair i know we've talked about a little bit i know that tiny homes and and small homes like this are regulated in different places in different ways and we have to look to see how we are able to based on what the dylan rule in general assembly gives us so i appreciate that i guess my only question follow-up to that is would we at least be able to then if we slip this out now have the possibility of of considering it later i am open to having discussion and seeing what authorities the general assembly gives us at this moment without having that in this moment

[03:15:40] not seeing enough examples of successful tiny home communities within the commonwealth of virginia i am not comfortable with this okay so you are okay with the friendly amendment i i accept it and i think the seconder has to also yes all right supervisor bailey has seconded it any further discussion with removing that i don't see anything so i'll go ahead and call for the vote okay you're sorry point of order you're part of a friendly friendly amendment okay no one okay no one but we still have to i don't have to vote on the friendly amendment we still have to

[03:16:17] no the resolution yes that's what i'm thinking the resolution so yes oh you do okay you're still All right, Supervisor Bodie. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. So I'm not going to wax poetic too much on this. I appreciate the conversation. I just, the basis of this resolution, as I sort of said before, and as is in the resolution, I know that Ms. Washington and her staff are working consultants to bring forth the comprehensive zoning ordinance update.

[03:16:41] But frankly, we can't wait until 2027 to fix a housing crisis that people are living through right now. We adopted the comprehensive plan back at the end of 2022. And we're now two and a half years beyond that. And we still don't have a zoning ordinance that handshakes to all these things we talked about.

[03:16:58] I appreciate Surajer Gordy is exactly where I was going to go with this. You know, right now we have a process where we go through rezonings, proffer amendments, CPAs, all these other things to do these larger projects. When we have options on the table, we could be giving folks to have gentle density, we talk about, right?

[03:17:14] Having that in-law suite, having that fully functional kitchen that is currently outlawed in Prince William County. having this ability to allow folks to have these slightly larger lots where they're able to put a new apartment on there to give folks more options.

[03:17:30] Right now, we have a lot of overreaching regulations that were created last century and do not reflect the reality of how folks live today. Right now, nearly one in three households in our county is cost burdened. That's a term for when people are spending more than 30% of their income on housing.

[03:17:50] It's no wonder the typical age, first-time homebuyer, is now 40 years old in this region, when the average home price in Prince William County is now $600,000. Not that winners have it any better, either. A two-bedroom apartment runs approximately $2,000 a month, depending on where you're trying to live in this county.

[03:18:08] That is not sustainable. These prices, and I assume President Gordy's talked about this, too, is hurting our younger residents and people who are trying to get established and move through their lives as they start a family and work through their careers. So, I'm not going to talk about too much, it's in the resolution, but one is creating a framework for allowing non-profit organizations and houses of worship to build affordable housing on their land in a gentle way, make it easier and faster for them to go through the review process.

[03:18:33] Number two, as was said, developing accessory living units, also known as accessory dwelling unit policy. Number three is removing barriers to smaller homes. We already talked about that, we pulled that out, so I'm not going to go into that. and also evaluate the potential for county-owned lands, not parkland.

[03:18:49] I know there was some concern that we're looking at parkland, but county-owned land outside of parks to create more attainable housing where it makes sense for the community. Places like libraries, near fire stations, other public facilities, to allow us to use the fact that if we use public land for that, the developer that comes in will not have to worry about the land cost to actually establish housing, which means that cost isn't then transferred to the eventual homeowner or renter, whoever it is.

[03:19:18] We talked about it before. There's no reason, especially in our more urban areas, why we should have single-use lots anymore. We have a public facility. We should be able to also establish housing there to bring people closer to the amenities that they will avail themselves of. These other provisions were added by staff or to empower county workforce to be able to do better outreach, be able to fit lots better, and be able to have advanced tools for their analyses.

[03:19:44] I'll just finish by saying this. Prince William County should have a place where a nurse, a schoolteacher, a barista, a janitor, and everyone else who makes our lives better can afford to live here. This resolution represents a meaningful step towards that, makes Prince William County better for all. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you so very much.

[03:20:00] We can go ahead and take our vote. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Yes, there is. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Wait, I'm sorry. Did you? Oh, I didn't know. I thought you were cleared out. Okay.

[03:20:16] No, I'm sorry. So this is directing staff to compile the ordinance information and then bring it back to us. Is there a way for them to do it like comprehensively as one whole thing instead? So yes and no.

[03:20:36] So why this is happening is because the comprehensive zoning ordinance update encompasses not only housing, but also commercial spaces, mixed use, a bunch of other things. And what this does is it peels out the things that pertain to housing and brings back all those comprehensively for us.

[03:20:54] And that's why one of the other bullets in the resolution says anything else that deals with housing. So all the housing stuff, yes, will come to us comprehensively, but it'll come to us before all the commercial and the non-residential piece of the ordinance update. Thank you. All right, and I apologize because I thought that you need to be cleared out the queue.

[03:21:13] All right, so let's go ahead. If there's nothing else, I'm just looking around. Nothing else. Do you have any? No one else? All right, let's go. Let's vote. An aye. I think that was an aye. Yes. Yes. Oh, God, that's...

[03:21:30] Motion passes unanimously.

[03:21:46] Supervisors Franklin and Vega absent from vote. All right, we are now moving on to elevancy, and that's to dissolve the Prince William County Arts Council that was put forth by Supervisor Angry. I don't know if you have anything to say, Supervisor, because you don't sound so good no no sorry all right so nothing so i do have a lot of questions but seeing as you're not here and you're not feeling well i have a lot of reservations about this because there are just too many questions for me like first of all who's going to lead this

[03:22:24] non-profit um why hasn't it already been up and running you know why not working with existing groups you know and what will be our role in working with them and also hearing from members of the Arts Council, they had a lot of concerns. They don't feel that they had proper heads up and discussion.

[03:22:40] So for those reasons, I am going to be voting against this, but however, I would like to go ahead. I don't know if you would like to do the motion, Victor. Yes, you can move it forward. Is there a second? Second.

[03:22:57] It's been moved and seconded. I'll give a second to Supervisor Bailey. Is there any further discussion on this? I'm sure. All right. All right, go on. I appreciate everyone who came out to speak today.

[03:23:16] And I've had some phone calls this week from concerned constituents. The best I can tell, we have some personality conflicts. And that seems to be what's driving some of the challenges related to the Arts Council.

[03:23:42] I believe in reconciliation. I believe people need to come together and try to figure out, work out their differences. And so regardless of what we do here today, that still needs to happen.

[03:23:58] That still needs to happen. Because no matter what we do next, the problem is still going to be there. And so the one challenge that I have, you know, as someone who runs a nonprofit in my civilian job, I know how long it takes to get a nonprofit up and running.

[03:24:20] First of all, you have to get it established, then you have to go and submit the paperwork and get approved. That could take six months in and of itself. We could be literally talking about a year before a nonprofit could even be established in order to provide the continuity of what we're talking about here.

[03:24:40] And so I don't know. I know the motion's on the floor, but I think given the fact that Supervisor Angry's not here, and I really wish he was, and he was able to speak. And, buddy, I'm really praying for you, man.

[03:24:55] That sounds really bad, what you're dealing with. That maybe we could defer this to January. And then because from what I'm hearing is, you know, on the resolutions calling for a nonprofit to be established that's outside the county purview, but then I'm also hearing the potential of an arts commission being established by the county.

[03:25:18] And I would like to get clarity on what the next steps are on the direction that we're going to go. And if we're going to move from one to the next, I think there needs to be a seamless transition rather than a gap in order for us to be able to maintain that continuity.

[03:25:34] And in the meantime, hopefully we can find out the basis of these relational conflict and seek to get that resolved so that whatever happens next moves forward in unity. And that's just my perspective on it. Thank you.

[03:25:50] All right. Supervisor Angry, I know, again, you're not well. How do you feel about possibly deferring this until you're here for the discussion? Okay, because, you know, I can't really, this is hard to talk, but can I send an email to someone or can I?

[03:26:12] You did, so for the record, and it is available, I did get a text from Supervisor Angry, and it says it's pointless to defer. Is that how you feel? Because we can continue the discussion. Is that how I feel?

[03:26:27] Yeah, you do not want to defer? No, ma'am. Okay. All right, so I'm going to continue on. Supervisor Vega. Thank you, Madam Chair. Supervisor Angry is here. He's not here physically, but he is here. And I think that his intent has been made very clear.

[03:26:44] It's not the first time we hear about this, obviously. That's why we're going to make a decision here today. But look, let's address the elephant in the room. I understand, Tom, Supervisor Gordy, what you're saying. I just don't think that we are at a point where we're going to fix the problems that have been going on for a very long time.

[03:27:01] You all have seen the emails. I've seen the emails. Some very nasty personal attacks have flown back and forth. And the reality is that it is not the board's job and it is not Seth's job or his department's job to babysit this council. And I believe that the next course of action and the prudent one would be to establish a nonprofit so that they can go ahead and manage things in a much more efficient way.

[03:27:24] And so for those reasons, Madam Chair, I am going to be supporting this initiative. I do hope and I believe that this nonprofit will be started up fairly quickly because we heard from a lot of passionate folks who are passionate about the arts. And I know that they're not going to let this initiative fall through the cracks.

[03:27:42] So I, Madam Chair, call for the vote. - I am not, I have two other people in queue, Supervisor Bailey. - Thank you, Madam Chair. I totally agree with Supervisor Vega.

[03:27:57] I think that because of how strong and dedicated folks are to the passion of arts, I think they will continue to make sure that the community gets the benefit of that. I think we're at a point where we do have to make a decision.

[03:28:13] As you recall last year, I brought this forward and it was somewhat of a surprise to most of my colleagues, but I brought this forth just for why we're discussing this today. And so I think we need to move forward, start all over, and mend some fences, as Supervisor Gordy has said.

[03:28:33] We do need to have the tough discussions, and it's hard to have the tough discussions, but we do need to move forward so that we can serve the community. So I will be supporting this. Supervisor Stewart. You know, so I have a friend was very upset, you know, that she was living in New York and she's, you know, hey, I'm going to move to, I think she wanted to move to Phoenix.

[03:28:58] And she goes, you know, New York is done with me. I'm going to move to Phoenix. And I said, well, guess who's going to be waiting for you at baggage claim? You, right? Like, we bring our problems with us, right? And if there is a personality conflict, which it does seem like there is, the new folks are just going to bring it to the new location, right?

[03:29:21] I really agree with Supervisor Gordie on this. This might be an opportunity where, if we do defer it, it gives them time to get all their stuff in one sock and work it out.

[03:29:40] I'd really like to give them that opportunity to go ahead and do that. I know there's a lot of passion in that community. I've been playing music since I was eight years old, clarinet and the saxophone. I still play today. Okay, I just realized that's 50 years.

[03:30:00] Okay, so anyway, you know, let's, I really think that we should give it a month. I mean, but, you know, if we're going to call for the vote, we're going to call for the vote.

[03:30:19] Supervisor Bodie? Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I mean, I'm of two minds on this because, you know, I appreciate the folks who came to speak today, and I completely understand how this was sort of a surprise to them of how this was put on the agenda. At the same time, as several of my colleagues have said, these issues are not new.

[03:30:40] Even before the emails that we received over the last, I'd say, two or three months, we know that there's been a lot of tension festering beneath the surface, and there's been a lot of issues around the folks that have been part of this. At the same time, I do not want to diminish the work that that council has done, right?

[03:30:58] They've done a lot of great work over the last few years, you know, since the beginning. The very programs that are mentioned in the resolution that we're going to have put to a nonprofit are proof in the pudding that they do good work. And there is obviously a place for arts, and we should continue to promote the arts in this county.

[03:31:15] At the same time, I'm always one to sort of look for, hey, are there other folks that are already doing this work that they can maybe connect with? So the Prince William Arts Society, for example. I don't know if anyone's, you know, reached out to them about this to see if some of the folks that really want to continue this from the Arts Council would maybe join up with the Arts Society, and that's a pre-existing group.

[03:31:40] There may be some synergy there to your point, Syriza Gordy, that there isn't going to be a huge spin-up time on starting up a new nonprofit if they can approach an existing one. And I think, I know that Seth and his team have worked in partnership with the Arts Council for years now. So I don't think I'll be speaking too much for him when I say I'm sure that there'll be staff support should they have a next endeavor, such if they go to the Art Society, for example, and find some kind of partnership with them.

[03:32:05] We know that nonprofits merge all the time when they find that their missions are aligned. They can have sort of economies of scale. And frankly, them connecting with an existing group like the Art Society may allow there to be a stabilizing force, having other folks have not been part of this drama sort of help you know calm the water so while I will be supporting this this dissolution now I don't want to diminish the work that has been done do not want to diminish the work that's been done by my appointee Don Horizons and I just hope that we continue to at least support the art council as they look at their next chapter thank

[03:32:42] you madam chair hold on all right I'm sorry supervisor Gordy did you have something else Just to clarify, because again, I'm still confused on whether the next move, the resolution says a non-profit, but then I'm also hearing the potential for a commission as a directive coming next month.

[03:33:04] Can I get clarity on, I know, but this has been fed to me today, so I just want to make sure that I'm clear on sort of what the next steps are and what the plan is.

[03:33:21] whether or not there's going to be a commission directive put forward when we meet again next year. Okay. To be clear, there is a parks commission currently. So my understanding, and I could certainly have Seth come down, is that the language is encouraging groups to set up a nonprofit or any kind of private organization.

[03:33:48] It is not a required component. So we are not saying that any component of the Arts Council, the Arts Council itself, or any individual that may be participating on the Arts Council has to go out and create a nonprofit in order for any of the grants programs or any of the special events to continue.

[03:34:11] We will continue the special events. We will work with a partner, whether it's competitively or not. And we will, the arts grants will still be, that program will still be administered.

[03:34:27] And so I just want to make sure that in terms of the next step, I don't believe the language is saying that we are requiring a nonprofit be established. I think what we are suggesting is that we are encouraging a nonprofit because it makes it easier to apply for grants.

[03:34:45] It makes it easier for us to work with the organization. So my colleague, Supervisor Angry, has texted me. He says his intent is to put forward a directive for a commission next year. And, again, I think that will fill a gap.

[03:35:06] And so based on that, I will be supporting it as long as that commission is established. Thank you. All right. I do have some questions, and maybe Supervisor Angry, you can, you know, message me.

[03:35:19] Are we choosing sides? Because what I'm trying to understand is everyone in the Arts Council as it is now, are they all going to be invited to be a part of this nonprofit? Or is a select group going to create a nonprofit? Are we going to have two competing nonprofits? I don't know how this is going to work. I am very worried about choosing sides. And without having that information, I cannot support this.

[03:35:47] You know, again, I know that there have been, unfortunately, a lot of personality conflicts. People are not getting along. I don't understand completely the genesis of that. I'm sorry that it has come to this. But I am very worried, and I want to be on record, if we are choosing sides.

[03:36:05] If not everyone who is currently on there will be invited to participate in this new nonprofit. That's a huge concern for me, especially since some of the allegations I've heard about being silenced, being shut out, being a close group, being a clique, being discriminatory from some of the members who feel that they're not welcome to be a part of this.

[03:36:31] So I'm going to be cautious on this one, and that is why I'm voting no. Supervisor Vega. Thank you, Madam Chair. I thank you that you just perfectly summarized how toxic, unfortunately, the council has become. I'm not picking anybody's side. I'm just being prudent, and I understand that the ship of civility, the ship of coming and meeting in the middle has sailed and sailed far away.

[03:36:55] When you have folks emailing board members to unappoint people, this, that, and the other, making claims that have absolutely no evidence or proof whatsoever is indicative that the group is not working. So who is the council serving?

[03:37:10] Is it serving its purpose? I think we have to come to the realization that it's not serving the purpose for which it was created and that we have to start over again and that this is the best course of action. So you asked, are we picking sides? I'm not. I'm basing my decision off of how ineffective the council has become.

[03:37:28] And I personally know that I wouldn't want to be a part of such a toxic environment. Supervisor Bailey. Yes, and I agree, Supervisor Vega. I'm not taking sides at all. I think this is an opportunity for us to clear the air and get the focus again on the community and not on personalities and to understand what the mission is, creating a new mission and vision for the county to serve the county. And I think the talent that we have, we need to preserve the talent, i.e. the county executive says we're going to continue with

[03:38:01] the programs. I think that's very important. But I think the negative synergy that has been created in this environment needs to be diffused, dissolved, and we move forward with a brand new fresh commission and we move forward with brand new fresh vision to serve the county so i'm certainly not picking sides but i think we're at a point now uh as we move forward with transformative ideas and transformative talent that we move forward with trans transformative

[03:38:36] decisions and how we're going to do that so not picking side but i think we need a freshness and moving forward supervisor stewart i i took my name out yeah i did i did all right so then let's go i'm sorry supervisor gordy yeah i misspoke um uh supervisor angry is not putting forward a directive for a commission um uh so i just wanted to correct the record for that so

[03:39:04] all right thank you so very much so let's go ahead and take a vote supervisor angry motion passes five to two supervisors gordy and chair jefferson voting nay all right thank you so very

[03:39:38] much we are now gonna go around the horn and i will start with supervisor vega she's not ready so i'll start with supervisor gordy thank you madam chair make this very quick um on the 11th uh had the pleasure of attending the parks foundation uh reception um and just a we have such a great community of supporters for our parks and to be able to see them all in one place and to see that commitment and the excitement, especially after the opening of the pump track has them very energized and looking forward to their next opportunities to support our community. And then

[03:40:17] last night, I enjoyed visiting with the Misty Creek community, again, to discuss issues related to their roads and opportunities, how we can address that. Yesterday began Hanukkah.

[03:40:32] I want to wish all of our Jewish community a happy Hanukkah. I know it started off very rough with what happened in Sydney, and our hearts go out to all those families, and some of that did hit close to home. Some folks from this area were over there participating in Sydney, but there are They're having the menorah lighting at the Atlas Walk in Gainesville this week, and so we certainly want to welcome the community out in support of our Jewish neighbors.

[03:41:05] And then I also want to wish our community a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and Happy Holidays and just look forward to seeing everyone again in the new year. I will say personally, 2025 has been rough. I'm ready for it to be over with, And it's been a very challenging year for my family, and so looking forward to a better 26th.

[03:41:29] Thank you. You ready now? Yes. I have a directive that you all have seen. And, Madam Chair, without objection, I'd like to direct the county executive to work with staff to compile a clear and complete breakdown of all county funds, services, and resources that support Prince William County schools and other public education programs.

[03:41:50] This should include not only budgeted transfers or appropriations, but also any additional monies approved by the board outside the annual budget process, as well as the value of services or resources provided through county departments, such as information, technology, parks and recreation, or other shared services.

[03:42:06] The report should identify the purpose and funding source for each item and specify whether it is required by state mandate, local policy, or provided at the board's discretion. The county attorney's office is directed to review the information and recommendations for any legal issues. When the research and work is complete, the county executive should report back to the board with his analysis and recommendations by memorandum within 60 days of the board's directive.

[03:42:29] That's all I have. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year, everyone. All right, Supervisor Bodie. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm going to add Supervisor Angry's request. I'm going to start with his supervisor's time very quickly. He wanted to put in his notice of intent to reappoint Kelly Easterly, the Animal Advisory Committee.

[03:42:49] So I want to make sure that you all had that. And he says Merry Christmas. So that's it for Neabsco time, not Occoquan time. Wanted to first thank everyone who came out to join me at the two open houses that happened on Friday.

[03:43:07] So first in the morning, we went to the Senior Center breakfast lunch and wanted to thank Supervisor Franklin for her invitation to that. It's always a great time going to see our seniors there. They live it up. There was a lot of dancing, a lot of festivities.

[03:43:23] so really wanted to say thank you supervisor franklin and to the senior center and all the staff that helped make that um that event a success every year and then in the evening we went to the uh my staff and some other folks went to the gainesville district open house so wanted to say that uh supervisor stewart and his staff do not play when it comes into throwing a good party um i heard they spent on apple a lot of time uh decorating their office it was well received so i want to say congratulations to your first open house supervisor stewart um on sunday my family and i took part in this in our annual santa trains over up in manassas uh for folks who have

[03:44:00] not been on the vre especially for santa trains i invite you to do so um my my four-year-old my two-year-old year old even my 13-year-old love it um you know we see mrs calls we see santa claus there's elves there's caroling there's singing there's it's a really really good time um but if you're if you are concerned about your kids having candy canes or candy um you should probably pass because they get out a lot of candy on that and my kids were bouncing around for quite often throughout the day um also wanted to just also talk about um yesterday morning i attended alongside

[03:44:36] supervisor bailey and and supervisor angry the annual transportation legislative town hall forum put on jointly by PRTC, VRE, and NVTC. It's always great to bring so many transit nerds into the same building to talk about the future of transit in our region. A lot of great conversations always come out of that. My team was able to join Rabbi Shmuley and the Jewish community for the menorah lighting in Occoquan a couple days ago, so wanted to commend and thank Rabbi Shmuley and the Jewish community in our county for continuing to continue that tradition.

[03:45:12] And as Supervisor Gordy said, especially during this kind of rough period that folks are going through. With that, I have nothing else. And I hope everyone has happy holidays, happy Kwanzaa, happy Hanukkah, Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year. You forgot Festivus for the rest of us.

[03:45:30] All right, Supervisor Stewart. Stole my Festivus thunder. Now it's time for the grievances. All right. So I want to thank everybody who came out to the Gainesville office for the open house on 12-12.

[03:45:50] It was like 12 days of Christmas, and thanks for being there. Thanks for the support. It was great hosting you all. I had a good time and can't wait for Christmas next year. The next day, the town of Haymarket, speaking about artists, I think the best artists in the county, descended upon Haymarket for their town bazaar and tree lighting.

[03:46:16] It was a great time. Mr. and Mrs. Claus were there. And we had the Haymarket Polar Express train for the kids. And it was really great. I also, yesterday, attended the unveiling of Elevate 2030, the Prince William County Schools strategic plan for the next five years, which was great.

[03:46:46] And this morning, I attended the ribbon cutting for the Polar Veterans Care Center on Vint Hill Road. Really awesome facility. Took some time to get it done.

[03:47:02] But, you know, from what I saw today, it was worth every bit of the wait. Um, the governor was there, uh, for the ribbon, ribbon cutting and, um, you know, for any Marine or sailor that, that knows the name puller, I think this place was, was, was aptly named and is, um, if there was going to be a place that's going to be dedicated to that whole family, um, you know, this, this, this was it.

[03:47:32] Um, and I, I also want to wish everybody a very happy holiday, Merry Christmas, um, happy Hanukkah, happy Kwanzaa, and, you know, this has been, for me, like an amazing year, obviously, you know, because at the beginning of the year, I was in this room in a completely different way, and now I find myself here, and, you know, and inside of that, though, I do want to remember Bob and his family, you know, especially at this time, you know, just the

[03:48:07] first Christmas without you know a close loved one as well as you know supervisor Bailey you know having just just lost her mom you know I you know my my prayers are with you and you know I I know what that can be like having lost both of my parents and speaking of parents you know another part of this year you know with me reconnecting with my my birth family as many of you know i'm i'm adopted and so that was very very uh like a special thing for me but i wish everybody all the success for the remaining days that we have for this year and make it a good one

[03:48:44] and i will see you on the next one thank you all right and supervisor bailey thank you very much madam chair uh thank you for the elbow touch i appreciate it um um on the 10th of december uh I'd like to thank my staff and Supervisor Franklin and county staff, Captain Smith, and all the constituents who attended the community meeting to discuss the safety solutions for the Potomac Shores community.

[03:49:15] It was an awesome turnout, and that's what we do, work together to resolve issues. On the 11th, thank you again to my staff, who has been covering me in the moments of losing my mom.

[03:49:30] I appreciate my staff just covering me and helping me in that regard. But they attended the DPSC 54 graduation and promotion ceremony. And congratulations to the seven graduates who were promoted. And welcome to the PWC team.

[03:49:47] Supervisor Stewart, I did hear you had a great holiday bash. You're first. You got an A+. And thank you for the invitation and for embracing my staff to come and participate on your open house. And then on the 13th, Quantico National Cemetery did the laying of the reefs across America.

[03:50:06] And so thank you to my appointee, Auriela Mejia, for attending the reefs across America for me in my absence because I graduated from the Sorenson Institute on December the 13th. Thank you. And it was an amazing nine months.

[03:50:23] And so I'm thankful to the staff, to Larry, Robert, Sarah, Sam, and Rebecca for your exceptional guidance and support in that program. That will help me to understand the state of Virginia a lot more and help me to be able to lead better in Prince William County.

[03:50:43] So I'm a graduate, so that was an amazing experience. And then on the 14th, thanks to my president, Allison Blow, and the Lynx Incorporated for partnering with me and my office for Toys for Tots this year.

[03:50:59] Special thanks to that organization and providing gifts, all kinds of gifts to our children that are less fortunate in the community. And so I'm excited about that. Being a Marine Corps wife, it's going to be a great time. And we will be supporting the Hildebarg Shelter and the homeless ministries and the local communities and churches here in Prince William County.

[03:51:23] Yesterday, I did participate with my colleague, Victor Angry, and Kenny Bode in the NVTC PRTC VRE forum. And it was exceptional. We're doing some great things in transportation across this region.

[03:51:39] And so we will continue to make transit priorities and legislative agendas our utmost to give service to our communities as it relates to strategic planning and funding. Last night was amazing as we supported Dr. McDade and her staff in the 2030 strategic plan.

[03:51:59] It was outstanding. It's another opportunity for us to partner together in this county for the best of what we have, and that's the next generation. So congratulations on that. Today, my staff attended the Virginia Puller Veterans Care Center.

[03:52:15] I hear it was outstanding, so thank you for supporting me in that way. 128-bed skilled nursing fertility for Virginia veterans, and we need that so much. Upcoming events on the 17th, I would like to thank my staff for attending the Sip and Sing at Swans Creek Elementary School.

[03:52:40] It's an evening holiday with songs, so I know that we're excited about that. And then Boys and Girls Club, the Big Kid event finality on the 18th. I will not be attending in that.

[03:52:55] That's the memorial service for my mom. But thank you to my staff for attending. And then Happy Holidays. I'd like to wish all of my colleagues sorry I'll get the cards after Christmas and I hope that you just have a joyful and peaceful and happy holiday season and I thank you to all of you for your warm respect and prayers and blessings for the loss of my mother thank you thank you this has been a really tough year for

[03:53:32] the board collectively and individually as people have been dealing with a lot of loss this year and the holes that people we care about leave in our hearts it's really hard to fill it will always be there some days it'll hurt more some days it'll hurt less i was really excited last night going to elevate 2030 the school strategic plan i have to say i was really blown away i was really wowed and in awe what our schools put together and it shows that having the right

[03:54:08] leadership, having the right people who care, and who are passionate about the work that they do, there are no bounds. Now, when I was thinking about this, you know, it's kind of funny how this came together. I am going to do a directive for a children's cabinet. I sent information around to all my colleagues about what this could look like on a local level. It's something that Poughkeepsie and New York has. So as for my directive, without objection, I would like to direct the county executive to work with staff to explore the creation of a children's cabinet

[03:54:46] to leverage the power of community stakeholders who address the needs of the youth in our community. The approach should examine bringing together local government, schools, health, human services, and other community-based organizations to address challenges related to the issues of attendance, mental health, housing instability, workforce readiness, and early childhood development.

[03:55:09] This approach should also consider how the Children's Cabinet would be structured to align policies, resources, and data around shared outcome for children and families, especially from birth through young adulthood, while maintaining the legal and fiscal responsibilities of the county government and school public school system.

[03:55:31] This model should allow for a coordinated community system that aligns efforts across education, health, housing, and social services. The recommendation should include the potential governance structures of the Children's Cabinet model with a list of potential members and impacted stakeholders, budget implications, and any other items that the board should be aware of in the creation of such a group. The county attorney's office is directed to review the information and recommendations for any legal issues. When the work is complete, the county executive should

[03:56:04] report back to the board with their recommendations during a board meeting or by memorandum as they deem appropriate. Madam Chair. Supervisor Vega. Thank you. I do object. You sent this kind of late last night, but a quick review. I understand the intent, but I'll keep it short because I know we're pressed for time. I'm proud to say that here in Prince William County, this initiative is not needed and here's why. Prince William County currently has a Children's Service Act division which is a state-funded pool for eligibility for youth under 21 with emotional behavioral needs,

[03:56:41] FAPT which stands for Family Assessment and Planning Team, multi-agency teams including schools, DSS, courts, health and it plans for individualized services like outpatient treatment that directly mirrors the proposal that you've shared. We have the Office of Youth Services that promotes positive development via evidence-based programs, partners with non-profits for after school and resilience building we have the child advocacy center which houses which is housed in dss which brings law enforcement prosecutors mental health and professionals other professionals together for abuse cases we have the strategic plan interagency tool which shares data dedicated liaisons joint training and quarterly school meetings which ensures alignments with spark

[03:57:21] funding to the tune of 350 000 which supports cls and other partnerships we have metrics and accountabilities in Prince William County schools that are tracked via SOL pass rates graduation data and family engagement surveys Prince William County County uses enterprise-wide processes for service delivery in summary madam chair and to my colleagues I will offer this that Prince William County's framework and interagency mechanisms via DSS Prince William County Schools Community Services and CSA and FAPT already delivers coordinated data driven supports with built-in accountability I don't believe that we should be adding another group especially when we really haven't spoken to the school division in

[03:58:00] regards to how this is going to me what is what it's going to mean and how it's going to impact policy I did a very quick rundown madam chair I had a lot more because there's a lot more detail breakdown specifically to the age population if you will specific age and so again I am proud to say that everything detailed in your directive is quite literally already covered through all of these other groups, which we should all be very proud of. Therefore, we do not need this initiative to be implemented. I agree that we have a lot of work that we're doing in the county, and I feel that better coordination can always be there. This is something that I have approached

[03:58:39] the schools about. I haven't had a chance to discuss it fully, but it is a directive for us to come back with recommendations. If there is nothing to be done, then there is nothing to be done but you know i've seen this in other jurisdictions i would love to explore this idea but since there is an objection we are going to have to make this a resolution and vote on this is anyone else um i'm going to go ahead and we can contain i don't know did you have something you want to say because should we can turn in the motion i should just second it so we can okay all right so i'll go ahead and move forward it's been seconded by supervisor bode is there any further

[03:59:15] discussion please jump into the queue so i don't miss anyone supervisor bode yeah thank you madam Chair. So very quickly, Suarez or Vega, I appreciate you bringing that forward. I know that there's a lot of cross-agency work, and you just gave great examples of what's being done. I think that, frankly, to the Chair's point, part of the analysis that would be given as part of this would be, are we duplicating efforts? Are there not? Is there room for something else to really enhance and de-silo further what is being done? So I'm going to be supporting it because, again, I think that it'll be good fact-finding on the part of the county and all of our colleagues in the in the agencies to look through that you know if it

[03:59:53] comes up that hey it is redundant we don't really need to do anything else other than maybe enhance what's already existing that's fine but if it comes back forth and says hey this is a new way to you know raise this to a higher level I'm all for that too just the last thing I'll say is I really like the idea of uplifting children and families around this madam chair would love to talk to you further maybe in the future about having a group like this serve to maybe inform a future futures report for the county thank you thank you supervisor vega sure madam chair and in closing um i hear everything that uh you have said and what supervisor bode has added i will just remind

[04:00:31] my colleagues that we often talk about the pressures that we put on staff uh quite literally if we just took some time to refresh our memories um on what we already provide in this county we would learn that it will be redundant but now we're going to go ahead and pile on additional work on staff that's already burdened with a lot of other initiatives simply because we want to.

[04:00:54] Supervisor Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. I really appreciate what Supervisor Vega is saying. I appreciate what you've put forth. I think that I didn't have an opportunity to really digest, because we did get it kind of late last night, but I didn't have an opportunity to really digest what you were putting forth.

[04:01:17] But I think a lot of what we saw last night with the school board is addressing a lot of what you've just presented. And I think this is opening an opportunity for us to really partner with the school board more and partner with our agencies more to see where the needs are.

[04:01:42] And I, like Supervisor Vega, one thing that I'm really concerned about, We've seen a lot of great transformative things being presented to us here lately. And I don't want staff to be overworked because the mission is to really get some data to understand where we are.

[04:02:03] And so, though I appreciate what you've presented, I think we're in the pathway of doing that. And so, I would like to see that come to fruition, if possible. And then if it's not what we want, then come back with another directive.

[04:02:22] But at this point, I think my concern is really overworking staff as they are trying to get a rhythm and partnering together to make sure that the programs that we have are relevant, make sense, the resources are there, and the funding is there.

[04:02:39] And we're in an era right now where nationally things are so unstable that to put additional things on them, I just don't see it right now. So though I would love to support this, I think right now the timing is off for me.

[04:02:59] And I appreciate that. I do want to check on the staffing and sending, and I apologize if it got back so late. I got it a little late, so I sent it around late. We've had people who've sent directives the same day or last minute, so I just want to name that. But we're talking about staff and being overburdened. I'm pretty sure I've been a very strong advocate. I think very few staff members would say that I haven't. We're making sure that they have the resources they need to do the work in front of them and make sure that our departments are adequately staffed. If people don't like this for other reasons, such as political reasons, I know no one's going to name that. But let's be honest, we can use more coordination.

[04:03:39] This is a directive. I don't think it hurts for us to look at things more holistically. And as you were saying, Supervisor Bailey, I want to understand, you know, I wasn't sure on your point, but you're getting back in the queue. So if you can clarify, yeah, if you can clarify about, you know, getting after what it is we want, if you can take a moment to clarify that.

[04:04:01] Yeah, I mean, because I don't want you to misread what I'm saying. First of all, not political at all, always communal. So I want the dais to understand, especially you, Madam Chair, not political. But what I mean by that is, you know, I don't want staff to be, I don't think it's fair for us to have staff to be overworked.

[04:04:25] Now, and you're not clear on what? What is it that you're not clear on? Let me make sure. You were saying there are other ways to get after what it is we want. Yeah, I mean, I think once what I meant by that, getting what we want, let them bring back to us what they're working on now with the data that they have now to assess what's needed.

[04:04:47] And then once they do that, then if it's not satisfactory to what is needed, then I think an additional directive is needed. But right now, I don't think it's needed right now because of all of the transformative things that they're trying to create to bring data back to us to make sure that the programs and the different agencies are relevant from being so old.

[04:05:15] That's kind of where I'm going with that. So it's not political. It's just I'm trying to make sense out of what they're bringing to us now. So I just want to be clear because you're saying getting the data back. Are you making a directive that we get data? I'm not making a directive. I'm saying we need to continue with what they're bringing to us now with the programs that Supervisor Vague has presented.

[04:05:38] And there are a plethora of programs, some that we need to weed out, some that we need to keep. But I think they're in there, meaning agencies are in a rhythm as it applies to our youth. They're in a rhythm now, bringing things back to us, as well as our school board.

[04:05:54] So this is not personal against you. I'm just saying information that is coming to us now is relevant, and it's information that we haven't had before. So I'm not trying to make it personal, not directing it at you at all. I'm just saying that's my opinion.

[04:06:09] So I'm still confused, but I appreciate your clarification. Sorry that you're confused. Bottom line, what I'm saying, it's not political. I'm not trying to make it political. But I think based upon what we saw last night, a lot of it can be resolved in what you're trying to initiate if we work with the school board.

[04:06:30] So what I'm looking at is more holistic than what the schools are doing, and it's looking at that coordination piece. Again, from my perspective, it's not needed. If we already had the data, I wouldn't have made this request. The reason why I'm making this request is because I would like staff to look into this.

[04:06:46] If it is nothing, it is nothing. I don't know if this is overburdening staff. I'm not asking for them to create a new program, necessarily. I'm asking for information. I'm fact-finding. I mean, I know we can go back and forth, and I'm certainly, you know, if you would like to sit down and discuss this, I am, you know, interested in doing that.

[04:07:07] No, ma'am, I'm just offering my opinion on it, my one-eighth opinion. That is true. And I wouldn't like to discuss it further at all. I just think that in consideration of what you're trying to propose, there is something in play already that you might want to consider.

[04:07:26] It may be an opportunity for you to, you know, I'm just offering that. You cut me off. I was going to say, I don't feel that something. Sorry, I don't mean to cut you off. We're going to go ahead and take a vote. I don't feel, I just want to say this, I don't feel that we have this in place, and that's why I offered a directive. And I can appreciate that.

[04:07:43] Let's go ahead and take a vote. Supervisor Angry? No. Motion fails three to three. Three votes for nay. Supervisors angry, Bailey, and Vega.

[04:08:18] Supervisor Gordy abstaining from vote. All right. Thank you very much. And with that, we will go to closed session. When I graduated from VCU, I was a criminal justice pre-law major. I was hired by a sign manufacturer. My first project 20 plus years ago was Potomac Mills.

[04:08:42] to install. From closed session, I ask that everyone please take a seat. We are going to

[04:10:45] certify our closed session, so if someone can give me a motion. So moved. Second. It's been moved and

[04:10:52] properly seconded. Let's take a vote. Yes. Sir, Ms. Supervisor Franklin absent from vote and all

[04:11:26] subsequent votes. All right, and then we have one thing to report out. Supervisor Stewart. Madam Chair, I move we appoint Susan Washington as Human Resources Director. Second. All right, We'll probably move it and second it.

[04:12:02] Let's go ahead and take a vote. Supervisor Angry? Aye. Thank you, sir. Vote unanimous. All right.

[04:12:19] I don't know if you'd like to say something. Thank you very much, Madam Chairs and members of the board. I want to first express my appreciation for your support and express my enthusiasm, great enthusiasm, to welcome Susan Washington, who has served this community extremely well.

[04:12:37] She has over 25 years experience in HR, and I am just very pleased that we now get to call Susan, not acting director, but director of human resources. Susan, I don't know if you wanted to say a few words. All right. Good evening, Chair and Board of County Supervisors and CXO Shorter.

[04:13:04] I appreciate this opportunity to continue to serve my community, to support the county and my colleagues across the county, and to help lead the Office of HR for Prince William County. I am very excited about this opportunity. I'm thankful that my children are here.

[04:13:23] They're out there to be able to see this. And I appreciate your confidence in me as we move forward. Thank you so much. Thank you so very much. I mean, everyone is really excited for this new chapter in your career.

[04:13:40] I know we're right at 6.59, but I'm going to because we had a rush back from closed session. I am going to give the board a five-minute recess. We will see you guys in five minutes. I know everyone's all seated and ready. Surprise!

[04:13:56] All right, five minutes. Thank you.

[04:14:15] Back. For us, five minutes really went by fast.

[04:14:31] I hope it did for you guys as well. We are now moving on to agenda item number 13A. and that is the rezoning from maple valley grove i would like to ask the applicant to come

[04:14:43] forward to present are we missing part of the applicant all right talk amongst yourselves we

[04:15:21] gained a lawyer but we lost a supervisor that's okay we still have a quorum good evening chair jefferson and members of the board my name is jonelle cameron with walsh collucci luboli and walsh here tonight on behalf of the applicant galveston crossing with me tonight are representatives from the applicant, the civil engineering team, traffic consultant, and environmental consultant.

[04:15:50] The property is comprised of three parcels and is approximately 23.43 acres in size. For reference, here is Prince William Parkway, here is Holdley Road, and here is Galveston Court.

[04:16:08] The property is currently zoned A1 Agricultural, and a small portion is zoned M2 Light Industrial. The property is comprehensively planned mixed-use 3. The mixed-use 3 designation recommends 4 to 12 dwelling units per acre.

[04:16:24] This slide is a contextual exhibit to show how it fits in with the surrounding area. Here is the shopping center. Here is the Apollo development, which includes townhomes, commercial, and here is additional commercial with residential here and Daryl Noor here.

[04:16:45] This slide is the illustrative layout that shows the proposal. The applicant is proposing 274 residential units, which will allow 242 multifamily stacked units and up to 32 traditional multifamily units.

[04:17:02] The up to 32 is because the multifamily building here is proposed to be a LIHTC building. That LIHTC building will be available to people making up to 60% AMI. If the LIHTC building is not approved, then the applicant has proffered that this building would be made available to people earning up to 85% AMI.

[04:17:24] The proposal is between 11.35 dwelling units per acre, and if there are 32 traditional multifamily units, 11.69 dwelling units per acre. The proposed density aligns with the comprehensive plan.

[04:17:42] This slide shows the open space plan. The PMR requires 30% open space, and the comprehensive plan also recommends 30% open space. The applicant is proposing 55% of the site as open space. The applicant is proposing a 50-foot buffer along Prince William Parkway in the area here.

[04:18:05] Due to the grade of the site, there's a 20-foot grade difference between Prince William Parkway and the property, which requires grading within the buffer area. The applicant is requesting a modified 30-foot buffer adjacent to the shopping center to the south.

[04:18:21] In this area here and here, the applicant wants to be integrated with the shopping center instead of separated from it. Providing a full 50-foot buffer adjacent to the shopping center disrupts the safe walkability between the uses. Although the buffer is only 30 feet, the applicant has designed a majority of the amenities to be along the property boundary line.

[04:18:44] although the sorry this slide here i can get it to work here so this here is the buffer area it's a variable width so there's a pinch point in this area here which is 37 feet but with the amenities it ranges up to 198 feet the applicant is proposing several amenities on site that are walkable no matter where you are within the community a little less than one and a third acres is proposed as the amenity areas which include a community garden community park pocket

[04:19:24] park fitness area and promenade in addition the multi-family building will have a community room located inside of it the applicant is also proffering a monetary contribution for parks and recreation for aquaquan and neapsco greenways this slide shows the community garden which provides outdoor space for for residents to plant their own preferences and needs in addition to plots shared work and rest space in the form of potting benches and seating will be present as well this slide shows the community park this is the primary amenity area in this portion of the

[04:20:01] neighborhood it includes a playground for ages 2 through 12 gathering space activity lawn gardens and a fitness area and this slide here shows the pocket park and fitness areas as well there's seating and benching benches in this area here and then the fitness area is in this area here.

[04:20:26] Finally we have the promenade. The promenade is designed so when you come into this site and look straight ahead what you're looking at is that promenade area. That area has a outdoor seating areas here, a lawn area, and the possibility to have a library station and or swing. As part of the proposal, the applicant was required to do a traffic impact analysis. The traffic impact analysis requires you to look at the three intersections on the screen. It requires us to look at the levels of service today, the levels of service in the future without the development.

[04:21:05] The in the future requires you to take a 2% per year annual growth rate, as well as include any other projects that have been approved and not yet developed so for this specific site we had to look at the dar el nor special use permit that was approved as the background trips and then you have to look at what is the level of the service in the future looking at that two percent annual growth rate the dar el nor approval and your project because hold lee square was also going through the rezoning process at the same time. The county and VDOT also asked the applicant to

[04:21:43] also include Holdley Square within their review. All of the intersections operated at an acceptable level of service, except for the intersection of Prince William Parkway and Holdley Road, which is failing in the future without the project. And with both Maple Valley Grove and the proposed Holdley Square, there was an increase in delay by five and a half seconds.

[04:22:05] In calculating the proposed trips for the development, the applicant did not take a reduction for nearby transit or walkability, which is something that they're normally allowed to do. As you all are aware, VDOT has started the STARS study, which is at the intersection of Hoadley Road, Davis Ford Road, and Prince William Parkway.

[04:22:26] That STARS study looks at the entire Hoadley Road corridor down to 234. The study has provided options for intersection improvements along this corridor, including at the intersection of Hoadley, Prince William Parkway, and Davis Ford Road.

[04:22:43] The applicant has provided a monetary contribution of a little over $71,000 for an interim improvement at the intersection of Prince William Parkway, Hoadley Road, and Davis Ford Road, or along the corridor. This slide shows the interior street network. The street network within the community is designed with a structured hierarchy, prioritizing connectivity, functionality, accessibility, efficiency, and safety for vehicular, bicycle, and pedestrian traffic.

[04:23:16] As part of the project, the applicant will be relocating the existing cul-de-sac that is at the end of Galveston Court and this area here, and relocating that into the development. The applicant was also asked if they can work with the adjacent shopping center to obtain an easement for pedestrian connectivity in this area here to be able to have a direct connection other than that on Galveston Court to the shopping center.

[04:23:46] In the event Holdley Square is not approved, the applicant is relocating Galveston Court further into the development, which is in this area here. This slide is an interconnectivity exhibit that demonstrates how both vehicular and pedestrian access would work in the event Holdley Square is approved.

[04:24:07] The red dashed lines are the vehicular connections, the blue lines are the sidewalks, and the yellow lines are asphalt trails. As part of this proposal, the applicant is over-parked by 55 spaces. This slide shows the monument signage.

[04:24:31] This slide shows the stacked multifamily elevations. The PMR standards are outdated and do not necessarily align with today's market. For this reason, we are seeking two modifications as it relates to the multifamily stacked units. The first is a modification to increase the building height to 55 feet to allow for rooftop terraces and a reduction of the front setback to 25 feet.

[04:24:57] The design guidelines require different materials, colors, and bump outs be provided to break up the building. This slide shows the multifamily buildings. The applicant is also seeking a waiver and modification for the setback.

[04:25:16] In the next few slides, I'm going to review revisions to the proffers that were made based on feedback at the Planning Commission public hearing. The first change essentially was requiring 30% of the units to include brick, stone, masonry, cement, siding, or cultured stone.

[04:25:33] The second revision was to add a low-impact development best management practice measure to the property. And essentially, this is a measure that is added to stormwater management to help with stormwater management.

[04:25:52] And finally, the applicant added the monetary contribution of $71,046.28 to be used for an interim improvement along the Holdley Road corridor. And that concludes my presentation.

[04:26:08] i am available to answer any questions that you all may have all right does anyone have any questions for the applicant right now all right oh supervisor bode thank you madam chair thank you miss cameron for the presentation just a couple questions and i'm gonna likely ask staff some of the same issue areas because i know there's uh constituents who have talked about sort of three issues transportation environments uh schools and just sort of character um can you talk a little bit about, you talked about the transportation piece quite a bit. Um, and you

[04:26:42] said that in this case, there wasn't, um, a, a bonus given for transit walkability, those types of things. Can you talk a little bit more about that? Yes, absolutely. So when you were doing a traffic impact analysis, each project based on the number of units and the type of units, it's assigned a trip. When you're doing this, you often get a reduction in your trips when you're near transit or its walkability. So in this instance, there are bus stops specifically on Galveston Court, as well as along Hoadley Road. And then there is the walkability between the

[04:27:18] shopping center and the residential. So that allows for there to be a reduction in trips. And the applicant did not do that reduction in trips when it was doing the traffic impact analysis. I appreciate that. And so can you talk also a little bit about, you talked about the the star study a little bit but um has there been any sort of conversation around what those interim or interim improvements might be that the the contribution would go towards so there um as part of the star study vdot provided options in addition when the star study was being reviewed

[04:27:53] prince william county transportation also looked at potential options one of those was being a um a triple left on prince william parkway and sorry to make you all dizzy um but essentially it's this left turn lane these two left turn movements that have that delay today in seconds and then with both projects it was adding an additional five and a half seconds so one of the options potentially was to restripe a through lane to create another left turn movement on

[04:28:29] Hoadley Road um but the county is still looking at all options with VDOT to determine what is the best interim option and Kevin's behind me I hear him I see him shaking his head but if you need county transportation we'll get there once we get to the county staff appreciate that um on to uh thank you for that so on to environments I know that a lot of folks are concerned about the Occoquan Reservoir and sort of how this feeds into that um for starters just for the record this as per the comp plan that we adopted and per staff's recommendation for the comp plan this was always proposed to be an MU3 right correct so no it wasn't supposed to be an ORPA nothing like that

[04:29:07] appreciate that so on the environmental piece can you talk a little bit more about the stormwater management system and how that compares the existing conditions on site yes absolutely and I'm going to have Matt Marshall who's our civil engineer come and speak on that good evening members of the board of supervisors my name is Matt Marshall I'm with LDC I am the engineer for the applicant.

[04:29:38] This system is going to be two parts, Supervisor Bodhi. It's going to be a level one wet pond, and complemented now with a LID, and we're committed to at least one, but we're going to pursue and kind of see where it fits and what provides the most benefit. But effectively, they're going to be in series, what's called treatment training.

[04:29:55] So one will drain to another to help improve the water quality. We are also doing what's called channel protection and flood protection, using the energy balance equation such that we are mimicking the pre-development flows to reduce downstream erosion. and be more friendly, if you will, in terms of the post-development condition relative to the pre-development condition.

[04:30:14] Appreciate that. Thank you. And last question, Janelle, for now, schools. I know that some folks are concerned about the school's impact. Can you talk about the school's impact and also some of the options that the school board has should this get approved? Yes, absolutely. So currently, the elementary and high school do not have capacity.

[04:30:35] Prince William County looked at the site as part of the application. The application gets distributed to Prince William County schools. They look at it, and they provide an impact report. There are other schools within the district for elementary schools that actually have capacity, and I have a couple of slides to hit that.

[04:30:58] So this slide here is what was actually in the impact report and within the county staff report that you received. So Marshall Elementary, Benton Middle, and Charles Colgan Senior High School are the three schools that are currently assigned. Marshall and Charles Colgan are overcapacity today.

[04:31:17] With this development, they would continue to be overcapacity. What the county said in their report back is the 14th high school will provide additional capacity to address overcrowding at the high school level. They also mentioned that the enrollment projections do not reflect any potential remedial measures the school board has, which includes redistricting.

[04:31:41] So what we did is we looked at the elementary schools, which is Carydale, Marshall, and Penn. Penn is overcrowded, Marshall is overcrowded. Carydale has capacity in the future. and then we also looked at the high schools that Prince William County school staff mentioned which were Hilton High School and Garfield and both of those are under capacity as well so it is likely at the time that the school system is notified we've sold our first unit or our first unit is about to be occupied in this amount of time they would then look at the schools and address

[04:32:19] overcrowding which could include redistricting the students in this development to a school that has capacity thank you are there any other questions all right i don't see any so let's go

[04:32:34] ahead and go ahead and have the county present good evening members of the board scott meyer in the planning office good evening nice to see everybody um so you've already been oriented to

[04:33:07] where the site is but just a couple things um so this uh the site is right here it's along the Prince Wayne Parkway. This corner, if you will, is entirely planned as MU3, neighborhood mixed use. So that's just one thing to keep in mind. It is not in the ORPA, but still you have natural features existing. And even though there's districts and descriptions, we still need to be mindful of all those things. So the applicant again is proposing to rezone this to plan mixed

[04:33:44] residential to have a total unit count not to exceed 274. It's going to be a mixture of stacked multifamily or stacked towns or two over twos, as we sometimes refer them to as. And traditional multifamily is going to be in the eastern part of the site. Staff is recommending approval.

[04:34:04] Just a couple things here. Again, this is the current land use, and we are charged with looking at what the current lane use is among other things. It's along the Prince Wayne Parkway. One of the big issues is just the, and I'll get into this a little bit later, is the loss of intact tree areas and also trying to preserve trees on site to the extent practicable. We have to balance that with there is a LIHTC affordable housing component with this, which is also important. So thus, that's just the context for our analysis. This is from the

[04:34:42] design guidelines. It's showing the site here in juxtaposition to the intersection of the Parkway and Holy Road. Holy Square, the next piece to be discussed after this is to the west next to Dar Al-Nor. So as Janelle had mentioned, you know, the Land Bay A, that's the stacked multifamily, And the height increase is just for the stacked multifamily.

[04:35:12] It's not for the traditional multifamily in the eastern part, just to clarify that. This is the environmental constraints analysis, and we have a staff from environmental services here as well. There's also a couple extra slides on trees if we want to get into that discussion.

[04:35:29] But the point of this is there aren't intact limits to clearing, grading, which is a good thing. Again, a lot of the site is being cleared. And how do we balance that with the intent of the environmental component of the comprehensive plan? And we feel that that is one of the issues that we feel could have been better looked at.

[04:35:49] But we look at everything in total. So just keep that in perspective. Open space, this is about 55% open space, which is considerably more than what we have. We look at the quality of the design. One thing that we do wish is that the buffer along the parkway was increased.

[04:36:10] It does meet the intent in the requirement of a 50-foot H-Cod buffer, but we feel like that with the height and with the massing, on the other side of the parkway you have a much more intact buffer. So we feel like respectfully the buffer along the parkway should be increased, and also we feel that there's existing a thin amount of pine trees along the parkway.

[04:36:33] Also, the applicants requesting to modify the buffer to the south. We really feel that that should still be 50 feet because it's backing up to the back of the shopping center. We want to have that separation, but we look at, again, all these things in combination, not in isolation.

[04:36:53] This is, again, the public street alternative. You're looking at the stacked multifamily in purple, and then the traditional LIHTC piece potentially to the east here. So the height increase is only for the stacked multifamily.

[04:37:10] It's not for the traditional. And there's also a setback modification as well. These are the elevations. We have the stacked multifamily to the left and the traditional multifamily to the right. And just a couple things to point out.

[04:37:28] Overall, we are supporting the application because we look at landings, we look at design, all those things. However, we feel that environment, there's concerns, and also schools. We understand we're not going to solve this all through the districting issue, but we look at what schools has provided us.

[04:37:50] So just a couple things to point out, with the loss of intact vegetated areas, the need for increased on-site preservation, we feel that there could still be greater tree preservation on site, and they could increase the buffer by not losing a lot of units by enhanced tree preservation, particularly along the parkway.

[04:38:11] We feel that there are still opportunities for on-site tree preservation. The applicant, based on the Planning Commission discussion, did add a commitment for low-impact development, but we feel that environmentally there's a lot of intact tree areas here that will be gone, and we have to look at what the intent of the environmental policies are. So environment was a no. Schools, we feel there is still unmitigated impact based on the school capacity for the elementary school. We also have some concerns about the analysis. Schools has brought

[04:38:49] up that they don't agree with the methodology. The applicant has done their analysis. We look at proffers as being voluntary. So it's just interesting to point out that this does not have a monetary contribution for schools, but Holy Square to the West does. So again, I don't want to speak about the two, but just something to observe. In community design, we feel like that, you know, again, with an undisturbed greater buffer along the parkway, and we feel also that with a greater buffer to the south, that that can fully mitigate the impacts. But we look at

[04:39:25] everything in combination. With the modifications, we are supporting all of them except for 27D. We feel like that the contiguous buffer for 30 feet, that really needs to be more of 50 feet. We've asked for that numerous times, but we respect the applicant's position on that.

[04:39:45] And we feel that the reduced setbacks is based on if fire safety requirements are met. That will be looked at later on in the site process. So with that, in combination, the Planning Commission recommended denial. There was a lot of discussion because there is a time element with a potential LIHTC component in the interest to move this forward to you all at the board.

[04:40:10] The Planning Commission recommended denial, but we have to note that it was recommended for denial. Staff was recommending approval. Staff is still recommending approval with the revised proffers that are dated November 26th. We feel that this meets the intent and directly implements MU-3 because that's what the current planned land use is.

[04:40:31] We feel that as proffered, we're going to have a cohesive quality development, multifamily housing options, most notably an affordability component we have to look at you know the good things and the things that could use improvement overall we feel of course this directly provides greater housing which we need an affordability component and also meets the intent of the strategic plan so with that I'll be happy to answer any questions we have transportation staff here environment I also wanted to mention that we also have the health department here as well Sean Carmen because I know that in the planning commission there was a lot of discussion about

[04:41:06] septic and about water quality and groundwater so uh with that thank you and um i'll answer any questions if i can and we have staff as well thanks all right i'm going to go to supervisor bode then vaga sure thank you scott for the presentation for all your work on this um before i lose the thought in my head can we go to transportation for a second to talk about the star study and those that piece of it yeah uh chair jefferson members of the board kevin wyrock transportation planning manager what specifically regarding the star study sure so um can you talk

[04:41:38] Talk a little bit about some of the options that are being talked about with the interim step for Hoadley and Princeton Parkway and some of the ideas that are being looked at in the future. So for the interim improvement, we're zeroing in on the triple left from the westbound approach on the parkway on to Hoadley, but by no means is that the only option.

[04:41:58] There are other options that we're looking at as well. As far as the long-term improvements, you know, not only can it be similar to the interim improvements, that that's what's, you know, considered to be most feasible from a cost and, you know, efficiency standpoint.

[04:42:13] But also there are great separated options that are being looked at right now as part of the STAR study. And we should get the results from the STAR study sometime in 2026 and begin to move forward with, you know, that project in the future, hopefully. So 2026 is when we'll have the results of the STAR study.

[04:42:28] Yeah, we believe mid-2026 that project will be closed. The study will be closed out. Appreciate that. So this is probably partly you questioned, partly a Scott question. So to go back for a second to that southern buffer along the shopping center, can you guys help me out in terms of the balance point of the tension between wanting a more walkable, multimodal-type development and this desire to have buffers?

[04:42:54] Because I know from a transportation piece, you guys like walkability. You like everything to be multimodal. But if we're pushing things back away from the shopping center, that makes things less walkable. Sure. Do you want to address that? Yeah. Yeah, so Supervisor Bodie. So we look at a combination of things.

[04:43:11] The standard is to provide a 50-foot buffer between, you know, commercial and residential. There is a connection point, which is right here. So, but we feel that because this is in the rear of the shopping center, there's drive aisles, there's loading and so forth.

[04:43:29] We feel that there is an opportunity to still increase this. At the Planning Commission, I will say that there was discussion of overshifting that amenity area here closer to where the red dot is. That was not done.

[04:43:46] This isn't the only way to do it, but we have to look at what the intent of buffering is. I guess with environmental services, Will, is there anything that you wanted to add? just because I just want to make sure that I'm reflecting why we were holding to needing the 50-foot and wanting the 50-foot to this out.

[04:44:07] Sure. Will Shoup, County Arborist. So basically, in DCSM, it calls for minimum standards. And so with this being that it's backing the loading area, we wanted more screening, which is what buffers provide. The DCSM does allow for perpendicular crossings of buffers.

[04:44:26] so if your concern is walkability they can certainly add more crossings through the buffer but being that they're going to be walking back to where trucks are loading that's obviously a concern for us for just public safety thank you for that and um scott last one for me for right now the light tech piece can you talk a little bit more about that sort of how that works and sort of the thought process that you talked about the planning commission there was a lot of discussion about that uh yes so uh with the affordability component the applicant's proposing

[04:45:00] two options um if they do the lie they're looking at the light tech component for the traditional multifamily or if not they're looking at um more of the traditional 80 of the ami um the in the planning commission there was an interest to keep this moving on in terms of the timing you know With the funding for LIHTC, I'll let the applicant explain that a little bit more.

[04:45:30] But I will say the Planning Commission, they recommended denial to procedurally still allow this to move forward. Because it was, yeah, but I'll let. Tanya Washington, Planning Director.

[04:45:46] The first motion at the Planning Commission was a recommendation of approval, but it was a split vote, and so that motion failed. I made a comment at the Planning Commission just to let them know in terms of next steps that if the Planning Commission did not take action on this application within 90 days, that the application would then move forward to the board with an assumption of an approval.

[04:46:10] But I also made note that the applicant discussed that there is a LIHTC component, and they do have an upcoming deadline, I believe, early next year. And so I just shared that for their consideration. And then subsequently, there was a second motion to recommend denial in order to make sure that the application can continue to move forward to the board so that the board can take action.

[04:46:34] And if it were approved, then they could presumably still meet the LIHTC application deadline. Appreciate that. And I think Scott was tagging in the applicant for the LIHTC piece. All right.

[04:46:50] Did you have anything? She answered that. The deadline to have your LIHTC application in is March 15th. In the event, sorry, that the LIHTC is not approved, the applicant has a specific proffer, and I can read that proffer to you if it's helpful or just reference it.

[04:47:16] So proffer 4B states that in the event the LIHTC application is not awarded, then the building would be made available up to people making 80% AMI. So that still would be an entire affordable dwelling unit building and not a market rate building.

[04:47:35] You're welcome. All right, Supervisor Vago. Thank you, Madam Chair. Scott, I have a few questions for you. Remind me again what the total acreage of this property is.

[04:47:51] It is 22.4. 22.4. How many stacked buildings are we talking about? We're looking at the 242. In terms of the buildings or the units, I'm sorry. No, buildings. The buildings. Yes.

[04:48:08] I guess looking at the sticks. Let me make it easier for you. What percentage of the project is composed of stacked buildings? Probably like 80%.

[04:48:26] 80%? About, yeah. Okay. So you answered a lot of the questions that I had in regards to proffers for schools, in regards to traffic. There was a comment made by the applicant that the PMR standards are outdated.

[04:48:41] Can you expand a little bit on that? Well, maybe the applicant could expand upon that. But I know that we often get waivers to meet current market demands and development trends. PMR, like a P district, it's not uncommon to have waivers that go with that.

[04:49:03] One maybe could say they're outdated, but I can't really say that one way or another. But I know that they're intended to have more flexibility. You have Ms. Washington behind you. As part of the comprehensive zoning ordinance update, as we've shared with the board earlier, one of our big objectives is to update the zoning ordinance so that it is in full alignment with the comprehensive plan.

[04:49:26] And as part of that scope of work, we will be looking at, and actually we've already provided to our consultants a sample of the waivers that we see frequently related to these issues in terms of zoning ordinance standards and how they do or don't meet with the sort of the policy goals of the comprehensive plan, PMR being a very good example because we do see that often with these types of applications.

[04:49:54] And so that is something that we are already looking at as part of the zoning ordinance so that we can bring the zoning ordinance standards in better alignment with a comprehensive plan and as a result reduce the need for waivers for these types of circumstances.

[04:50:10] Okay, thank you. Back to you, Scott. You mentioned some of the concerns that led to the Planning Commission's denial of this application, and you've highlighted some. I see that there are two proffers specifically listed, right? that are at least highlighted. I'm sure I know that there are more. And out of the two, one is being accepted with contingencies, and then the other one, staff does not support as submitted. That's Profer 27D. Now, I do know that there is a request for a waiver in regards to parking, but for public record and awareness, can you talk to me a little bit about the parking

[04:50:48] situation uh well uh this site as uh proposed as janelle mentioned earlier um they're providing um i think like 40 50 spaces more than what is so it is going over yes it is going to be over parked based on the minimal requirements okay because with these kind of developments parking isn't a concern on site okay i wanted to clarify that thank you for that um and then the last question that i have um is in regards to buffers you kind of talked a little bit well no you actually talked a lot about the buffers, and I know that that was a point of great discussion during the PC hearing

[04:51:25] also. My concern stems, I know that you talked about the buffer along the parkway, but I do also know that we've received concerns in regards to the buffer that abuts the commercial property. And based on my understanding of your comments, this has been a request made, but I guess we haven't been able to reach common ground? That is correct. Yes. We respectfully feel that it should be increased to 50 feet. That would meet standard. Okay. All right. Those are all the questions I have for now. Thank you. Okay. You're welcome. All right. Does anyone else on the day

[04:52:01] have questions? All right. If not, I am going to go ahead and open the public hearing for agenda item number 13A, and that is Maple Valley Grove. I already have a list of people who have signed up to speak in person and i'm sure there are more i am going to call you in groups of five and you will have three minutes apiece if you are with an organization recognized by the board then you have five minutes and we cannot have two people from the same organization so there's not double time

[04:52:36] but anyways i'd like to start with mr martin jeter then delton nichols larry bringelman chris cummings and then jessica francis can i have the overhead projector please and i'd like to remind everyone to make sure you state your name clearly in the magisterial district where you reside don't need to give your home address unless you want us to come over for dinner and make sure that

[04:53:09] you adjust the microphone so we can hear you that's very important good evening uh chair jefferson members of the board my name is martin jeter adjust the microphone please sorry start again thank you good evening chair jefferson members of the board my name is martin jeter i I live in the Aquaman District, and I'm here representing the Mid-County Civic Association.

[04:53:40] I'd like to extend the time, please, if I could. Thank you. I want to welcome Mr. Stewart to the board. I look forward to working with you. I already had a fairly short conversation, but looking forward to working with you in the future. I want to thank the applicant, first of all, for coming out to Mid-County Civic Association and meeting with us and sharing the information on their program.

[04:54:03] We digested their information and took a look at the project, and we sent a letter to the board previously from the Mid-County Soak Association and Prince William Conservation Alliance asking that you deny the application, and I just want to go into some reasons why.

[04:54:22] So just a little background on this area first off, and referring to the slide I have up here now, the area that's now in ORPA was previously in the comp plan before this was all semi-rural residential including this part these parcels where maple valley grove is so um that semi-rural residential is 2.5 acres per home uh average density for a project and of course the orpa that we have now is five acres per home and it's been recognized for a long time um in the county comprehensive plans and even before the county comprehensive uh had a comprehensive

[04:54:57] plan that this area of the county is very environmentally sensitive and is the watershed area for the Occoquan and should be protected, such as Fairfax County did many, many years ago and down-zoned their area on the Occoquan. So this area was in the SRR, but for whatever reason in the new comprehensive plan, it was put into a much, much higher density designation, which is MU3. And we don't agree with that change. We think that this creates a situation where you have

[04:55:31] a transition that's really unworkable between the MU3 designation which is 4 to 12 units per acre and the ORPA designation which is one home per five acres. I mean it's just hard to have a transition between that much of a difference in these density recommendations for these projects and I might mention that the Maple Valley Grove project is right at the top of that density range at 11.6 units per acre so we have a range and I'll talk about that in a minute but this project is right at that right at the top of that so from the very beginning we we just didn't see a way forward with we like to work with the applicants we like to try to you know work with the community

[04:56:11] and and and make improvements to a project but it was so far out of scale for what was around it that we just didn't feel we could do that with this application so since it is in MU3 now we have to recognize the reality of the situation and it's in the comp plan with MU3 so developers are going to develop based on that but we would still recommend going to the lower end of the density range in a situation like this where you're in an area where you have much lower density around it that would provide for a better transition to the other areas other parcels and it would also enable the applicant to do some things that the staff is wanting to do with the

[04:56:51] with the larger buffers it would enable them to preserve more of the trees if you talk to your arborist you'll find that this parcel is completely wooded with with with good quality forest so this project would involve clear cutting most of that most of those woods and it would involve a lot of impervious surfaces added to this project so we um we would recommend going at the lower in the density scale which is four homes per acre and that would that would enable you to protect a lot the um sensitive forest and protect the and less impervious surfaces and make a better transition

[04:57:29] to the surrounding areas and we we did talk briefly to the applicant about that in a meeting and and that wasn't something they they were interested in doing so i just will say that along with the your planning commission who did recommend denial and and of course they were they were deadlocked and then they they went ahead and um moved it forward uh but they did recommend denial and also Prince William Conservation Alliance, as I said, has sent a letter with MIDCO recommending denial.

[04:57:56] So that's our position on this. We appreciate the time, and I'll see you again in a few minutes. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Supervisors. My name is Delta Nix. I'm the president of the Hunters Ridge Homeowners Association, and for that I request five minutes, please.

[04:58:18] Hopefully each of you is doing well. So the Maple Valley Grove, this proposed development is proposed in the wrong location. You know, the idea of a development, nothing against it, but the location is not good.

[04:58:37] When you think about the high density and being in the middle of a transportation desert, it just doesn't add up. And we hear people talk about walkability and so on and so forth.

[04:58:55] walkability is a big variable. When you think about walkability, if you live in a community, you have favorite spots that you want to go. You have your favorite grocery store. You have your favorite hardware store and so on and so forth. And you may not, people there may not want to go and shop at Harris Teeth or any of these businesses right next to it. And so when you think about walkability let's let's be let's be real that that is not a locked in uh it's only a

[04:59:35] theory now this area is already overly saturated with traffic when i came over here at 5 30 this evening so i could sign up to speak on the prince william parkway the backup coming from manassas was just about a half mile and when you think about that kind of congestion which is typical for basically any day of the week that is that is not acceptable so the question uh that begs

[05:00:12] the question why would we want to uh pack a high density uh development with 274 units into an already oversaturated intersection of the Parkway and Holtley Road.

[05:00:32] Now, keep in mind that the mosque is going to expand in the future, and you're going to have even more traffic. So I think that we need to think this through very clearly and not be prone to say yes just because someone asks the question.

[05:00:55] To consider the location, this location, it's likened to trying to hammer a round peg into a square hole. And when you think about that, this oversaturation, there are a lot of other areas in the county in which this would be the ideal development.

[05:01:18] And ideally among transportation hubs. And I can never figure out why we sometimes seem to consider developments in isolation from so many other factors that are interlocked.

[05:01:36] They are interwoven of the same canvas. You can't consider one without the other. You can't consider building housing without considering the transportation. Because in the process of doing that, you create a larger problem in that overused phrase, the unintended consequences.

[05:02:01] But the truth of the matter is you're going to have to come back later and fix those unintended consequences. And they're going to cost you more or cost us more later than they do today. So Maple Valley Grove would place a lot of pressure on this small area corner of the county, oversaturation in this particular location that's already suffering from congestion in vehicles.

[05:02:34] So the Planning Commission, as it was stated, already recommended disapproval and asked you to please consider the big picture. Don't consider this in isolation. Consider it with all of the pieces that go together, that make up the whole.

[05:02:54] And I'm under the impression now that we are perhaps considering one or two pieces of this and disregarding the whole. so think about the synergistic consequences of that just may not be so positive so i'm asking you to vote no thank you thank you and can you just hold on two things we are not going to have any outbursts of applause okay we're not second of all mr nichols if you can say the magisterial district and where you reside it's very important that we get everyone's name and where they reside

[05:03:30] the Magisterial District. Excuse me, Madam Chair, I thought I already said that, but I reside in Occoquan District. Supervisor Kenny Bode is my supervisor. I live at 122. You don't need to give your address, again, unless you want me to show up. You better have some good cooking. You're always welcome. My wife just makes some cookies. Why don't you come over? That's not what I need, though.

[05:03:53] All right, next speaker. Thank you. Again, say your name, your Magisterial District. Yes, good evening board my name is Larry Bringelman I am in the coal district I would ask I'm just a resident of Prince William County I would ask the board to please vote no on the current versions of the projects I realize we're talking about Maple Valley Grove but as my previous speaker just spoke about Holy Square is is is abutted right to this project so just as the Prince William County Planning Commission would you please speak into the mic schools have have have done yes I

[05:04:32] understand progress and i am in favor of it however progress should be strategically planned stay within the confines of previous planning and be what's right for the surrounding area as well as prince william county these high density housing projects do not fit in the locations proposed other board approved projects such as holey falls and king's crest fit into hunter's ridge and spring lake communities although two separate projects and i'm going to bring holy square into this, Hoadley Square and Maple Valley should not be considered in isolation, as the previous

[05:05:08] speaker spoke to. Instead of a possible 40-plus homes covering the 81 acres of both of these properties, these projects propose 553 housing units combined. This introduces an overwhelming amount of traffic and has environmental and school implications, as we've heard. Then add proposed projects at Kings Grove, the Mosque Expansion, the Purcell Project, and you have completely inundated and overwhelmed Hoadley Road. Not sure about the parkway, but I assume it'll be overwhelmed as well. I live in Prince William County since 1983. Bought my first home

[05:05:44] here in 1989. My second home just down the road in 2013. We use Hoadley Road in Prince William County every day. My wife and I would sure love to retire here. Please vote no on the current versions of these projects. Send the applicants back to redesign and stay within the Prince William county 2040 comprehensive plan and its parameters and protect our water sources thank you board all right next speaker please good evening members of the board of supervisors my name

[05:06:21] is christopher cummings i live in the occoquan magisterial district and i've been there since 1996 it seems that recently all we get are increased taxes more data centers and more high-density housing. The Maple Valley Grove proposal, if passed, will, I believe, impose unreasonable new burdens on the transportation infrastructure, as well as the watershed area that buffers the Occoquan Reservoir. High-density housing should be steered to areas with high-capacity

[05:06:55] transit, like VRE nodes, and not to major road intersections already heavily burdened with traffic. The impact on schools has been mentioned here, but the solutions sound very tenuous and iffy to me. It's a very crucial consideration. As things stand, a huge amount of impervious surfaces in the Hoadley-Prince William Parkway area detract from the watershed and threaten those of us nearby who depend on well water for our homes. It matters that the Planning Commission

[05:07:29] had a lot of concerns about this that only tells part of the story i think this is an ill-advised plan and should be denied and i ask that you vote no next speaker please and i ask everyone who's speaking make sure that the mic is close to you so that we can hear you uh good evening board my name is jessica and i am an occoquan resident and i'm happy to call my prince william county my home i'm here to speak about both maple about valley grove and holey square since they're kind of together at this point. So I know something I'll say, I know people have touched on the ORPA

[05:08:08] and the impacts. I think I was at the PC meeting as well. I thought it was really important that they shared it was a 1000% impact on ORPA, which I thought was really minimal. I think both of these communities actually, again, my thought is being close to existing retail, existing commercial businesses that I shop at, Paris Teeter, Nash & Smashed. I'm happy to see that they're near businesses like that that I want to stick around and be supported in the long term.

[05:08:35] I think that makes it just a sensible fit for where it's at. On a personal note, I am a parent of a two and a half year old. So I care deeply about creating places where my two and a half year old can be raised. I want to be here for the long term. So I hope when you guys think about these projects, which I'm very much in support of because they have amenities and they're close to the shopping that we're using, that you guys think about young voices like us who want to live here for the next 20 to 30 years and i appreciate your time today thank you so much all right and i should have called up my next bunch ashley stedham norman stone ann stevenson gary o'brien and paul

[05:09:11] howard hi my name is norman stone i live in the aquan district uh like to mention something that we're talking about trees buffers and other things walkways to the shopping center but the most important things are the traffic number of cars at this development and the holy square development is going to bring it's already tough getting out of my neighborhood which is lost creek

[05:09:49] court uh and during the mosque on friday you'd be lucky to get out within 30 minutes and i don't know where they got the numbers of princeville and parkway uh only be a five second delay on a car what world do they live in and also the schools there was some unclear statements about overcrowding in some of the schools and if they could handle this development and i didn't hear a clear answer of what the future would bring and virginia is doing the study on holey road now but look they

[05:10:29] haven't come up with any solution and we're talking about adding more problems to the road So wouldn't it be wise to get the first solution corrected on Holy Road before you start adding any more possible traffic or something that's going to be here forever?

[05:10:45] And if you approve this project and they start it, there's no turning back. We might lose water also in the reservoir, across the Aquacorn Reservoir quite often, and it seems like there's more loss of water than gaining of water.

[05:11:01] So that should be very important to the board, traffic, schools, and water. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Chair Jefferson, members of the board.

[05:11:20] My name is Ashley Studholm, speaking on behalf of the Prince William Conservation Alliance, and I request five minutes, and I'm from the Occoquan District. So the Prince William Conservation Alliance is an environmental nonprofit. We've been operational for over 20 years in the county, and we focus on creating equitable and sustainable communities throughout our wonderful county.

[05:11:45] So Martin Jeter outlined a lot of the main points that I wanted to hit, but there are a couple of things that I wanted to mention and maybe highlight again in relation to Maple Valley grow proposal.

[05:12:01] First, that this site is currently forested, and it is located within the Occoquan Reservoir Watershed. And so from an environmental perspective, there's really no environmental reason why this parcel was excluded from the Occoquan Reservoir Protection Area when ORPA was created.

[05:12:24] But instead, it was left out, and it was up-planned from SRR for development. So as a result, we're now facing a proposal that would pretty much clear-cut nearly 100% of an intact forest in the watershed that supplies the drinking water to up to a million residents.

[05:12:46] And so we just keep seeing this erosion across the county. So second, this parcel is located in what PWCA is referring to as the forest belt. And actually, if I can get this little doohickey here, we can see it together.

[05:13:10] So this is the forest belt, maybe, well, anyway, we'll just have to go with it. But the light green area, so it's the forest belt that extends from Prince William Forest all the way through the Orpah and into Fairfax. And it functionally protects most of the headwaters of the streams that flow towards the eastern end, So Quantico Creek, Powell's Creek, Neopsco Creek.

[05:13:35] I'm sure I'm leaving Rumsco Creek. But then also the Orpa area in the reservoir. So, and then the red areas. So this proposal represents a further outward expansion of our suburban urban footprint.

[05:13:54] So those red areas on the map into the landscapes that play a critical role in protecting our waterways. And each of these decisions, taking individually, may seem small, but collectively they add up to a steady erosion of our remaining forest. So from a smart growth perspective, we would prefer to see this type of development in maybe even higher density directed to those red areas and areas where infrastructure already exists.

[05:14:21] And we can build a critical mass needed to support existing public transit hubs and walkable communities. rather than continuing to push development outward, which undermines those goals. So while this proposal may be consistent with the current comprehensive plan, it also reflects a long-standing pattern of building on woodlots and agricultural lands because it's easier and more profitable to do so than redevelopment.

[05:14:50] So as long as we fail meaningful incentives for redevelopment or incentivized conservation, This is the type of things that we'll be continuing to see. And so I guess I want to leave with, like, what if we had a goal of maintaining our existing tree cover and really took that seriously?

[05:15:12] How would we build then? And what if we had a goal to reduce salt in the Occoquan Reservoir? And what would development look like if that was our goal? So PWCA created this vision to start to play with these questions.

[05:15:29] and so much more. And this application should at the very least consider reducing its density so we could cluster and protect more of those tree cover at the very least. So thank you very much. - Next speaker, please.

[05:15:49] - Good evening, my name's Paul Howard. I've lived in the Occoquan area since 1987 and I'm currently a resident in the Bren Forest development of Lost Creek Court. The addition of high-density housing on the corner of Hoadley and the parkway is going to create just an additional nightmare.

[05:16:10] I'm not too sure where the 5.5 seconds come from, but it took me almost eight minutes to make a left turn from the parkway onto Hoadley yesterday evening. So I'm not sure how that translates to 5.5 seconds, to be quite honest with you.

[05:16:26] But there are a lot of things to like about these developments, particularly the low-cost housing for, hopefully, first responders, police, etc., that live in the county. But there's much better places to put this, hopefully near a transportation hub.

[05:16:46] I had the misfortune of having to get the bus to Potomac Mills from the Hoadley Road bus stop, and it took an hour. So I don't really consider that practical for people living in these proposed developments.

[05:17:02] To use public transport, they're going to have to use cars. And as far as the walkability to the shopping center, I certainly don't want to be lugging bags with four or five days groceries from Harris Teeter all the way back to my house on the Hoadley Square or the other development.

[05:17:25] That's just not going to happen. No one's going to go and do their shopping at Harris Teeter and then lug it all back to their house. That's just not the way it works. So at least be realistic about that. You know, let's talk about 50 feet, 30 feet. Another 20 feet when you're carrying your weekly groceries doesn't really matter.

[05:17:44] But I am not in favor of either of these developments. And I think that they could be moved to much better locations in the county that are near transportation hubs where people can use public transportation to get to their jobs, get to shops, etc.

[05:18:04] Thank you. Next speaker, please. Okay, thank you for this opportunity. My name is Gary O'Brien.

[05:18:19] I'm from Coles District. Please excuse my reading. The proposed rezoning of the Occoquan Reserve Protection Area for the proposed Oatley Square and Maple Valley Grove development brings back disturbing memories of the initial rezoning within the Royal Crescent in 2001 for the 305-acre preserve at Long Branch.

[05:18:45] Some of you remember that. First of all, calling it a preserve was an oxymoron. Every buildable portion was totally stripped of trees. Our argument then was that it would subsequently be used by developers and their lawyers as a precedence for more rezoning within the Royal Crescent watershed.

[05:19:05] As MIDCO and the Prince William Conservation Alliance and others had correctly predicted, within a year the supervisors voted to totally eliminate the rural presence, 117,000 acres or 52% of the county's landmass, which removed that substantial portion of the Occoquan watershed from adequate protection.

[05:19:30] What we didn't foresee at the time was homebuilders like Stanley Martin selling their rezoning land to data centers, which are now exploding across the county within the Royal Crescent and other formerly protected watershed areas. Protected watershed acres are gone forever.

[05:19:49] So like I said, here we go again. They are once again saying it's just a small intrusion into a newly created ORPA for much needed housing. The exact excuse used last time. The only difference at this time, it was argued, was that we needed that upscale housing to attract industry.

[05:20:12] Boy, did that royally backfire. It's sad to watch decisions that are so short-sighted, decisions that provide instant gratification at the cost of painful and very expensive subsequent outcomes that we all live to regret.

[05:20:27] Putting highly density housing that permanently takes away more water-absorbing, critically needed resources, and producing potential flooding, rapid water runoff that scours the stream banks, which in turn fill the Occoquan with sediment, reducing the amount of water that it can hold, as well as reduce its water quality.

[05:20:51] As we can all see, rainstorms and droughts are getting more severe globally. If we continue to pave over the rapidly disappearing critical forest cover, as well as not update our stormwater management guidelines, we are just asking for more trouble ahead.

[05:21:08] These proposed projects would further permanently harm the Occoquan Reservoir. They don't allow for enough tree buffers, and there are not enough classroom seats available for high-density housing. It threatens our nearby woods, and it's too far from mass transit.

[05:21:26] Thank you, sir. To exacerbate the problems both in Holy Road and Prince William Parkway. Thank you. I'm going to call up the next group, but I do ask. This is going to be a very long night, particularly for people who are going to be speaking on all the cases tonight.

[05:21:41] I am going to ask for a decorum that when your time is up, be respectful, because we have a number of people who want to speak. And I know no one wants to stay here until O-Dark 30. I hope no one wants to stay here until O-Dark 30. So before I get to the next speaker, I'm going to call up my next group of people.

[05:22:00] um paul howard william quinn michael sever clancy and clancy mcquick so if all y'all can go up there and ma'am you can move go to the microphone you can also adjust it because i want to make sure we hear you and everyone else can you hear me i can hear you just stay there don't move you may begin okay my name is ann stevenson and i reside in occoquan district and um actually my property

[05:22:37] is adjacent to the current horse farm, what would be Hoadley Square. I came to this county in 1970, actually, to teach school, and Dale Boulevard ended at Darbydale at the time, so that's how long I've been here. I've lived in my current house since 1990, so I've seen the widening in New Hoadley Road. I've seen the building of the parkway. I've seen it all, actually. And these two projects together, it is hard to talk about one without talking about

[05:23:15] the other one, are just as you've already heard. They're good developments, but not in this area, not for the kind of land they're going to be built on and not for the traffic that it's going to exacerbate. The clear cutting of the Maple Valley Grove area is very disturbing. It is an environmentally sensitive area, and we've had meetings, Zoom meetings, over the last, you know,

[05:23:48] year or so with environmental experts, and they feel that that area actually should have been placed into the ORPA. It is, as I said, very sensitive. It has wetlands. It's got close to RPAs, just like the horse farm area there.

[05:24:10] So whatever is done on that land, Maple Valley Grove, will affect on down the area where the horse farm is and on into our neighborhoods. And as Norman was talking, you know, we are concerned about our wells.

[05:24:27] And two houses on our street already have had to re-drill their wells. So it's a sensitive issue, and we have a right to be concerned with it. The traffic problems that Maple Valley are going to cause, and added to that, Hoadley Square and the mosque expansion are, to me, unimaginable.

[05:24:57] Maple Valley Grove in that location is going to be landlocked pretty much. There's only one road that's going into that, and that's Galveston. And Galveston will also be the main road going into bringing the cars in and out of Hoadley Square.

[05:25:13] So you can just imagine all of those people in the morning and at night coming down to Galveston trying to get out onto Hoadley Road. Yes, there's a light, but there's also another new light there by the mosque. And then there's a, you know, you've got the parkway very close.

[05:25:32] So the traffic jams and gridlock are going to start on Galveston and pour out on the highly. Thank you very much. Your time is up. Next speaker. Hi, my name is Bill Quinn.

[05:25:50] I've lived here for 30 years in the Occoquan District. So the Planning Commission denied this, I'm sure, for great reasons. So you got that against it. The biggest thing for me is the traffic congestion.

[05:26:06] I mean, it's a zoo out there already. On Fridays, the mosque has a lot of people, and it does add at least a half an hour. I live over by the intersection of Purcell and Hoadley. And when I've got to get to the parkway going south towards Old Bridge, it's taking me forever.

[05:26:26] And when I forget about that it's Friday afternoon, I'm in trouble. But you put in a light over there by the mosque, which is great. It helps with safety. But the police are still out there for, what, eight hours? They start before noon, and they don't stop until after 5.

[05:26:45] And it's not just one cop. You got like a bunch of cars down the road, and they're all out there. So the light is not doing it. I can't imagine what the intersection of Galveston and Hoadley is going to be like. That is, as the previous speaker just said, the only way into and out of there.

[05:27:04] When I'm heading east on Hoadley, and I've got to get in there, that's the only way. So when I want to go to Frosty Moose, I've got to wait, make the left, and then thread my way over through there. To get out, yes, there are a couple of ways, but they're only heading west.

[05:27:20] If I want to turn around and go back towards the parkway, I've got to wait in that separate left-hand turning lane to turn around. Can there be a separate left-hand turning lane for the new intersection?

[05:27:33] No, there can't. Because when you look at it, the way it's set up now, when you're heading west on Hoadley, right after Galveston, there is a left-hand turning lane. There is no way to back up a new left-hand separate turning lane to get into Galveston. It is going to be a zoo. And if they're talking about 3,700 additional trips out of Galveston, that's insane. It's just not going to happen.

[05:28:03] And I don't know where the 2% figure came from of growth, but in 30 years, I can't imagine that this place only grew at 2% a year. It was a whole lot more than that. I mean, that's a little too much. So I just can't imagine that this is happening.

[05:28:20] I mean, if it was at the same density as the stuff that's over near Penn Elementary, okay, I guess that would work. But that's unbelievable. And there are other places. I've been up and back on Ashton Avenue over by Costco for the last couple of weeks.

[05:28:36] On either side of Ashton Avenue, there are already constructed entrances into vacant land. It seemed like that would be a good place. So I very much hope that you're getting rid of this thing. Thank you.

[05:28:53] Thank you. Next speaker, please. Evening. I'm Michael Sever. I reside in the Aquan District. So I've spent the last several weeks walking our communities.

[05:29:09] I've been to over 350 houses across Senator Bode's district as well as Yesley Vega's district. And universally, every single person I talked to that I encountered walking dogs, they were shocked and irate when they found out the details of these two projects, Maple Valley and Holy Square.

[05:29:31] No, I'm mainly speaking about Maple Valley. The density is what was shocking to them. They were appalled that this was being considered for this place in the county. I grew up working for my father who owned a construction company. I know growth is a part of this county.

[05:29:49] I've been here since I was born in 1979. My grandfather sat on the school board. I understand the challenges that go on in those schools from having conversations across the dinner table. The fact that the schools are looking at this the way they are and saying no, and the fact that when I just talk to people that have a lived experience on Hoadley Road every day, like myself, that this dense project in the shape it is today is being considered for a vote, it is horrifying to those of us that live here. I'm not saying that I want to see this land stay exactly as it is. That's not what this county has been for my entire remembered life

[05:30:28] since the 1980s. We grow. We improve the community around us. But this particular project, where it is in the county is too dense for the current transportation and schools. What I would ask of the board is to consider looking at things holistically across all of these projects being considered and offer real-world solutions.

[05:30:51] A turn lane from the parkway to get onto Hoadley Road is a laughable solution. Look at what's being done down at the courts districts with the overpass. That is a more reasoned solution. we need real solutions for real problems that exist today before this project is even put in place we have real challenges that need to be addressed thank you for my time thank you next speaker please good evening my name is james highland i currently live in the opsco district

[05:31:28] we recently relocated from the brand forest subdivision my wife and i fell in love with that neighborhood 23 years ago there was just simply a horse farm in the verizon substation on odley road so obviously things have changed quite a bit over the years and we just couldn't handle the congestion and the frustrations of of the friday moss traffic alone let alone all the other development proposals so we relocated to montclair but high density growth in an already small and congested sector like Hoadley Road is not intelligent, well-planned development. The

[05:32:08] result is a plethora of danger and safety concerns together with environmental and quality of life issues. You have building codes developers must abide by. And although your transportation codes sound very technical and accurate, I got to wonder about their practicality. You know, when a population quadruples in the same two lanes are on the road network, something's definitely wrong.

[05:32:37] All this suggests that the primary emphasis is on tax revenue and appeasing the interests of one group over the betterment of all. Thank you very much. All right, before we get to our next speaker, I want to call up my next group, Dr. Jack Mugen, Andrew Dowdy, Nancy Armour, and Julie

[05:33:01] Nortree Novotny thank you all right sir you may proceed good evening I'm Clancy McQuig from the Lake Ridge Occoquan Civic Association and in Occoquan District I've been in the same house since 1973 that's more than three months my five minutes right if you get the five minutes then

[05:33:40] Dr. Jack can't get it so okay wait he gets it then he okay he'll give you the history I'm just going to say I served on the comp plan committee and I've served on the DCSM committee and this thing the ORPA we tried with the ORPA to protect the Occoquan our drinking water our drinking water all of you and everybody in this room other than those of you who are unwell we have that's our

[05:34:12] legacy to protect it and not overburdening the river with over inappropriate developments We're putting an urban center in the middle of our so-called rural area.

[05:34:33] I have a question. The staff said they're going to try to get some trees preserved, but I didn't hear the county arborist say it made any sense to think you could have trees where you're going to clear-cut everything. I know we worked with Ridge Development for years trying to retain as many trees as we could in Lake Ridge, and that's why you have trees there.

[05:34:55] But the fact of the matter is, on a quarter acre lot, you can save some trees. On this thing, there's no way you're going to have trees anywhere except in the buffer, and they don't want to have a buffer. It needs to have a buffer, as much buffering as possible.

[05:35:15] Maybe a golf cart path between the development and the shopping center so people who can't carry four or five bags can hop in their golf cart like they do in Florida and drive down there and go shopping at Harris Teeter or in the shopping center.

[05:35:33] We need, and I know we've ignored this, but we really need to look at the DCSM to say, what kind of development standards do we want in the ORPA? Fairfax County has done that, and we have not. Our staff is way behind the curve on trying to preserve the Occoquan Reservoir as a drinking water source.

[05:35:54] Thank you. Thanks, Speaker. Good evening, Madam Chair and members of the board. I wanted to wish you the... Dr. Jack, could you please? Thank you.

[05:36:10] Yes, Jack Kuyumjian, president of LOCA and the Ocracorn, live in the Ocracorn Magisterial District. I wanted to welcome George Stewart. Welcome, George, and wish you all the very best for the holidays and the new year ahead.

[05:36:27] And I'd like to ask for five minutes. I don't know if I need it, but this... I served on the original ORPA committee over 15 years ago when we recommended the ORPA to be created.

[05:36:46] And we had high hopes, but we were very much gratified to see this happen with the 2022 comp plan. That was wonderful. But what we don't have is something like an ordinance that could institutionalize some of the things one would expect in an ORPA.

[05:37:12] So I would like us collectively to think about that and what we might do to work, move in that direction, to have guidance, text and such that would have expectations for performance within the ORPA.

[05:37:33] That would be very helpful in our decision-making process moving forward. Currently, this site, as you well know, is a very heavily wooded site. It's only 23.4 acres, and when it came into the PELT Committee, we do what we normally do.

[05:37:55] We always extend our welcome to the applicant, and we try to be as objective as we can. We work within the guidance of the former PELT chairman, Tom Burrell, who was PELT chair for 23 years, And he would say, hey, guys, what if the board approves this project and you have some misgivings?

[05:38:20] Do you walk away or do you continue the dialogue? And so his recommendation was always continue the dialogue, never walk away. So in that vein, we did meet with the applicant more than once. I think the last time was July 31st.

[05:38:38] Now, the Pell Committee had mixed feelings about this high density, so we weren't enthusiastic for the project, and we had mixed feelings also for a lot of the high density in that area.

[05:38:54] But we understand when the transportation solutions to move Holdley Road westerly occurred, it set up a major highway network that goes from the parkway all the way to 234.

[05:39:15] And it set up growth and development patterns for developers. And so this is part of that normal result that you see here with developers coming in, looking at the comp plan.

[05:39:32] And here we have the MU3, and it's just comp plan for MU3 and at the higher end. So I just want to say that we support some elements in here that try to provide for green space, continued green space along the parkway.

[05:39:54] For instance, the 50-foot H-card buffer along the parkway, we fully support that. We were talking originally of having a pedestrian walkway there, But that was taken out, and we understand having the full 50-foot HCOD buffer.

[05:40:16] At the planning commission, there was much discussion regarding the 30-foot buffer to integrate it with amenities along that variable with property line is a good idea. But you have backs of the shopping center that need more buffering, so that I think the staff recommendation to look at beefing that up is a reasonable one.

[05:40:44] And so we should take that and look at it a little more carefully and see what could be done there to improve it. We were asking for BMPs for stormwater, and we do have a proffer for low-impact development.

[05:41:01] which we support, and we would like to encourage continued dialogue with the applicant for ORPA-like controls, including things maybe later on we will see low salt applications on the reservoir. That would be a very good thing. So with that, we're comfortable offering those suggestions and you

[05:41:29] have to work a difficult decision thank you very much thank you next speaker hi good evening can you hear me okay awesome uh good evening chair jefferson and supervisors welcome george my name is nancy armor and i'm an occaquan resident i've lived in the county for 38 years i've come tonight to ask you to please vote no to the maple grove project the reasons for denial have been eloquently

[05:42:06] expressed by all the previous speakers. My main issue is the potential impact on the Occoquan Reservoir and our drinking water. The other issues are traffic, the impact on schools, and the overall environmental impact. And for the record, I'm also requesting you deny the Hoadley Square project for the same reasons. Please protect the Occoquan, the water I drink, and the water that over 800,000 other people drink in this region. Thank you. All right, I have a couple more people before

[05:42:40] the next speaker then I'm going to call up Mr. Richard Welsh as well and Nathan Higgins. You guys can go in the back and ma'am you can come speak. Hi good evening can you hear me? No you can just move it a little closer. Hello can you hear me? Yes. Okay great. So my name is Julia Novotny and I'm in the Occoquan district. I am a resident here and have been really disappointed to hear that this type of development is coming into this area.

[05:43:21] I moved here specifically because I saw how green and how protected the area was. I saw that there was the ORPA put in place and felt that that was a great sign for the community to show that they take their watershed seriously.

[05:43:40] They want to protect the trees. and really liked that this area was protected for that reason. So I've been very disappointed to see that, you know, these projects will chip away at the protections given to the watershed.

[05:44:01] And, you know, our house is off of a well, worried about drinking water, you know, and thinking all of the issues that will come from not having, you know, a house with water. I mean, that's something that really keeps me up at night.

[05:44:19] And then when I've been reading these reports, it sounds like this area for Maple Grove, even though it's technically not in the ORPA, it will still have impacts on the ORPA, which is definitely where Holdley Square is planning to go. So I've seen the plans that it's almost like 80% covered in concrete with the big buildings and all the parking lots and I'm very uh concerned about the storm water runoff and so would request

[05:44:52] that if there is some kind of development here to greatly reduce it um to look at having again something that's like what is required by ORPA to have the four houses per acre um something that can kind of as um I believe somebody had mentioned before some kind of trade-off that it's not uh the same requirements as what orpa had but that at least it could kind of be a transition period like or location um and then also very worried about um the traffic that the um everything is

[05:45:31] going from what i've been able to see in and out of galveston um road and that that is going to be for those very dense communities, adding all of those extra cars to that one light, trying to get onto Hoadley.

[05:45:47] I also live in the Hoadley Road Purcell area and just cannot imagine how we're going to be ever able to reach Prince William Parkway again. So I appreciate your time.

[05:46:03] I urge you to vote no on this rezoning and the project. Thank you. Thank you so very much. Next speaker, please. Good evening, board. Chair Jefferson, supervisors. My name is Andrew Doughty.

[05:46:20] I live in the Occoquan District. I recently just moved from Fairfax County to Hoadley in Lost Creek, right behind the mosque. Our whole desire to move here was to get away from that high density, that high traffic, and to seek peace, seek that greenness that everyone's talking about.

[05:46:37] So I highly recommend you vote no for this development in this tight space area. And for these reasons, the MU3 is a high-density. This is usually meant for an easy transit. As all my other fellow speakers, it is not an easy transit to the VRE to get to 95, to get to 66.

[05:46:56] You're putting these people that everyone's arguing for affordable housing, stuff like that, at a more of a disadvantage and a strain on the infrastructure of the Occoquan District. So that creates a trickle effect, a domino effect of taxpayers paying more taxes to increase the bus infrastructure.

[05:47:13] if the metro ever made it this far, anything like that versus just keeping intact the way it is, and we say develop and improve the district maybe, so select another area. On the schools, all they offer is a rezoning. Marshall Durgood, as of today, have four first-grade classes, four second-grade classes at max capacity of 21.

[05:47:36] You develop these new homes. You're bringing in new, younger families. What do you think that's going to impact? Rezoning is not going to solve these problems. So infrastructure, once again, not sustainable. Taxes go up. We talk about being Prince William County. Within five years, it will be Fairfax County.

[05:47:52] People will not be able to live in this county because of the property tax, because there was poor planning. Infrastructure is starting to fall apart again. And we're not taking into consideration the courts community that's being developed as we speak. There's 1,015 homes being developed. That's going to create over 5,000 more car trips per day.

[05:48:12] And that's just on a standard two-car household. Many of us have kids that drive, in-laws that live with us that also drive. So increase that number. And as we talked about the effects of Maple Grove affecting the ORPA.

[05:48:29] Yes, it does not fall on the ORPA, but it will affect the cleanliness of the ORPA and the 800,000 people that that water system provides. Within my neighborhood, we have all wells within the 40 houses. So when you start developing that close to ORPA and that close to our development, you're going to start impacting our water systems, which could cost anywhere from $10,000 to $30,000 just to have a well re-drilled.

[05:48:52] So once again, I say do not approve this project. I am all for development. The JR Development Company has developed Cannonball and Fairfax and the Oakton View, which is more along the lines of our Aquacan area. So I recommend those type of projects.

[05:49:08] That's all I have. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening. My name is Richard Welsh, Occoquan District. I live off of Hoadley in the Barrington Oaks neighborhood. Use Hoadley every day. I don't want to be too repetitive of what other people have said. I just want to add my voice urging you to deny the application. The traffic impacts will be horrendous. The environmental impacts will be horrendous. I live off of a well. I'm

[05:49:47] concerned about the aquifer levels. I don't want to have to re-drill that well. I shouldn't have to. I think this is just too high-dense a project for the location selected. If this density is a requirement, then the location should change. If the location changes or it stays, then the density should change. So I just urge you to support smart development rather than ad hoc, piece by piece, applicant-by-applicant development and take a holistic view, and I think you'll come to the

[05:50:24] conclusion that this should be denied until it's amended meaningfully. Thank you. All right, next speaker, please. Hello, can you hear me? Maybe just a little bit more. Can you hear me? You can raise it up. You don't have to lean in. Can you hear me? Yes. All right, so my name is Nathan Higgins. I am in the Occoquan District, and I'm a student at Charles J. Colgan High School. I represent the students and what i can tell you about this entire thing is that the students and the teachers all

[05:51:04] think the same there's too much traffic and the charge jay colgan is already 40 over capacity and with all the parents that i've spoken to a lot of these people have bought properties in the area specifically to go to colgan and i could tell you on top of that i live in the lost creek and trying to take a left out you know especially as a new driver you know i just turned 18 recently it's very very difficult to take a left turn out if i want to go anywhere i have to take a right turn and then a u-turn and if it's the mosque even if i take like like a mosque day even when i take

[05:51:42] a right turn it takes forever and another thing is is that for me to get to school in the morning if you go down hoadley and you try to take a left on the dump freeze to get to colgan in the morning It takes about 30 minutes if you're waiting at that light trying to turn into the school.

[05:52:02] Holi simply cannot handle any more cars. And also, as a future Virginia taxpayer and resident that I would love to live here for the rest of my life, I can tell you that I'm extremely concerned with the increased property taxes that may be imposed because of this development.

[05:52:21] i think and everyone at charles or most people that are students that want to live here would oppose of this plan so therefore i would like to vote no we should want our children we should want our children to want to stay in this area for a longer period of time that's what virginia wants as a state and i think that this would be a huge mistake i receive the rest of my time thank you All right. Thank you so very much. I am going to move on to remote, the remote part of this public hearing, Supervisor Bailey.

[05:53:00] I was admiring the last speaker, but yes, we do have two people. Are you ready? Good evening. We have nobody speaking for this item tonight. Okay. No one, ma'am.

[05:53:16] All right. Thank you so very much. I am now going to close the public hearing for agenda item number 13A. And with that, I would like to invite the applicant or staff if there's anything that they wanted to respond to. I do want to say, or I do actually have one question, because from the best of my understanding, Maple Valley Grove, is that in the ORPA?

[05:53:38] No, that's what I thought. Can someone come and say that for the record? Turn on the microphone, please. Madam Chairman, members of the board, my name is Joe Franconi. I'm with the applicant. This property is not located in the ORPA.

[05:53:58] Thank you so very much. And is there anything else that you guys have heard from public hearing that you'd like to respond to? Yeah, I just wanted to address the gentleman's last comment regarding the Colgan High School concerns.

[05:54:15] The Hodley Road Star Study is taking a look at the entire corridor from Prince William Parkway all the way to Dumfries Road, and in fact includes the Dumfries and Colgan intersection as part of the area that we're studying for improvements as well. All right, thank you very much. Anything else?

[05:54:32] Yes, I wanted to follow up. There was a lot of comments on transportation, so I thought it would be helpful just to answer some of those. For the traffic impact analysis, as I mentioned before, we are required to look at future traffic, which was a 2% growth rate per year, which matches what VDOT and the county have seen in growth rates in this area.

[05:54:54] And it also required us to look at the full buildout of Dar El Nor. So it assumed the full buildout per their approved special use permit application. The traffic impact analysis is reviewed by both VDOT and Prince William County Transportation and ultimately accepted by transportation by VDOT.

[05:55:14] The STARS study is looking at a regional improvement to Holdley Road. So Kevin mentioned it again. It's from the intersection of Prince William Parkway and Holdley Road all the way down to Dumfries Road. And it's looking at a long-term solution for transportation improvements.

[05:55:29] So it actually goes out to 2055 to make sure whatever solution is proposed that it can handle future growth and traffic. We also heard a lot of comments regarding transit. There is an omni-ride transit hub on Galveston.

[05:55:46] That transit hub has two routes. The first route, or one of the routes is probably the best way to say it, is between the stop and the commuter garage at Stonebridge, which also has stops along the way to other commuter parking ride lots.

[05:56:02] The other stop goes from the site to the VRE at the Woodbridge VRE on Dawson's Beach. So again, that also has stops along the way. So one of the things that OmniRide wanted to make sure is that they would still have their transit hub on Galveston and that this project would not impact that.

[05:56:24] I also heard comments regarding Galveston being the only way out. The applicant, as part of the traffic impact analysis, looked at this. That intersection operates today at a level of service B in the AM and a level of service C in the PM. In the future, without the project, the levels of service remain the same.

[05:56:43] And in the future, with the project, the levels of service remain the same. In the event Holdley Square is approved, there is a street grid network and interpersonal connectivity that allows for access also on Queens Chapel Road. So I thought that was important as well.

[05:57:01] And then there was one more I wanted to hit as it related to stormwater management and impacts to the well. So we are not near any wells or septic fields. We're providing 55% open space and public water, which will allow recharge and removes demand on the aquifer.

[05:57:21] We also drain north with a drainage divide between the sites and west of Hoadley. Also, the soils are characterized as slow infiltration and high water table, so there will not be any impact to the wells. And I think I hit all of them, but if not, I'm sure you all will ask me questions.

[05:57:39] I have a quick question. Yes, ma'am. Because you were talking about transportation A and B, the route. Can you explain that a little bit more? I'm sorry? When you were talking about transportation, you were mentioning the routes A and the timetables? Yes, absolutely. So when you do a traffic impact analysis, you have to look at various intersections and you look at the levels of service.

[05:57:59] Each one of the levels of service have a letter grade that's associated with it. That letter grade is A through F. You look at the levels of service, and it's based on how long you are at the traffic signal waiting. So what is that timing? And the goal is that your levels of service remain the same.

[05:58:18] And if they degrade, then there is a mitigation measure that you look to do. So for the intersection of Galveston and Hoadley Road, that AM peak hour period, which is what we're required to study, so that assumes the worst-case scenario for traffic is your peak.

[05:58:35] So that AM peak is a level of service B, and the PM peak is a level of service C, and that remains the same level of service in the future with the project and in the future without the project. So we are not degrading the levels of service on Galveston and Hoadley Road.

[05:58:54] Thank you so very much. Supervisor Brody? I'm sorry. Hold on before we go on. I'm sorry. If we can, I ask the people while they're here, please observe the quorum so that we can continue this meeting moving forward.

[05:59:15] Scott, were you going to stand up and say something? Yeah, Supervisor Bodeo, I just want to point out just big picture that this is a, in the comprehensive plan, it's a suburban type of development. This is not an urbanized development pattern. So MU3 is kind of in the middle.

[05:59:33] So I just wanted to point that out. It is a long, you know, a major quarter. You know, we have, you know, of course, that major intersection there. but this is not, you know, like a T5, T6, T7 type of thing. So I just want to point that out.

[05:59:50] They are at the higher density, but that is permissible via the comprehensive plan. But this is very suburban. The pattern here is a very suburban type of development. But what's challenging is you have ORPA right adjacent to this, and you have intact trees, but you have a major shopping center.

[06:00:09] And on the other side of Holi, on the south side, you have a lot of other rooftops and services so just want to give that general perspective that this is a suburban type of development pattern but this is a remnant undeveloped piece so and if I could follow up on that thank you for that Scott I don't know if it's going to be you that answers this or someone else from the planning team but why this was recommended by planning staff to be MU3 in the comp plan versus ORPA. Hi good evening David McGettigan from the planning

[06:00:41] office. This is an opportunity with the retail shopping center there to create a mixed-use community. The MU-3 provides that. It is not high density, as Scott mentioned. It's a medium density. And these are opportunities to provide mixed-use walkable communities with a mix of

[06:01:08] There's already the retail there. It's lacking the housing to support the retail, and we need to develop these types of places so that people can live near where they work and near where they shop, and also the transit is there, and when we, in the comprehensive plan, when we align the transect, in this case it's a transect three, with the type of transit that's available to that transect and served by that transect.

[06:01:38] And you need transit-supportive densities as well in order for transit to be working out there. So hopefully that answers your question. It does. And, Madam Chair, just two quick ones, if you don't mind. Thank you for that, David.

[06:01:54] And I appreciate your context there, especially grounding us in what MU3 looks like and that being a suburban-type place type. Can you talk a little bit about this being on the edge of the Government Center Activity Center And this obviously didn't happen when you guys recommended this in the comp plan, but now that we have the master space, master plan for the government center, how do those interplay with each other?

[06:02:19] Well, so again, we want to live near where we work. Also, the opportunity for affordable housing in this location and the LIHTC development is essential to providing not only the housing that the people who work in this area can afford, but that is going to be near where they work.

[06:02:44] So with the development of an increase in the government center and the jobs in that area, there is a need for additional housing nearby to support that workforce. All right.

[06:03:03] Thank you very much. I don't see anyone else in the queue. Supervisor Bode. Sure. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm not going to go on too long before I make the motion here, but wanted to thank everyone in the community who came out today. Obviously, a lot of folks here are concerned from the Occoquan district, whether you live in Brynn Forest, you live off of Purcell, you live right near where the property lines are for this site.

[06:03:25] I hear you traffic in this area can be challenging, especially given some of the unique uses, such as Darrell North. So I hear you on that, and I know that between the STAR study and some of the conversations we are in with OmniRide, we are looking to address a lot of those concerns.

[06:03:42] I want to remind everyone that when we approve these projects, they don't just rise out of the ground and they're immediately built. It takes time to build projects, go through permitting, all those other things, which gives us some time to work with OmniRide, work with the VDOT, work with the County Transportation Department to work through some of these traffic issues.

[06:03:58] That said, Madam Chair, I want to move that we do 13A for approval. Second. All right, it's been motioned and properly seconded. Supervisor Bodie? Thank you, Madam Chair. So I hear concerns about traffic, schools, and the pace of change. I also want to be candid.

[06:04:14] Growth pressures are real, and the choice isn't growth versus no growth. So whether we steer growth to places where it can be coordinated with transportation, services, jobs, or whether we push it outward and worsen sprawl longer commutes and environmental impact countywide. For the folks who were following the comp plan as it evolved before we adopted it, there originally was supposed to be a proposed multi-use center just north of Bacon Race.

[06:04:38] i advocated for that to be taken out of the comp plan so we did that there was also a proposal and a request to have the delaney track up zoned i fought against that and that was down zoned so to me this is a culmination of that work pushing everything to where it actually belonged which is near the shopping center near the government center near these employment centers one of my constituents talked about fire and safety first responders there is a public safety center just north of davisford road and the parkway that will be expanded with the county master's place master plan we had a very robust conversation about that last week if you did not

[06:05:16] tune in i invite you to do so over the next 20 years the government center will be built out into a modern robust employment center which will have which will host uh double digits dozens of county agencies that's likely going to be hundreds of employees those people will need to have places to live. To me, this is where this goes, because no matter whether you're a social worker, a planner, a fireman, a teacher, or a barista, or you work in that shopping center, in that Harris Teeter, you deserve to have a place to live close to where you work. So for those reasons, I support this.

[06:05:51] All right. So hold on. I have never had to clear board chambers. We've had a lot of... Thank you. All right. I'm going to say this. We can disagree. Now, we've had a lot of disagreements. We've had a lot of disagreements over this board. But I do not want outbursts.

[06:06:19] I want people to be able to speak. I want people to be able to have their comments. But I also want respect. And for some of the frequent flyers who come to a lot of these meetings, I see Dr. Jack shaking his head. We don't agree on everything, but we listen. So I'm going to ask that there be no more outbursts. I know that passions are high, tensions are high, but I'm going to respectfully ask that there be no more outbursts. Because if there is, I will have to clear out the chambers. I don't want to have to do that. I have never done that before. And I really don't

[06:06:57] want to have a first time for everything. So I'm asking for everyone who is here to please adhere to the decorum that we've established in this boardroom. Supervisor Vega. Thank you, Madam Chair. First off, I want to thank the citizens that showed up. I noticed a lot of Coles residents and former Coles residents, redistricting did happen at one point.

[06:07:22] The proposals on the agenda for tonight were, in fact, in the Coles District, so I know exactly the concerns that you've raised here, not just tonight, but over the course of the last four years. I also want to thank county staff for all of their work, the applicant as well, for making themselves available to any questions that I did have.

[06:07:40] And the reality is that I understand the frustration, because I sound like a broken record up here, constantly saying, we continue to put the cart before the horse we continue to approve projects while we have lagging infrastructure in some cases we may even argue that it's crumbling infrastructure we keep talking about studies we keep talking about 20 years from now but the reality is is that the things that we're approving now are only going to make the challenges that we face here today much greater so I want to make sure that nobody leaves chambers feeling like their concerns are not valid because they absolutely are. I commend the young man that came out here and

[06:08:17] spoke. We need young voices to continue to do the very thing that you did here today because education is a very, very powerful tool. And the more you know about what's happening in your community, the more impactful and viable your change will be. So I commend you for being here tonight and I encourage you to not be discouraged and to continue to stay engaged. And for those that may feel that this vote is not going to go their way, I continue to ask you to stay engaged because that is what we need. We need further engagement. We need lines of communications to get stronger, and they're always going to be open. I will echo what the chair said about decorum.

[06:08:54] We may agree to disagree, but at the end of the day, respect carries the way. And so with that, Madam Chair, the environmental concerns have been raised. The additional strains on our schools have been raised additional concerns about traffic have been raised I don't want to drag this out but they're valid concerns and this board has to look closely in the mirror as we move forward and continue to approve these projects and ask ourselves are we really making our communities better or are we just giving out explanations long explanations trying to justify our votes I think that the county residents are very knowledgeable they're smart to see what's going

[06:09:30] on here and they're tired of it and at some point we have to start doing things differently so i will not be supporting uh this application here tonight for the concerns raised during the planning commission uh hearing some concerns haven't been addressed but more importantly i understand the county um staff is recommending approval but i do take issue with that because they've raised a lot of concerns a lot of things that they're not happy with yet here we are again recommending another project forward for approval i want to be very clear madam chair with the with the time that i have left we keep hearing folks being opposed to projects right in the current form that they're being presented, not being opposed to development, which is a very clear

[06:10:09] distinction that needs to be made. People are not opposed to growth. People are not opposed to development. What people are opposed to and what people get frustrated with time and time again is that we have proposals being brought before this governing body that can, without a shadow of a doubt, be made better. And that is not happening. And I don't think that that is a fair request that our constituents are demanding of their elected representatives. And I hope that we can do better by the wishes of the people that have elected us and put us in these seats.

[06:10:36] Thank you, Madam Chair. Supervisor Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to thank the citizens that came out tonight that shows that you care. And I want to thank, I got a little distracted, Madam Chair, and I apologize to you, because I'm very proud of the young man in his dapper suit with his curly hair.

[06:10:57] And he came out and he spoke extremely eloquent about how you felt about your community. and I commend you for that. I have a son much older than you, so I am proud of you, and he speaks out for his community as well. You need to continue to do that, and you tonight are an example of what we are trying to do on this dais. We want you to come back and live here once you go to college.

[06:11:21] We want you to come back here and work here once you finish college. We want you here because this is your community. Now, a lot of the things that we deal with on this dais are very old, very old, 20, 30 years old. And I'm speaking to you because I want you to understand that. Because part of what's happening, and when we make these decisions, sometimes favorable, sometimes not so favorable, is education. We need to educate our community and bring the community along with what we're doing.

[06:11:55] that has not been done in a very long time and so having you stand at that podium and voice your opinion is critical because you're engaging you're engaging in what's going on right now so you can speak about it 20 or 30 years from now and you can give the history about it we had to inherit the history so with that i want to say education continually in this wonderful place called Prince William County is so important, so important. People want to live, work, and play here.

[06:12:28] They want to. Military people want to stay here once they retire. Whatever that looks like, people want to live here. So how do we make it better? And we need to collaborate to make it better. The other thing that I want to say is to the staff and the developer and working through this project. You work really hard on making it the best that you could. And it's not about giving in to the developer. It's not about that at all. It's about how can we have policies

[06:13:03] and procedures that we have to live with and work with and make it good for the citizens. And so I'm saying all that to say, again, I'm proud of you because you're an example of what should have been done 20 or 30 years ago. You are today.

[06:13:20] And to the citizens, thank you for your voices. Thank you for saying exactly how you felt about it. And I would ask you, please, help us to work together to educate each other. Because there's a lot of history here that we are dealing that is old, old infrastructure, a lot of old stuff.

[06:13:42] And Dr. Jack, you know that. So thank you for coming out tonight. Thank you for the developer that worked with the staff. Thank you for staff. Long hours. Just thank you. I will be supporting this because we need housing. We need housing. And we can't get around that.

[06:13:58] We need housing. So we need you to help us tell, to explain to us, what does that look like? But it has to happen. Dr. Jack, you know that. So thank you, Madam Chair, for this moment. Supervisor Stewart.

[06:14:20] So, look, I support everything that everybody has said up here. like especially Supervisor Vega and even Supervisor Bailey and also Supervisor Bodie. We do need housing. We do need housing close to where people live.

[06:14:38] But, you know, this project is not ready for prime time. 50-foot buffer, fail. Environmental concerns, fail. School concerns, fail.

[06:14:58] And those are things that need to be fixed. And you came here not ready. you came here not ready. And, but I also agree with, with, with, with Supervisor Bodie that, you know, we do need places close to where people live, work and play, right. And places more so that they can afford, right. Affordability is, is a problem here in the county. You know,

[06:15:32] Mr. Higgins, I do appreciate your being here. I was you literally 40 years ago, right. You know, Well, not yet, but exactly 40, right? You know, at your age, I was coming to these meetings dressed just like that, right?

[06:15:52] And so I appreciate that. And I really need the concerns that the staff has called upon these things to be fixed.

[06:16:10] You know, like Supervisor Bodie said, this is not just going to, like, sprout out the ground tomorrow and all of a sudden, like in a cartoon, it's going to be there, right? But I need these things to be fixed. The community needs these things to be fixed.

[06:16:26] You know, people want to be treated fairly. People want to be heard. People want their tax money that they're paying to be utilized in a fashion that reflects them.

[06:16:44] And, you know, because of the location, I am going to support this project.

[06:17:03] However, there are things that I'm going to be breathing down staff's neck about all the way until the first shovel's in the ground. All right, and you should be aware of that because this is not good.

[06:17:19] This is a bad haircut. Thank you. All right, Supervisor Vega, additional questions for staff? Just a quick question for the county attorney. For clarification purposes, is this board also, I guess, committed or under the same pressures as the PC was with the timing component of this application?

[06:17:39] With rezonings, the board has one year to act unless the applicant waives, and I'm not sure when the application was filed. May of 24, so it's been more than a year.

[06:18:00] So this board has to take action today? I would recommend the board take action. Nothing else, Supervisor Vega? No, thank you. All right, does anyone else wish to speak on this?

[06:18:17] All right, let's go ahead and take our vote. Supervisor Ingrid, motion passes, 7 to 1.

[06:18:33] Supervisor Vega voting nay. All right, thank you very much. The attorney who's presenting these cases has asked for a brief recess, and I will grant that. So we have 10 minutes. And then, everyone, please come back.

[06:18:50] If you would like to sign up for the speak for the next set of applications for Holy Square, please make sure that you do so. Thank you.

[06:20:09] All right, everyone.

[06:20:57] We are back. I'm going to ask everyone to kindly find a seat. And we are going to start with the applicant. So, I'm going to let everyone know we are going to combine the presentation and the public hearings for 13B and 13C.

[06:21:14] So, the applicant will present the CPA as well as the rezoning. The county will give their presentation. And then I will open up the public hearing. So, thank you. We can proceed, Ms. Cameron. Good evening, Chair Jefferson and members of the board for the record.

[06:21:31] My name is Jonelle Cameron with Walsh Colucci, Lou Belay, and Walsh. Here with me tonight, on behalf of JR Real Estate Group, are the applicant JR Real Estate Group, our civil engineering team, transportation team, and environmental team to answer any questions that you all may have.

[06:21:47] As a roadmap, we're going to walk through the property location, land use and zoning, the proposal, which includes open space and buffers, amenities, transportation. We'll then end with 3D exhibits to show you how the development will look and a very, very brief video that walks through the development.

[06:22:06] The applicant is the contract purchaser of eight parcels off of Hoadley Road and is seeking a comprehensive plan amendment on two of the parcels and a rezoning on all of the properties. The property is a little less than 58 acres in size.

[06:22:23] Here is Prince William Parkway and here is Hoadley Road. The property is currently zoned A1 Agricultural and SR1 Semi-Rural Residential. It is comprehensively planned Mixed-Use 3, Residential Neighborhood 2, and Orpa-Aquaquan Resource Protection Area.

[06:22:46] The proposal is a comprehensive plan amendment to designate the entire property as Mixed-Use 3 and a rezoning to PMR planned mixed residential. The applicant, again, is seeking that comprehensive plan amendment on the parcels here.

[06:23:05] The applicant has conducted significant community outreach, and based on feedback, the proposal has changed. What you see on the screen is the initial proposal. The original proposal included 432 units, which included multifamily stacked units here, townhome units here and here, duplex units here, two multifamily buildings here, and a community center to be open to the public here.

[06:23:35] This slide shows the final proposal based on input from the community. The applicant is now proposing 279 residential units. 265 of those are single-family attached units, as you all know, as townhomes, and 14 are duplex units.

[06:23:54] 28 of these units will be ADUs. The applicant is now proposing a density of 4.84 dwelling units per acre, inclusive of areas defined as erpo and they're around eight dwelling units per acre if you exclude the b3 portion in this area here access will be from galveston court here a write-in write-out access from hoadley road here and then access from a new public road public road a that i'll

[06:24:29] go into further detail with you on in this area here this slide shows the rear loaded townhome elevations. The applicant is seeking modifications of the width of the townhomes to allow for 16-foot townhomes, to allow for seven townhomes in a row, an increase in height to 45 feet to allow for rooftop terraces, and a reduction in the minimum setback for roofed and unroofed decks, stoops, landings, and similar features, and a reduction of the minimum footprint for the townhomes.

[06:25:03] This slide is an illustrative of the duplex elevations. The applicant is seeking modifications to decrease the minimum lot area to 3,900 square feet and reduce the lot width to 38. In May of 2024, the board initiated a comprehensive plan amendment at the request of the applicant to change the designation on two of the parcels to mixed use three. At the time of the initiation, planning staff recommended approval with four of the recommendations that you see on the screen.

[06:25:41] The first recommendation was to provide a minimum of 60 percent open space within the areas that are currently designated as ORPA. The second recommendation was to provide a minimum of 60 percent undisturbed area within that ORPA open space. The applicant was encouraged to preserve preservation of a natural buffer or existing woodland or forestation area of at least 50 feet along each side of all significant non-RPA streams and the applicant was asked to commit

[06:26:15] to additional measures to improve water quality to the Occoquan watershed. With this application the applicant has met or exceeded the county's the county's recommendations in the comprehensive plan. A total of 56% of the entire site is open space. The applicant is preserving 64% of the area that is currently designated as ORPA as open space. In addition, the applicant is preserving 65% of that ORPA open space as undisturbed. That's a little less than 18 acres. The applicant has

[06:26:53] exceeded the county's requirement or request to commit to 60 percent open space within the area designated as ORPA and then to preserve 60 percent of that ORPA open space. The applicant is providing 20-foot buffers along Hoadley Road, a 30-foot buffer adjacent to Dar El Noor in these areas here, 50-foot buffers adjacent to the residential, and then 30-foot buffers that will be undisturbed adjacent to these residential neighbors here, and then a 50-foot HCOD buffer adjacent to

[06:27:30] Prince William Parkway. The next recommendation was to encourage the applicant to provide a 50-foot buffer next to non-RPA streams. The applicant was able to accomplish that in most areas except for the area here and the area that's in this area here. The area here is where the stormwater management facility is, there was a cultural resource that was found on the site that is going to be retained and undisturbed. And because of that, the applicant is unable to relocate the

[06:28:07] stormwater management facility to the east. And so that's why they were unable to commit to a full 50-foot buffer in this area here. And then this area here is the area that is for the interpersonal connection to Maple Valley Grove and the road network. The applicant has proffered several proffers as it relates to environmental protections within the Aquacon watershed. The applicant committed to perimeter controls within the area that's designated as ORPA. The applicant has also

[06:28:43] committed to construct a sediment basin at the very beginning of the development pre-construction, And essentially what this does is it allows for there to be additional mitigation treatment during construction.

[06:28:58] So normally you wouldn't put in these sediment basins until after construction. So there's a concern that some of that erosion would go into the water. From a stormwater management perspective, the applicant proffered low impact development within the area.

[06:29:15] The applicant also proffered to not purchase any off-site nutrient credits to comply with water quality requirements. And to my knowledge, this is the only time that this has been proffered. The applicant has also proffered a reduction in phosphorus by 60%.

[06:29:33] The county, when they adopted the comprehensive plan, they do not have a zoning ordinance as to how you develop within the ORPA area. Fairfax does, and Fairfax has a similar area with the Aquaquon, and these recommendations or these proffers came from what Fairfax requires and actually exceeds what Fairfax requires.

[06:29:56] So, for example, in Fairfax, the phosphorus reduction load is a minimum of 50%, so the applicant here has proffered a minimum of 60% higher than what the requirement is in Fairfax. In the next few slides, I will review with you the amenities that are proposed on site.

[06:30:18] This slide here shows the linear park, the dog park, the garden, and a reflection park. This slide here also shows another border park. The central community park is located in this area here.

[06:30:35] And then we also have the pony park, arrowhead trailhead, and community garden. When the applicant originally proposed the application, that trailhead was in this area here as well, and it looped around.

[06:30:52] Based on feedback from the community, they wanted that trail moved further away from their residential development, and the applicant agreed to do that, which is why you see the trail in the location that it is today. This slide here shows the overall transportation node and network, and as part of the proposal, the applicant is required to conduct a traffic impact analysis. They were required to look at the five intersections on the screen. Again, they're required to look at what are the existing levels of service, what are the levels of service in the future without your development, including

[06:31:31] a 2% growth rate per year, as well as any unapproved projects, which includes the Dara El-Nor expansion project. They were then required to look at what are the levels of service in the future with their project the two percent growth rate per year and the darl nor expansion and they were required to look at it in the future assuming that maple valley grove was also approved all of the intersections operated at acceptable levels of service except for the

[06:32:05] intersection of prince william parkway and hoadley road that intersection in this left movement here is a failing movement. VDOT has kicked off the STARS study which looks at the corridor from Prince William Parkway, Hoadley Road, and Davis Ford Road all the way down to the intersection of Hoadley Road and Dumfries Road. That is designed to look at the future development and any improvements that need to be made at this intersection to account for growth. The applicant has proffered a little over seventy one thousand dollars for an interim improvement at this

[06:32:42] intersection as part of the proposal the applicant is realigning the access into the mosque which is currently their access is in this location here the applicant is creating public road a in this location here that removes the offset geometry so currently the access into daryl nor is offset from Queens Chapel Road. This will now align the road. It also reduces potential conflicts,

[06:33:16] and it improves that operational efficiency. So today, that access into the site is an E at this intersection. With the approval and the change to this signal, it's now a level of service B at that intersection. So the delay from the AM is 48 seconds, a reduction, and the PM reduction is 24.8 seconds. And on Fridays, that reduction is about 37 seconds. This slide shows the overall

[06:33:52] site connectivity to the site. There is a transfer station today on Galveston Court. The applicant has proffered a monetary contribution for three bus shelters, two on Galveston Court, and one on Hoadley Road. The applicant has also designed the site so if in the future OmniRide decides that they would want a stop internal to the site, that that could be accommodated in this area here.

[06:34:22] As we were doing the community meetings, there were a lot of discussions about parking and what does parking look like? How are you all providing parking? There are 708 parking spaces that are required. The applicant is providing 1,124 parking spaces. In addition, the applicant has designed the site so Public Road B can have public parking on the site. When you are calculating your number of parking spaces, the county and VDOT do not allow for you to include public street parking

[06:34:59] even though it can be used. If we were to include that public street parking, that's an additional 59 spaces. So that's 1,183 spaces. So for this project, the applicant is over parked by over 400 parking spaces. There were comments that were made at the Planning Commission public hearing and recommendations from staff and the staff report. So I'm going to briefly review with you all the proffer revisions that were made first as part of the project there is a b3 land bay

[06:35:34] staff wanted us to be able to commit to what that use would be there were concerns that it would be a shopping center or some more heavily intense commercial use the applicant has proffered and limited these uses to adult daycare center child care facility event center meeting hall mortuary funeral home, office, religious institution, and or wedding chapel. And essentially those are uses that are compatible with the uses that Daryl Noor already has. So what we wanted to say is what are

[06:36:05] the other uses that would be compatible with and are not heavily intense. We also heard a lot of discussions and concerns from the folks that live along Lost Creek Road regarding their wells and what would this do to their well. What would the development do or how would the development impact their wells. The applicant essentially did a proffer to do a baseline study of 17 wells that are immediately adjacent to the property. Essentially what that means is 60 days prior to commencement of site work, the applicant would send a letter to those neighbors offering to do a

[06:36:42] baseline study. That baseline study would test for both quality and quantity of the water. They would then, when they were completed the site construction of the site, offer to do another study to confirm that there were no impacts to their wells. If there is an impact to the well, the applicant would be responsible to repair or replace that well. And this slide here shows those properties in which the letters would go to and are subject to that proffer to do that. Another change pertained

[06:37:20] to adding the low impact development. That was a proffer that was not included at the Planning commission public hearing but it was a request from dr jack on behalf of loco um on behalf of loco pelt so the applicant made that addition the applicant also provided clarity and the nutrient credit credit and phosphorus reduction proffers as requested by watershed staff in the next few slides i have aerials this is the view um from holey looking towards prince william parkway

[06:37:55] this is the view from the other location and direction this is the write-in write-out entrance this is the area for the central community park this is showing the clubhouse in this area here

[06:38:12] and i do have one video that i may need andrea's help to upload good evening ladies and gentlemen

[06:38:53] of the board safer man jr real estate so we were challenged to actually create a sense of place here so we wanted to pay homage to the chriswood family and the horse farm so there's horse theme throughout the tack shop the bridlewood park and as well as the trails so as you'll see where everywhere as part of the development when you turn in you will actually turn into greenery and it's intended to look like that as you're driving down hoodley road so as you turn into the site you'll turn into linear parks throughout and we created a central amenity area that will be public access so this will be publicly accessible not just for the community

[06:39:29] and we called this area actually bridlewood so we're trying to keep the horse steam throughout and even sort of the trail network within this area, the hardscaping, is horse-themed. The clubhouse is just for the community, and it creates a place for the community to have sort of meeting space and grilling areas.

[06:39:49] And what we did here is we took out all the two-over-two units because that was what was at Maple Valley Grove so that we could create a more integrated community. So you have different levels and different sizes of townhomes here to create a fuller community between the multifamily, the stacked townhomes, and then traditional townhomes over to the two over two units.

[06:40:09] As you can see, the streets is a grid network. We have parking on everywhere on the streets. Even the townhomes are rail-loaded townhomes, and we purposely did that, and they have their own driveways so that we could exceed parking requirements. We have multiple playgrounds throughout the site, and we have multiple amenities, community garden within the site, as well as a dog park that's there. We also purchased a piece of property just so that we can create the connection to the shopping center and make sure that that's an accessible facility. The dog park will be a part of that, and then the pond will be a wet pond that

[06:40:47] is sort of amenitized there. So the central park area is going to be publicly accessible and maintained by the HOA of the community. Thank you very much. The only thing that I did not mention in my presentation is this property here was initially purchased

[06:41:20] to have another access point from Lost Creek so that they did not have to come out at Lost Creek and Hoadley intersection. Based on feedback from the community, they absolutely did not want that access point. That access point was removed.

[06:41:36] And the applicant in the proffers has stated that that house will remain as a residential use. And I can answer any questions that you all may have. I actually have a few. I want to get it started.

[06:41:53] You live in this area, correct? Or you live nearby? Yes. Okay. One of the questions I had proposed to me is that there is a pond in front of, you know, where the horse from is. There's a pond. Is that part of the Neabsco Creek?

[06:42:09] I mean, is that the headwaters for Neabsco Creek? We do not believe that that is the headwaters for the Neabsco Creek. We had both our civil engineer as well as the environmental consultant look at that. We believe that it is a pond that was created for the horse farm itself.

[06:42:25] And I think I actually have an image. So this is the pond that's being referenced today. The civil engineer looked, and there is no evidence that there actually is any piping that goes from this pond anywhere else under the road.

[06:42:43] All right, my next question, there is, I believe, a small piece of land that is B3, if I'm not mistaken. Yes. Can you tell me what, because I've heard concerns that it might be something not fitting, you know, perhaps a 7-Eleven or some kind of convenience retail?

[06:42:58] Yes, so that is the area that we specifically proffered what those uses are, and I can repeat those uses. So that, go to the proffer so we can read it. So it is only permitted for adult daycare center, child care facility, an event or meeting hall, mortuary, funeral home, office, religious institution, and or wedding chapel.

[06:43:25] In addition, this piece here, which is that piece I mentioned before, it shall be retained as a residential use. So really when looking at what those uses are, we looked at what is the Darrell North special use permit and what do they have or what can they already do?

[06:43:42] so that it would be a compatible use. And we did hear concerns that somebody thought that it could be a convenient store or a shopping center. So we wanted to make sure we limited those uses. All right, thank you so very much.

[06:43:58] Supervisor Bodie? Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Janelle. Long time no see. A couple questions. Transportation. You talked about not only the proffers to help enhance the bus shelters that currently exist, but also that sort of center drive area.

[06:44:15] So could you talk a little bit more about that and some of the conversations you may have had with PRTC? Yes, so we actually met with PRTC on this site in particular and the transfer station. They wanted to make sure that with this project and the other project that the transfer station would still be able to be located in the vicinity.

[06:44:37] Initially, what was proposed is that transfer station would come into the site. OmniRide came back and said, no, we don't want it in the site. We want to keep it at Hoadley on Galveston Court. And we said, great, we're happy to do that.

[06:44:53] There currently are not bus shelters there, so the applicant is proffering the monetary contribution for OmniRide to be able to construct bus shelters where they see fit in that corridor. Thank you for that. And then to move on to, well, actually, let's stay on transportation for a second.

[06:45:09] Can you go back to what you were talking about around that Queens-Chapel-Hodley intersection. Can you just please repeat for the record what your improvements were going to do for that intersection and its performance? Yes. And so the current access to Daryl-Nor is here. So that access is offset from the intersection. The applicant is proposing to construct Public Road A. Half of it is on the Daryl-Nor side of their property line. The other half of it is on the Holy Square side of the property line. What that does is it better aligns

[06:45:46] that intersection. What it also does is it pulls people that are coming from the mosque further into the site. So right now you come in and you can turn left here or you come straight back and turn left. What this does is it you come in, you go straight, and then it has a designated left turn lane into the site. So it's pulling vehicles further from that intersection. When we looked at this during the a.m., it's a 48-second reduction in time that you are waiting at that

[06:46:22] light. And the p.m. peak, it's a 24.8-second reduction that you are waiting on that line. And then on Fridays, because that's the main prayer day for the mosque, it's a 37-second reduction in the delay that you're awaiting at that intersection appreciate that and connecting that point is on this slide you have up you see you show that it connects all the way through that that public street all the way to galveston what does that do for the connectivity and especially for folks who are concerned about the traffic around the moths yeah so what happens now is

[06:46:57] when you're coming out it is controlled by the police so there's a police car cars here and then there's police car or cars here what's happening now is you come out and then if you want to come on during fridays when you come out if you want to go back to prince william parkway you are making that u-turn movement here which ultimately is a delay for people on lost creek or webster's way that are trying to make a left out of their development what this does is it creates a street network so what the police could do is instead of making that u-turn they can people

[06:47:36] can come all the way down here, come out at Galveston, and then make that left. So it provides another option and opportunity for the police when they're doing their traffic management plan with Dar El Noor to determine the best way to get people back to the parkway, but this way it avoids making that U-turn movement. Thank you for that. Now to move on quickly to environmental. You talked a lot about the environmental protections, the enhancements that the applicant is going to be doing um can you talk a little bit about the timing uh when it has it pertained to the the

[06:48:12] stormwater management the water protections and sort of the delay there between when you all put it in and when staff received it and what's what's being reflected in the previous staff report okay um so what is being reflected in the previous staff report does not have that lid change um at the planning commission the proffer still allowed had the nutrient credit and the phosphorus reduction what watershed staff wanted us to do is be very clear at what that 60 percent meant

[06:48:45] and so that's basically a reduction in 34 pounds appreciate that i wanted to see if your consultant wanted to add anything else to the water quality conversation so i think matt marshall with ldc i'm the engineer for the applicant um so there's two parts supervisor bodie i guess number one is about the sediment basin we were talking about so what we're actually doing is building the permanent pond in phase one in lieu of building a sediment trap or basin then building the pond said differently you'll have to do it once it minimizes the amount of sediment that can migrate downstream the also permanent pond also has triple the capacity of what a sediment basin would have

[06:49:24] allowing for more storage and settlement of materials to the bottom number two relative to water quality we are also deploying treatment train here we also have underground stormwater management, and something else we are using is called an MTD, or someone may reference them as a jellyfish, for example, that help improve the water quality significantly above what is required by the minimum code, and that's what we're proposing here. All right, do we have anyone else with any questions? If not, I'd like to invite the, oh, Supervisor Vega. Yeah, Jonel, can you address some

[06:49:59] of the questions from folks that talk about the 60% that you all are leaving undisturbed, and in regards to how much of that can be built on? And if you could pull it up on the map also to show folks. So there have been questions.

[06:50:17] I think Supervisor Vega and what you're getting to is our limits of development is essentially this gray line here. And the question or comment that I think you're getting to is, well, you're saving it, but you couldn't build on it anyways.

[06:50:34] Is that correct? Yes. Okay. Supervisor Vega, Safer Haman, JR Real Estate. So the acreage that we are preserving is a little bit right under 18 acres as undisturbed. The actual RPA area that we wouldn't develop on in that area, I believe, is somewhere in the neighborhood of four to six acres.

[06:50:53] So there is actually 12-plus acres that are developable back there that are still going to be left as undisturbed. And not only undisturbed, we have proffered to actually put them into a conservation trust that will remain as undisturbed in perpetuity.

[06:51:12] Anything else, Supervisor Vega? I just want to correct myself. I think I misspoke. I think I said 60 acres. 60% is what you all are. Okay. Just wanted to correct myself. Thank you. All right. I would like to invite the county to present.

[06:51:51] Good evening. My name is Reza Ramiar, case planner for this CPA request. This is a request to change long-range land use of this property of 48, almost 48 acres, from ORPA and RN2 to MU3.

[06:52:18] PC recommends denial for this case. Staff recommend approval of the CPA. This slide shows existing long-range land use and proposed long-range land use for this request.

[06:52:34] As you see, the area on the north and on the east side of this property planned for ORPA, and the west side and south side are planned for MU3 and RN2. These slides compare long-range land use, existing long-range land use and proposed long-range land use.

[06:52:57] As you see, the ORPA is planned to protect Aquacon Reservoir by reducing density in this area to one dwelling per five acres. And recommended open space for this land use is up to 60%, and the primary use for this use is residential.

[06:53:20] For RN2, also the primary use is residential, and minimum open space is 30%, and NVGEN density is 1 to 4 dwelling per acre. For MU3, the primary use is residential and commercial and office use.

[06:53:43] Density is 4 to 12 dwelling per acre. The applicant in the rezoning proposal, they show they are going to have 9.2 dwelling per acre in land bay A and 7 dwelling per acre in land bay B, which are the two residential land bays in their proposal.

[06:54:03] They provide 67% open space in Orpa area and totally 56% open space in their rezoning property. also they they they are going to build 265 dwelling in their application which 10% defined as affordable and work for students there are some weaknesses with this application and they the the proposal includes development in within some environmentally sensitive area as shown here and here and they

[06:54:40] didn't provide 50 feet buffer as recommended by the board in the initiation process. The applicant also expand their request in their rezoning and add this property which making consistency in the boundary of the request, in the boundary of CPA request and rezoning request. And also they add commercial use in their request which was not discussed in the initiation process and its intense use in ORPA. This slide shows a strain of this application

[06:55:18] Within this project, the applicant provides a mix of residential housing, including affordable units, addressing the county's housing needs. The request also promotes local community and support mixed use development in this area and align with the smart growth in the policy and the comprehensive plan.

[06:55:44] And also, the applicant committed to preserve, to provide 60% open space and protect 60% of 60%, which is equal to 36% of ORPA area undisturbed in their request.

[06:56:01] This slide concludes my presentation. Staff recommend approval for this CPA. All right. Thank you so very much. Does anyone on the dais have any questions? I see. Come on, do it, do it.

[06:56:19] You got a question, do it. Sir Advisor Vega. you madam chair mr. Cobra who's Cobra okay well I'm sorry we didn't hear your name at the beginning Reza I'm sorry Reza Reza Reza okay can you please refresh my memory and tell me what the primary purpose of the ORPA is to reduce density and have one dwelling per five acre here to protect okay and why is

[06:56:58] the Occoquan Reservoir so so crucial for our county? Because the main source of water in the county is Occoquan Reservoir and the ORPA the main idea for ORPA is reducing pollution in the watershed and also manage water like with low density manage Occoquan Reservoir. Thank you. That's all I have for now Madam Chair.

[06:57:28] I have Supervisor Bodie then Bailey. Sure thank you Madam Chair. Thank you Reza for your presentation reza um thank you for your presentation appreciate you i know this is one this is you've been you've not been doing this in front of the board for very long so good job so far um to piggyback off of what supervisor vega just asked um because of the unique nature of the cpa why did you all decide to require the 60 of the current area that's currently orpa to be uh undisturbed or to be open space and that 60 of that 60 to be undisturbed

[06:58:02] So this strategy, we want to mitigate the impact of this development by protecting some area, first providing open space and then protecting watershed by making them undisturbed.

[06:58:20] Through ORPA, we don't have any authority to protect. The property owner can do what they want to do. But by proffering and conserving this area, we can have better management of the water supply.

[06:58:36] I appreciate that. And can you repeat that in a slightly different way? Because right now, we currently do not have a zoning district for ORPA. So if someone wanted to go buy right in ORPA, are there any protections that we would be able to impose upon them for the water supply? No, we can.

[06:58:53] Appreciate that. And then as we've talked about slopes and other things, as you looked at the level of protections that the applicant is proposing for this, are there elements of this that you would likely want to see in further and future proposals for ORPA?

[06:59:14] So I am a member of Regional Watershed Management Advisory Group. So one of the main concerns is salt based on the development.

[06:59:30] So I think reducing salt pollution in the run of water is the main important factor that we need to take care of this. Appreciate that. My last question goes to looking at this more holistically.

[06:59:48] We just talked about not too long ago Maple Valley Grove and the connections here, the shoppings and what have you. in your opinion how does this sort of make a cohesive sort of area especially given that the applicant during his presentation talked about the fact that they actually changed their unit mix to be a more cohesive kind of holistic community yeah so as you see in there so it's the they protect northern part of the property which has which has more major trees and and south of this

[07:00:21] property is planned for RN2, mainly residential, and they are adding some, they're using some ORPA area and connecting to the MU3, which is this area which is very close to commercial part. Yeah, I think this is a good design for this development, and the location-wise is very close to MU3, and it is helped to have a workable mixed-use development there.

[07:00:54] Thank you. good evening again tanya washington planning director just wanted to add um just in looking at that bigger context i think that's the question that you're asking about so this area um i don't know if it's in this presentation but um in the previous one where you saw the mu3 areas how essentially they're sort of uh directed towards princeway and parkway and holtley road and so this is essentially a slight extension of that but it's essentially including um if you

[07:01:29] also consider the 60 percent of that area being um kept as open space is essentially creating a cluster development that's closer to the roads and so it's it's sort of building off thank you building off of the mu3 um sort of focus closer to the prince william parkway holy road and then the government center activity center which is right across um that that major intersection

[07:01:55] And so it's essentially creating kind of cluster, more cluster development around this area, but still with this CPA request, you know, still preserving part of that area for the ORPA as open space.

[07:02:11] Appreciate that. Very last one. I have 30 seconds left. Can you talk about the density across Hoadley and how the differences between, if there are any, the differences between the density across the street and the density here at Hoadley Square?

[07:02:26] Supervisor Bodie, Alex Venegas from the planning office. Primarily on the other side of Hoadley, we have a diversing housing stock as well. We do have some apartments.

[07:02:42] We do have townhouses as well as single-family detached. So this adds to that element. Both of these projects would, but in particular, this one supplements what we have already on the other side of Hoadley Road.

[07:02:58] All right, Supervisor Bailey, then Vega. Thank you very much, manager. Hi, Reza. You did good. I wanted to ask, did you say on slide, I think it's slide number seven, where number, the environmental commitment, I'm just, yes, that one.

[07:03:27] Did you say that it was 60% open space, but 30%? Yeah, they come in to provide 60% open space. 60% of that 60% should be undisturbed.

[07:03:46] So 60% of 60% means 36% of the area. Okay, got you, got you. And then the other question that I have is where there is an expansion of the road by the Dar Elnor piece.

[07:04:04] We've been talking about over maybe the last three or four years, the congestion there. Will that additional expansion allow for less congestion in that area?

[07:04:20] Kevin. Yeah. Because I know there's no light there, so I'm just asking. There is, since we looked at the, you know, the CPA in tandem with the rezoning, what we recommend is that the rezoning would have to mitigate any of those impacts to the road network.

[07:04:43] Okay. Okay. So it helps, though? Yes. Okay, that's my key. And then the other piece that I wanted to ask about was, in the presentation, it mentioned there's a clubhouse, a private clubhouse that's a part of the project.

[07:04:59] Is there a spot, if I recall, that is open to the public in that area also? Supervisor Bailey, if you wouldn't mind, we still have to do a presentation on a rezoning application, and so your question might be more relevant to that part.

[07:05:18] Okay, I'll hold it to the comprehensive plan amendment. Okay, I'll hold it to the end. Thank you. Supervisor Vega. Thank you, Madam Chair. Reza, I got it right. I'm going to say it all night. Can you, just as a follow-up to a comment that Supervisor Bode made, what would density, what would by right density look like in comparison to this project?

[07:05:43] So by right, comprehensive plan is a guideline. So it's a guideline. So by right density is a zoning issue. Now it's A1, and they request to rezone this property.

[07:05:59] So by right is A1. It means that one dwelling can make it. Yeah. So it's for later. Okay, fair enough. I'll ask it then. But can I have watershed management? Do we have somebody that represents here?

[07:06:15] We do. We have Clay Morris here. All right. Hi, Clay. Good evening, all. Quick question. What protects the watershed better? Development of this sort or ORPA?

[07:06:35] If you look at the intent of ORPA, ORPA was meant to reduce imperviousness. And that strategy could be both for infiltration as well as stormwater management. So ORPA, thank you.

[07:06:53] Does anyone else have any questions before I allow? All right, you may resume. Hello, everyone. Good evening. My name is Kobra Babayi.

[07:07:18] I'm Case Planner of Rezoning Hodley Square Application. The Hodley Square Application in part of the rezoning is located north of the Hodley Road and south of the Prince William Park Bay.

[07:07:36] This is a rezoning application. In this application, the applicant requests to rezone of the 57.69 acres from A1 and SR1 to PMR, Plant Mixed Residential, to allow for development of 279 residential units.

[07:08:01] The zoning of application, I'm talking about the boundary of the rezoning because as Reza mentioned, the boundary of the CPA is different from the rezoning. The most part of the application, the zoning of the application is A1 And we just have a SR1 in western of the property, in the property that is located in west of the project.

[07:08:31] The long-range land use of the application is contained of the three parts, ORPA, RN2, and MU3. Again, the property on the west of the rezoning application was not in CPA request for change of the ORPA and RN2 to MU3.

[07:08:55] Following the CPA request to change the ORPA with MU3 designation mixed-use neighborhood, the target land use in MU3 is 50% to 85% for residential development, 10% to 45% for non-residential, with primary use for single-family attach, single-family detach, and retail service.

[07:09:27] The implementing zoning district in MU3 is for PMR, B1, and B2, and the target residential density with MU3 is between 4 to 12 dwelling units per acre.

[07:09:45] With this application, for rezoning application, the applicant provides a mixed type of development. This is a development for residential and non-residential. We provide for 265-ton house, 14 duplex, and recreation area.

[07:10:06] On the other hand, the applicant requests to provide the B3 or retail service in west of the property. The implementing zoning is PMR, and the provided density in rezoning application is 8.

[07:10:23] that is completely consistent with the density of the MU3. So the proposed rezoning to PMR is consistent with MU3, but the proposed B3 designation as a non-residential development is not consistent with MU3 designation.

[07:10:47] Please let me back to background and summary of the development of the application. In the first submission, the applicant requests to 432 units development with just two type of the houses, multifamily and ton house.

[07:11:08] And in second and third submission, the number of the units reduced to 370. And the last submission, the number of the units reduced to 279. And the applicant completely changed the multifamily type of house from the application.

[07:11:29] So it means from the first submit of the application to last, the density of the application reduced 35%. As I mentioned, the application is contained of the residential and non-residential development.

[07:11:47] With non-residential development, it's contained of the two parts. the applicant requests to outdoor kiosks and seasonal activity. And the other proposed development in terms of the non-residential development is related to the land by D that the applicant proffers to provide the B3 or convenience retail district in land by D that I mentioned is not consistent based on the NU3.

[07:12:21] In terms of residential development, the application is contained of the total 279 units. That is contained of the 265 townhouse with different size and 14 duplex.

[07:12:39] It means 95% of the units are townhouse and just 5% of the units are single family detached. Weakness of the application or concern, some concern about the application.

[07:12:57] First of all, the first concern and weakness of the application is related to trafficking. Podlia Square application is very close to the mosque with high level of the service, school, Maple Valley application, and commercial area.

[07:13:18] So closing to this area will increase the traffic congestion in area. The other concern of the application is related to the land. As I mentioned, the applicant proffered to provide the non-residential development in this area.

[07:13:39] The applicant proffered for what type of the development, but the exact type of the development and the exact purpose of the non-residential didn't determine or detail by the applicant.

[07:13:54] So staff need to have more detail and information to review the type of development for design, to review and analyze the design standards, and all to ensure all of the necessary is consistent with development regulation.

[07:14:13] And special, special staff need to be more consistent with potential impact of the non-residential development on adjacent area. School impact. The school confirmed with this application the future student for the future student generated, but the application has not enough space for elementary school and high school.

[07:14:43] Some of the key points of the application that is a string of the application is related to conservation of the natural open space. Applicant during the CPA and rezoning process proffers and provide more than 60% natural open space and try best to conserve the ORPA area.

[07:15:10] The other key point of the application is related to multipurpose recreational area. With this application and rezoning application, the applicant proposed and proffered to provide the multi-recreational area, such as the Central Community Park, Community Garden, Dock Park, Pocket Park, and Trail.

[07:15:32] The other string of the application is related to profits provided 28 dwelling units or 10% as affordable dwelling units for this application and project.

[07:15:49] So, after review the application with different agent, staff recommend that the Board of Community Supervisors approve rezoning REZ 2024-00023.

[07:16:08] Hotels were subject to proffers dated December 1st, 2025 for the following reason. The rezoning is consistent with the long-range land use designation, except on the western portion of the property.

[07:16:23] The applicant proffers to provide the recreational amenity and site connectivity to meet the residents' needs. The applicant proffers to provide the 10% or 28 dwelling units as an affordable housing. And the last key point of the application that costs to recommend for approval is related to conservation of the existing natural openness space and environmental resource protection with proffers for conservation easement.

[07:16:55] thank you so much for your time and my pleasure to answer your question thank you so very much does anyone have any i'm sorry chair jefferson um so after the staff report went out we received some uh revisions to the proffers that address the b3 um i know we showed that as a weakness but that's what it was a weakness at the planning commission and then the applicant provided us clarification because staff felt it was important that we had that information.

[07:17:30] The applicant has addressed that. I just want to make that clear. They did limit the uses that could occur on that B3. And then Kevin. I'm sorry. Kevin Weirach, Transportation Planning Manager. I do want to add a clarification as well. In the time between the staff report and tonight, we met with the applicant to resolve some outstanding VDOT comments that were giving us a little bit of pause.

[07:17:54] They're meeting all of their requirements as far as meeting the TIA results and mitigating their traffic congestion. I would like, following Mr. Renegas' comments about the B-Tree, I would like to give more information in purpose of the non-residential development in PMR area.

[07:18:15] Based on the zoning ordinance and section of the PMR, Every PMR district greater than 50 acres shall incorporate at least one area as non-residentials and with reviewing the application compatible with surrounding residential.

[07:18:37] So provided non-residential development in PMR that is greater than 15 acres is essential for the development of the application. All right. Thank you very much.

[07:18:56] I am, does anyone have any questions? I don't see anything going once, going twice. All right, then, it's time to open a public hearing. So I am going to go ahead, and I'm going to do these together for 13B and 13C.

[07:19:15] I'm going to open the public hearings for both. I ask the people, please have a seat until I call you up. Thank you. People are so excited to talk. All right, so what we're going to do is, because I'm doing these both together, Whereas you would get three minutes apiece to speak, I'm going to give people six minutes.

[07:19:35] If you are an organization recognized by the board, then you get up to ten minutes. And again, please, we can only have one person for each organization. I'm going to invite people up five at a time. Please state your name, where you live, the magisterial district.

[07:19:52] And also make sure that we can hear you. That's a really important piece because sometimes we're straining to hear people. and if you've come out this late you should be heard all right so with that i'm going to call up martin jeter delton nichols larry briggleman connie christopher and chris cummings you are

[07:20:12] my first five could i have the overhead projector please okay good evening chair jefferson members of the board i'm martin jeter from the aquan district and i'm here representing mid-county civic association so i'd like the extra time please if i could thank you um we want to thank the applicant for coming to midco and presenting their project at the midco meetings um in midco

[07:20:52] we talked to everybody but more importantly we listened to everybody and we've reviewed this project a few times there have been some changes made in response to community concerns but unfortunately this project has a fatal flaw that's been there from the very beginning and i'll go into that uh just in a moment uh i first want to say that midco has not opposed other developments in this general area along the parkway the king's grove project is one um that that we were not opposed to and the community didn't have opposition to that that we saw and it was generally less impactful than someone something that could have been built there by right another project that

[07:21:28] midco was not opposed to is the dean crossing project that's right on the other side of the parkway from here that's a 42 unit apartment building for 50 i'm sorry for 50 and under of the area median income level so it's a low income housing project that again the community didn't have much opposition to that we saw and the Belmont Gardens project is a 55 and over community a little further down the parkway near the Glenn Shopping Center again it was less impactful than other projects could have been that could have been there and the community also we didn't see much opposition to that this one's different however we did have seen a lot of community

[07:22:05] opposition to it and we're opposed to it for that and other reasons as I said but first I want to start by dispelling some misrepresentations and misunderstandings that that have been kind of floating around this project over over the last year or so you may have heard that the ORPA boundary line is arbitrary and it isn't it's the watershed line and you can see that on this map the yellow line that parallels the Hoadley Road is the watershed line the green area is the ORPA area and that's the Occoquan watershed on the other side is the um the Potomac River watershed

[07:22:42] fed by Neabsco Creek into on down into Potomac River so it's the watershed line and another thing that made things a little confused is the fact that the um previous project Maple Valley Grove was taken out of the ORPA so it was it was it's been said that well it's just a fungible line but two wrongs don't make a right, and there is a reason for that line.

[07:23:05] It's the watershed line, and that makes sense because it's a watershed protection area. You know, and this is something we heard again tonight. Some have been saying that doing projects like this with much more impervious surface and clear-cutting of the trees on the property is actually better for the watershed than five-acre lots that are recommended in the ORPA area.

[07:23:28] I think that obviously violates common sense, just like saying that adding thousands of vehicles to the road in this area is going to improve traffic conditions. These are things that violate common sense, but more importantly, it's counter to the opinions of our own environmental management staff, as you just heard a few minutes ago, and it's counter to the experts we've heard from.

[07:23:50] It's also counter to what Fairfax County has done in the past when they did pretty much the exact same thing with a five-acre lot and downzoned a large area of the watershed on their side of the Occoquan, and this was 30 or 40 years ago that they did that.

[07:24:06] So, I mean, I think it's clear that the ORPA protects the watershed better than covering properties with large amounts of impervious surfaces and clearing large amounts of trees. As Claymore has told you just a few minutes ago, You have three factors, groundwater infiltration, stormwater volume and speed, and nutrient pollution and runoff.

[07:24:27] And you can, to some extent, mitigate the last two of those, but the infiltration is the thing that's important that really you need to work before, especially for the folks that live in this area that are on well water, which means pretty much everybody from Hoadley Road over to the city of Manassas and from the Aquan Reservoir all the way over to the Prince William Line.

[07:24:48] These are all well and septic for the most part, and people are worried about their water. So another reason why it's not a good idea to start chipping away at ORPA is that we don't know what the groundwater situation is in Prince William County.

[07:25:07] The board just initiated a groundwater study just less than a year ago, I think, and that study will not have results for at least a year or two. So we don't know what the levels of the groundwater are in Prince William County. we don't know what the trend is going up or down we won't know that for a while and we do have a lot of people on well water and we have had some anecdotal information about failing wells we don't know what the situation is so we we need to be really careful about what we do um there there's been a couple times and i think it was said again tonight that you can um there's not as good

[07:25:46] protection in orpa because people could clear cut five acre parcels and you know the reality is they don't and i can tell you that from experience we've worked on numerous projects in mid-county and what we do is work with the developers and we have the lot the lots clustered on part of the property because the five acre recommendation is an average on a part on a given project the lots are clustered we have large amounts of open space that are permanently protected with a conservation easement and the tree that we save most of the trees on the parcels and the reality is people aren't going to move to this most forested area of the county and immediately want to cut their

[07:26:24] trees down it just again it's another thing that doesn't make logical sense it's you know it's just reasons to try to make this project seem better um so um if it was better to pave over large areas and clear cut the trees areas like washington dc and richmond virginia and baltimore maryland would be ideal watersheds because they'd use all these high-tech techniques and the watershed would be improved over the natural state and i think we all understand that's just not true but the overarching issue and the one i can't overemphasize with this project is the precedent setting part of

[07:27:03] it um the staff says they do a case-by-case basis when they look at these projects and i i don't they probably do they maybe they took a take a blinders on approach but i can tell you developers don't developers look at trends developers look at what the board has an appetite to do And when they see, as we all know, developers make money off the units per acre that they get on a given project.

[07:27:26] And that's fine. It's a profit motive. That's what makes our economy work. But when the developers see that people are getting entitlements to vastly increase of density on land and the board is okay with that, you will get more applications for this. Anybody that thinks it's not a precedent is not being realistic.

[07:27:46] And the reality of the CPAs we've gotten in Prince William County over the last 10, 15 years, the majority of them, once they are applied for, are approved. So the idea that this won't be a precedent, it's again, it's just not comporting with common sense.

[07:28:05] But the good news is on all this is that we don't have to do these kind of things in our watershed protection area to achieve our housing goals, to achieve our affordable housing. as I just said there's projects on the parkway for affordable housing we have plenty of areas within our comprehensive plan without changing it where we can achieve our goals for housing and have walkable communities and mixed and varied housing types and all the things we need to do in Prince William County as we grow I hope you all understand that there are places in the

[07:28:39] comprehensive plan where we can do these things so based on all that and the fact that the planning Commission recommended denial along with a letter you've received from the Conservation Alliance, LOCAPELT, and PWCA are also recommending denial of the CPA. We respectfully request that you deny the CPA for this project. Happy holidays everyone and we'll see you next year. Thank you so very much Martin. Next speaker. Good evening again supervisors. I'm Delta Nichols and I am

[07:29:17] HOA president of Hunters Ridge, and I'm in the Occoquan district, and I request the additional time, though I probably will not need all of it. So, Hunters Ridge is in the middle of Arthur.

[07:29:38] We are 216 homes strong, and we do not support Holtley Square, this proposed development. And we ask you to please disapprove the comprehensive plan amendment and the rezoning. So part of the proposed Holtley Square development would encroach upon ORPA. And as you know, ORPA was originated from sound scientific principles and is grounded in prudent concerns to protect one of the county's

[07:30:11] most precious resources. That's our drinking water. There's not a person in this room that does not need good clean drinking water and also to enable it to be sustainable far into our county's future for our for our posterity and the county's future prosperity it is imperative that ORPA is protected it is somewhat rare for a majority of the county's residents and government

[07:30:46] entities to identify an issue, our concern, and to come together and unite around it and to protect it, regardless of what part of the county you live in, regardless of your ethnic background, your political persuasion, or your background affiliation.

[07:31:04] There are a lot of things that have the potential of dividing us, but ORPA is one of the most important things to this county, and that individuals and interest groups came together in a form of firm ORPA's importers. And they developed a sustainability plan and codified it, codified ORPA into our comprehensive plan. And it has only been standing and codified about two

[07:31:38] and a half years. And now a developer wants the county to approve his plan to start undoing ORPA and the work that has been done to put ORPA in place. We find ourselves asking the question, why? Now, given all of the wise thought, all of the considerations and the debates that occurred to stand up. Why would one developer put forth a request and ask that the county start

[07:32:14] to undo the good, wise, and prudent work that has been done? And I submit to you that those who are asking for this are asking simply because they can ask. But you do not have to say yes just because they are asking. They are asking you to forget about sustaining this county's drinking water.

[07:32:40] The Hopeless Square proposal is asking you to not be concerned about creating excessive amounts of impervious surfaces that negatively impact groundwater recharge. This proposed development is asking you not to be concerned about the worsening traffic that is already a nightmare in this area in overly congested and in the failing intersection of Holtley Road in the Prince William County Parkway. Holtley Square would best be built close to a transportation hub

[07:33:19] Not in the middle of a mass transportation desert, in the middle of mid-county. Now, we talk about, you know, bus stops and OmniRide, and I don't want to disparage the Rappahant anyway, the OmniRide, but we all know it just doesn't work.

[07:33:39] If it worked, more people would use it. It takes too long to get from point A to point B. It's just not feasible. We should focus on making the county better through better housing location planning that goes hand in hand with better transportation planning and accessibility to efficient and affordable mass transit.

[07:34:02] The Chris Wood Farm is not that location for this type of development. And again, I'm not against development. And I will tell you, the Hunters Ridge, the residence, 260 strong, we are against this development.

[07:34:21] So don't let this proposed development steal water from our future. Tell this developer to find another location for Hoatley Square. Many of us would be happy to help him to look for another location. Supervisor Bodie, you ran on a platform of protecting our precious natural resources like water.

[07:34:49] Stick to the platform that you ran on. That's what we ask you to do. Stick to it. Don't show favor to this developer who wants to put the drinking water for our future at risk.

[07:35:04] We ask you, Board of County Supervisors, to be responsible elected citizen residents of our county and stewards of our drinking water now and into the future.

[07:35:22] Don't chip away at the opera. And as was said earlier, if you set this precedent, you know that another developer is going to come and ask for the same thing.

[07:35:38] And then what are you going to tell that developer? When you do things like this, it's just like feathers in the wind. It's hard to get and pick them all back up. So don't set a precedent.

[07:35:55] Disapprove this. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Madam Chairman, I don't know if I can follow those two speakers.

[07:36:11] I'll do my best. Larry Brinkerman, I'm in the Coles District. Supervisor Vega, thanks for what you do. So I spoke about the Maple Valley Grove. I won't bore you with that again. I would just say, if I heard this correctly, the applicant requested, I wrote down five waivers.

[07:36:32] You know, reduce setbacks, increase the height restrictions, reduce the minimum footprint for a structure, reduce the lot length, and reduce the lot width. I may be incorrect, but that's kind of what I thought I heard. To me, these are indicators.

[07:36:49] And then I just wonder if we're going to ignore or waive of restrictions, then why do we even have them on paper? The second thing I'm going to talk about is they presented that this public road through this development. If I was a prospective buyer, I would want to be told that.

[07:37:07] And they're probably going to be told that, but they probably don't know what that's going to mean down the road. Because any of us who's lived here a couple of years know that a cut-through becomes a cut-through. I mean, you get a lot of traffic going through a public road.

[07:37:25] And then Hillendale is a good example, by the way. And then just the third thing, I'll just talk about traffic again. So one of the weaknesses that was identified by the staff was traffic. And I'll just run down this real quick. Everybody knows about them, but we're going to put all these people that are going to live here and move here.

[07:37:45] The church on the corner of Davis Ford Road, they're going to increase that. Holdley Square, what we're talking about right now. Maple Valley Grove. Holdley Falls 1 and 2. King's Crest. King's Grove. The mosque expansion, the Purcell project, not all these have been approved yet, but they're all on the docket.

[07:38:05] And then on the other end is the Kline Farm, right? And then on the other side is the Quartz project. Where are those people going to go cut through when they want to get to two silos, right? They're going to come right through the Hoadley Square, I mean the Hoadley Road, Prince William County Parkway intersection.

[07:38:22] I ask that you vote no to this project. Thank you for your time. Next speaker, please. Good evening. My name is Connie Christopher.

[07:38:40] Myself and my sister own Corswood Farm. My family moved here in 1969 into Forestdale and Dale City on the day that Neil Armstrong walked on the moon.

[07:39:06] My parents, in 1975, when I was 18 years old, we bought Corswood Farm. It has been a riding, a boarding, and a training facility for 50 years.

[07:39:28] People ask me all the time, how can I sell the farm? It's not easy. It's not been an easy decision. and this is very emotional for me. I'm sorry. But throughout this whole time, we have tried to keep our prices down and have kept our prices down to try to allow people to be able to learn about horses, learn about riding horses, and to afford a place for people that own horses to keep their

[07:40:04] horses here. How I know that we're affordable is because for years I have other barns call me and try to talk me into raising our prices. And we have always been one of the least expensive in a four-county area. When we bought the property, Hoadley Road was a two-lane windy road. Our property was surrounded by woods on every side except Hoadley Road. There was a farm, another

[07:40:40] farm across the street where Dale City is now. There was woods where Bren Forest is now. There There was woods where Harris Teeter Shopping Center is now, and there was woods where the mosque is now. When each of these things came before the county to be built, we never went and opposed any of them.

[07:41:04] We moved into an area that we expected to grow, Dale City, Lake Ridge, wasn't even there yet, was all an up-and-coming area. We are in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., and we pretty much expected growth to happen.

[07:41:21] What we did, because we were the only farm, was put up a bigger fence to keep our horses in so they're not running across people's yards and to keep people out so they are not messing with our horses. We have built a thriving business through the years. It's not always been easy.

[07:41:50] Having large animals is a lot of work and most of the time my family has done the work because we could not afford to hire people. I made, I made the decision to sell my farm when I got kidney

[07:42:16] cancer seven years ago. I had to ensure that my horses would be taken care of. So I had to get another place. I have some land that I hope to build a barn on to move all my horses. Three quarters of my horses now are over 20 years old, which makes them between 60 and 70 years old in people years and you will not get any money for those horses. People say you can sell them. Not

[07:42:54] really. I cannot let my horses go to people who will not take care of them and old horses require a lot of care. So here I am seven years later still fighting the cancer, still hoping to sell my place and still hoping to move my horses. Chriswood Farm has been my life. This is I want

[07:43:32] to sell it and I don't want to sell it, but I cannot continue what I've been doing. So I have no choice. I would like to thank all the residents of Prince William County and all the board of supervisors before you and you guys, because without all the help from this county throughout the years, we would not have been able to make it this long. We truly appreciate it. Thank you for

[07:44:11] listening and it's been a great ride all right thank you before our next speaker i'm gonna call up the next group of five i have ashley studum uh norman wait hold on i'm gonna call up the next group so then you're gonna speak so that we um so ashley studum norman stone and um stevenson

[07:44:36] gary o'brien and katherine howard all right sir you may begin good evening board of supervisors I am back here. I'm still Christopher Cummings from the Occoquan District.

[07:44:57] And can you adjust the microphone so we can hear you better? Sure. Thank you. I'm still perturbed by the feeling that we only get increased taxes, more data centers, and more high-density housing here.

[07:45:16] Turning to the matter at hand, the Hoadley Square application needs to be seen together with the Maple Valley Road application. And together, if passed, and one of them already has been passed, they will impose unreasonable new burdens on the transportation infrastructure, as well as the watershed area that buffers the Occoquan Reservoir.

[07:45:41] High-density housing, and these two combined together comprise high-density housing, should be steered to areas with high-capacity transit like VRE and not to major road intersections already heavily burdened with traffic.

[07:46:00] The impact on schools has been discussed, and everybody knows how tricky that gets in terms of redistricting and promises of new schools that get postponed and all that sort of thing.

[07:46:16] As things stand, a huge amount of impervious surfaces in the Hoadley-Prince William area detract from the watershed and threaten those of us nearby who depend on well water for our homes. It matters that the Planning Commission recommended denial or at least had serious problems with the proposal.

[07:46:40] I would ask that you seriously consider and actually deny this application. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Chair Jefferson, members of the board.

[07:46:58] My name is Ashley Studholm, Occoquan District, and speaking on behalf of the Prince William Conservation Alliance and request the additional time. And Prince William Conservation Alliance is an environmental nonprofit. We've been operational for over 20 years here in the county, and our focus is on creating equitable and sustainable communities.

[07:47:22] So the Occoquan Reservoir Protection Area was created just two and a half years ago. So a lot of this, we've heard Martin Jeter did a really terrific job providing an outline here, but I did want to highlight a couple of points that he pointed out, that this was established two and a half years ago as part of the Comprehensive Plan update.

[07:47:44] That same update dissolved the urban growth boundary, the rural crescent, And as a result, significantly increased the allowable density within the Occoquan Reservoir watershed, which is already one of the most urbanized drinking water watersheds in the country.

[07:48:02] And while there are watersheds that are more urbanized, they're not able to convey drinking water at an affordable cost the way the Occoquan does. This change was made despite the request from Fairfax Water to conduct a water study prior to making such significant land use decisions.

[07:48:27] We are still waiting for those results, although my understanding is that those are being wrapped up, and also a recommended groundwater study has also not been conducted. With the adoption of the new comprehensive plan, ORPA has become the county's primary strategy for protecting the Occoquan Reservoir and the groundwater resources that are in that area.

[07:48:53] Like we heard before, ORPA closely follows watershed boundaries and hydrogeologic lines, and these lines are not arbitrary. They were drawn intentionally and based on the soil type and geology that are particularly susceptible to drought, and is why I mentioned earlier that Maple Valley Grove really does fit into these categories. So we already weren't including all of the parcels that could have and maybe should have been included in ORPA. So without a groundwater

[07:49:29] study, we still do not fully understand how increased development pressure will affect these resources over time. And now, just two and a half years later, after density within the watershed has already been significantly increased. We're facing the first request to remove land from the ORPA area, and that is here, Holy Square. Now, planning staff has recommended approval, which, and they've highlighted prioritizing affordable housing goals over upholding our primary policy to protect critical drinking water resources. And this creates an

[07:50:07] either or scenario when the whole purpose of comprehensive planning is of course to be able to say yes and. I want to acknowledge the comments made during the planning commission hearing that that I heard and it was it was really important for me to for all of us to hear from residents who spoke favorably about this proposal and hear their lived experiences in their hopes that this proposal represents. And their perspectives really matter. And it's really heartening to

[07:50:42] hear those stories. And I appreciate the care and thought that it brought to that discussion. And by looking at the county holistically, though, we can accommodate that vision and that dream and continued growth by incentivizing redevelopment and infill near existing transit hubs, while also offering additional housing configurations in, actually, yeah, in the, I'm going to use this really quick,

[07:51:22] even though I'll know for next time to zoom in so we can actually see this a little bit better. But, so, and allow for different housing configurations in the Forest Belt, so that's that green, and then the AAOD, the Ag and Arts Overlay, which is in yellow here, to protect our natural and cultural resources for the benefits of all residents and to allow for diverse housing.

[07:51:54] I will say this project does have a lot to offer. And if it were located in one of the red areas, that would be awesome and provide a lot of really, and end up protecting some of the reducing green space that we have in those areas.

[07:52:20] And you can see from the map on the other side, from the ICPRB, that there are parcels. You can see the little flecks of purple and green. There are parcels that we can and should still protect in these areas.

[07:52:36] So a configuration like what we're seeing here in one of those areas would be absolutely phenomenal for the residents in those areas that are experiencing depleted green space.

[07:52:53] And they have a right and should have access to walk out their door and get into some trees as well because there's a lot of health benefits for that. So it really comes down to that here in this area, our focus should instead be on building upon the ORPA density framework and ensuring that it succeeds.

[07:53:24] And in fact, we have had multiple meetings with county staff and with the late Supervisor Weir and Supervisor Bode about discussing the importance of ORPA, how we can build on that framework and the need to create a dedicated ORPA zoning district so that we can build upon and strengthen the protections that the ORPA framework was designed to provide.

[07:53:50] And this should come first, but luckily, the by-right development here is mostly A1, so that's one house per 10 acres, so even proposals that fit in ORPA would still need to go through rezoning and um and honestly from the speaker before the owner of of the farm like you can't hear her story and not have your heart broken and when i heard that it made i just felt so sad

[07:54:22] that we have not yet incentivized this type of land use and supported her vision for what that parcel could and should be and to the point where she is feeling like she has no choice and needs to be pushed out and find somewhere else to go and I have to sit like I think we should sit with that sadness that we do not have the incentives in place to encourage that and instead we are seeing

[07:54:54] data centers buy up our nurseries and we're seeing all of our green businesses leave and I don't think that's the direction we want to go. So right now the board is considering starting to erode what has become our primary protection strategy, especially at a time when we are seeing unprecedented development pressure across the county. It's not relevant arguments to me

[07:55:26] to say that this proposal only removes whatever number of acres or is whatever percent of ORPA or the watershed. This is about upholding a policy. It's about sending a clear message that we take our responsibility as stewards of a critical drinking water resource seriously, and that we are proud of that responsibility. Rather than contributing to the death of 10,000

[07:55:55] cuts, we at PWCA recommend that the CPA be denied. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening.

[07:56:15] Ann Stevenson, Occoquan District. Supervisors, thank you for letting me speak again. I would also like to address the ORPA. It's had quite a history. Martin Jeter with MIDCO, Mid-County Civic Association, pursued the creation of an Occoquan Reservoir Overlay District for more than a decade. The association's committee published a report with a list of recommendations for a potential overlay district in 2011.

[07:56:54] Ashley's organization, the Prince William Conservation Alliance, a local nonprofit, also backed plans for the overlay district. That's what she was talking about. The executive director before her, Ken Hosen, may she rest in peace, advocated for development restrictions throughout the entire Occoquan watershed, from headwaters to river, which spans two-thirds of the county's landmass.

[07:57:22] I quote Kim, It's important that the overlay apply to the entire watershed. Addressing problems in the upper reaches, which is where the horse farm is, addressing problems in the upper reaches of the watershed and the headwaters is of critical importance.

[07:57:43] If you screw up the headwaters, you'll never recover. And to comment on whether or not the pond on the Criswood horse farm is spring-fed or not, the information, I was told by Connie when I talked to you it was spring-fed.

[07:58:04] No. If you look at Martin's overlay or projection, and he showed the RPAs, the protected areas, that one that comes out of Dale City and crosses over Hoadley Road, and it covers that first section of the horse farm where the pond is.

[07:58:23] So that may need to be investigated more because that is in the protection area according to the county map there. And then back in 2020, Supervisor Vega, thank you, directed the county staff to begin work on creating an overlay district in November of 2020 following several controversial development proposals approved by the board.

[07:58:56] At the time, Supervisor Vegas said many of her constituents are concerned about increased development throughout the county that could impact the county's drinking water. The last ground study was done in 1997.

[07:59:14] That's a while ago, and I know there's one in the making now, but it hadn't yet been done. And that I feel needs to be done before all of this development takes place within the ORPA and potentially will affect our drinking water and our wells.

[07:59:32] We all drink the water that comes from these headwaters and goes into the Occoquan. I'm going to read an excerpt from Prince William County Times.

[07:59:48] This was dated back in August of 2021. And actually, it's by, the quote is by Supervisor Bode. A major part of Prince William County's commitment to its citizens is ensuring that environmental resources, including clean water, arguably our most important resource, are protected for current and future generations.

[08:00:14] Currently, poorly planned development and lax enforcement of environmental safeguards are threatening the health of our waterways, including the Occoquan Reservoir. the region's drinking water supply. The Occoquan Reservoir is already on the EPA's dirty waters list and its condition continues to decline, posing a direct threat to the cleanliness of your drinking water while protecting the watersheds that are critical to the health of the Occoquan Reservoir is both affordable and practical.

[08:00:44] Once the damage has been done, the cost to you as a taxpayer will be astronomical. Prince William has both the tools and the obligation to address this issue. One of the most important tools granted to local Virginia governments is the ability to protect waterfront land, known as the resource preservation areas, from clearing and other destruction.

[08:01:05] These waterfront buffers are our last and best defense to prevent pollution from entering our water. Serving the Occoquan District, this is from Supervisor Bozzi, I am particularly aware of the importance of protecting our waterways.

[08:01:22] As supervisors have debated allowing more development, including data centers in the county's rural Crescent, some residents who rely on private wells for drinking water have raised concerns about how that kind of development might affect groundwater. The county is preparing options and recommendations for a groundwater study to be considered.

[08:01:41] That's in the making. So by signing on to the 2040 comp plan, those of you who are here, you made a promise with your signature in signing on to protect and preserve this ORPA for our drinking water.

[08:01:59] Please leave the ORPA as is. Will you keep those promises, promise made, promises made, promises kept, or will the promises be broken? Please keep yours. Keep the ORPA as it is. Thank you. All right, before I go into the next speaker, I want to call up the next group, Paul Howard.

[08:02:21] I called up Catherine Howard. Catherine Howard, Paul Howard, Michael Seaver, William Quinn, Clancy McQuig, and Jack Kamushin. You may proceed, sir.

[08:02:38] Thank you. Gary O'Brien again, Coles District. Thank you, Yesley, for the vote. If we continue this path, I really worry about this county.

[08:02:55] If you look at the way we do things here, it seems that we set these rules only to be broken, and not having any real solid protection for ORPA is the case in point.

[08:03:13] We need to lock it down so that builders don't come in and say, well, we'll just get a waiver on a portion of it, and we'll just chip away at it, and eventually it'll be worthless. Because if you've been here, these board meetings like I have over the years, the boards are faced with lawsuits if they refuse precedents that have been set by their previous votes.

[08:03:41] And here we are setting another precedent potentially. And I continue to worry about this because if we right now there is a serious salt problem in the Occoquan and it's growing worse and worse.

[08:04:04] The data centers are only going to make it even worse as they flush their systems. Now, where are we going to get our water from, clean water, if we have to share it with data centers and potentially, I hate to say this, but nuclear power plants potentially to run these things?

[08:04:28] Where are we going to get our water? We're already having droughts and severe floods. The floods are causing damage that we're spending a fortune to try to repair streams and what have you, and that's not cheap. And if we have to use osmosis to get the salt out of the water, can you imagine what it's going to cost us for fresh water?

[08:04:52] And if you've got a salt problem in your diet, you're going to have to drink bottled water because you won't be able to drink anything out of the faucet. And I didn't hear anything about the schools this last time. Where are we going to get the money for all these schools these kids are going to come into?

[08:05:16] And I didn't hear any proffers in this last, they said there was, but I didn't hear any. And it's not cheap busing kids, and nobody likes their kids being bused outside of their area just to satisfy some builder that wants to build high density in a wrong place.

[08:05:36] and who's to say that the quartz isn't going to be built before this maple valley is going to be built and isn't that going to have low density or low cost housing and yet you say you needed this one for low cost housing well you just got another 279 now you want to put double that with this

[08:06:01] development so i i just don't get it um and and as far as the pond goes i can't imagine a pond not being self-sufficient there does there isn't any stream that runs into it so it has to be a spring fed and you want to have a house built over a stream or over a pond i made the mistake of buying a townhouse once that was built inside a dry lake and every time it rained the basement

[08:06:36] practically filled up with water so i um these may not have basements but i still wouldn't want my foundation on unsolid ground um we have a number of issues here um the biggest one being orpa and setting a precedent and then we already have approved some low-income housing we're going to have more with quartz do we have to sacrifice orpa and our fresh water that we need for our

[08:07:13] future and our future's children just to make some builder happy. I don't get it. And if you really are determined to vote for this, what about that B3 property? Why don't you just delay this and say, bring it back, give us the B3 property as offset for what you're taking away from ORPA and put it in conservation instead of making it industrial. Industrial in that area doesn't make

[08:07:48] any sense. In fact, it makes things worse. So in conclusion, I just think we have to look for the future and think logically and do what's right for citizens and for our taxpayers because bad mistakes now are just going to cost us a lot more later. Look at schools, 50 to 60 million dollars just for the next middle school, maybe 79 million for the next school. Where's that money going to

[08:08:25] come from. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Evening. Michael Sever, Aquan District still.

[08:08:42] Thank you all for the time. So I'd like to talk a little bit about impacts and what we see from these projects. One was already approved. We're looking now if this one is approved, which they're not equal as we've just established in this room. One is in the ORPA, one isn't, but it's 550 homes.

[08:09:07] You're looking at approximately, depending on which estimate measure you use, around 3,000 to 4,000 trips on Hoadley Road in the span of a day between deliveries, trash trucks, cars, what have you.

[08:09:23] You put that much traffic on Hoadley Road, you're looking at having to solve that traffic issue, which is already a problem, which maybe it means widening Hoadley Road. So I hope the residents along Hoadley enjoy the road getting a little closer to their homes.

[08:09:38] Let's talk about schools for a second. The elementary and the high school is overcrowded today. It's at 100%, and I appreciate this developer proffering some money towards it, unlike the other one that we approved in this room and put more burden on me tonight and all of the people in this room that live in Prince William County.

[08:10:04] My kids are looking at going to school at the elementary school level in trailers. Nathan, who you all praise tonight in here, they have trailers at Colgan High School. Is that what we want in our community, to take 100% packed schools and make that the way our kids go to school?

[08:10:26] And then to solve it, because the proffers, while they are great, they do not solve everything. You're talking about additional funding coming out of each taxpayer's pocket to fix a problem that we're saying yes to tonight that is not our problem as county residents.

[08:10:47] We are creating that problem in this room. We breezed past another thing that flew past earlier in the night about the, I forget the exact phrasing, the cultural significant area on the project.

[08:11:03] Just so everyone's clear, that is a site that predates colonial settlement. And pattern of life in any archaeological area means that it is not just in that area in which it's discovered. Once we bulldoze that area and disturb it, that is damage that can't be recovered from.

[08:11:24] so there's also the orpa which we have talked about in depth the orpa was put in place to protect every single person's drinking water in this area we've heard ad nauseum i don't want to go through all of it and repeat what others have said better than i can but i know from the well on my property because i bought the house from family that the well has lowered the amount of gallons per minute that is produced since it was drilled in 1986. The cost and impact to the people that live

[08:12:03] in my area out towards Liberia, the entire Midco area, to drill a new well, you're talking $10,000 to $40,000. So if we vote yes on this particular project tonight, when somebody in Prince William County's Midco area in the years to come has to drill a new well, and maybe they don't get the car that year, maybe their kid doesn't get to go to college anymore that year, That is the choice you're making tonight by beginning to take land out of the ORPA.

[08:12:36] Those people, I want them to remember, if they're listening, that if people vote for this project here and take land out of the ORPA, that they are taking potentially money out of their pocket. Thank you for your time. I appreciate it.

[08:12:53] Good evening. I'm Clancy McQuig from LOCA. I'm an Occoquan resident since 1973. And I'll just take the short time, because my father, Jack, is going to do the long time.

[08:13:17] I want to thank the Criswood family for all the years you put into that place. Both of my daughters became expert riders on your property, and they both went off to compete at the national level in quarter horse riding.

[08:13:34] So thank you very much for your service, and I am beyond sad that this is shutting down Criswood. You guys were a magnificent addition to our community for more than 50 years. So thank you very much.

[08:13:50] And I'm going to repeat what you just heard. Please keep the ORPA in place. We have to protect our drinking water and our data center water, unfortunately. Either that or seed the ORPA to Fairfax County because they know what they're doing up there, and we don't.

[08:14:14] If the data centers need water, they can just use groundwater recycling through wells that have cut down. A huge amount of our water from Prince William County that we produce down in the Mooney plant goes, not the water from Fairfax County Water Authority, the Mooney plant recycles it.

[08:14:41] But a huge amount of that water goes to the data centers. As a matter of fact, if I was you, I'd ask BWSA how much of their water is going to data centers, because that's an unknown. You should know what that number is every day, how much of our water, because we can't drink it if it's in a data center.

[08:15:00] It just goes up there, and then it gets pumped up to UOSA, and UOSA recycles it, and then it comes back down to the Occoquan, of course. Okay, I want to—this is your decision, obviously. You know, citizens have opinions, planning commissions have opinions, and boards of supervisors are the only ones who have votes.

[08:15:23] So this is on you all. I want to thank the applicant for downsizing from what he started out and staying open in communication with the rest of the community. Thank you very much, sir. You guys done good.

[08:15:39] And I think, not being an expert on this kind of stuff, but I think your big open area there with the pond on it is going to do the kind of things we want for protecting the Orpah rather than just five-acre lots. So thank you very much for that.

[08:15:56] We need, like Jack says, we need more support for the Orpah. Okay. Thank you. Thank you all for paying attention.

[08:16:14] Thank you all for a long night. Thank you all for doing what you're going to do. and protect the ORPA, whatever you do. And as far as I'm concerned, we have a quality developer here who's trying to make an environmental impact, and he picked up the Fairfax County standards, which nobody else has, which I appreciate a lot.

[08:16:37] Thank you. Okay, Jack, go get him. All right, wait. Before Jack goes to get him, I have a call in the next group out. Andrew, hold on. Let me just call him up. Members of the board. Wait, no, I'm sorry, Dr. Jack.

[08:16:54] Let me just call up the next group of people. Oh, yes, please. All right, thank you. So I have Andrew Dowdy, Fayya Saeed, Julie, I'm sorry I have your pronunciation on the other page, but I'm looking at you, so go up. Richard Welp and Nathan Higgins.

[08:17:13] Thank you. Oh, no, you're still here? Okay. All right, Dr. Jack, it's your turn. Oh, thank you. And Madam Chair, members of the board, again, I wish you well for the holidays and the year ahead. And I did want to say we're blessed with quality staff, and they do as much due diligence as possible.

[08:17:39] And I want to thank the staff for working with the applicant. And I also want to thank the applicant for remaining open in dialogue with us. We could pick up the phone and say, could you meet us? In fact, we met October 30th, our last meeting, and just went over all the changes.

[08:18:00] And the committee, as I said, they have angst over the high density, but we ended up with substantial density reductions and then also doing a lot of things that were more respectful of the ORPA-like nature of the land.

[08:18:22] So I want to compliment the applicant in that regard. And I know he has a commitment to continue the dialogue. And with that, I do want to ask that whatever decision you make, if you make an approval, we would like to have a courtesy review for LOCA on the architecture, signage, lighting, landscaping, stormwater, orbit controls, and such, so we can have that dialogue and we can engage the community in that discussion prior to final site plan.

[08:18:57] so we would like to see that. With regard to the ORPA in particular, we strongly recommend to maintain the ORPA designation rather than the MU3 or RM2. It's a philosophy of protecting the reservoir and then just trying to be good stewards, and I would say the applicant has

[08:19:28] stepped forward in that regard in a very positive manner, which encourages us. And as we look at this particular application, we have serious commitments. 65% of the ORPA is now in open space.

[08:19:50] We've got the commitment to place it into a conservation easement and trust. And we've got the H-Cod buffer along the Prince William Parkway, it will be an undisturbed buffer. It's not quite 50 feet, but it's an undisturbed buffer. And we talked a lot about parking, and we said we want to see ample parking and street parking, and all that came to pass. So we ended up with 1,124

[08:20:28] parking spaces when we have 728 required spaces. And we're approximately 400 spaces above code. So these are all good places to be. We've got the three bus stations that we're looking at with PRTC within or around the site. And so the other thing that we worked on years ago with the mosque was trying to eliminate the U-turns.

[08:21:04] And so actually our specific recommendation in the local letter to the mosque leadership was the Queen's Chapel intersection to be better realigned. And what Mr. Rahman has done is actually effected that change with what he has done, what he is proposing along Galveston Court and the Queen's Chapel area of the complex.

[08:21:32] And then we talked about internal traffic movements and with the idea of not having more traffic on the parkway and Holdley. And so I think it's a work in progress, but the internal traffic movements have been optimized as much as the applicant could do.

[08:21:55] And I think that will help and reduce the counts on those two problematic areas of that section. And we are looking to have undisturbed areas with natural slope and this natural surface trail.

[08:22:20] And that was discussed by the applicant with the Lost Creek neighbors. And the trail would be field cleared with minimal clear cutting. So these are, and it would be under the conservation easement as well.

[08:22:37] And so a lot of this is coming to pass based on his discussion with the neighbors. And we like to see that continue in some fashion because this project will not be built overnight.

[08:22:57] It'll take a while to get in place. And I just want to go back to the ORPA. The ORPA is designed, I was on the original committee, and we were trying to meet Chess Bay preservation standards.

[08:23:16] By the way, I worked on writing a paper to House Public Works Committee as the chair of the Federal Water Quality Association Government Affairs Committee and the Water Environment Federation to Senator Mitchell and the committee to recommend that Chess Bay be established.

[08:23:37] And then they came back for the Sunshine and Government Act five years later and said, hey, should the act remain or should it go away? And we recommended that it remain in place as a permanent institution because we have ecological change going on in the area.

[08:24:03] Ecological change is more than decades. And you have local jurisdictions that need to work to codify things, And they hadn't, and they were working on it. So it just says an aside, that was quite an experience working to get the Chesapeake Preservation Act incorporated in Congress.

[08:24:32] And I did it through the professional organization of the Water Environment Federation with other members of associations, Chesapeake, Virginia, and others. Pennsylvania and others. So I do want to say that when we were pondering the ORPA and what it should look like, to have it function to reduce sediments, reduce nutrients and pollutants, and

[08:25:05] reducing salts and all of that, to be respectful of steep sloped areas, environmentally sensitive areas, and it shrinks well soils, which, by the way, on the list, if you could see up on the charts the staff offered, you had those elements in the chart. And that is a very definition of ORPA.

[08:25:33] And so we do need to work smartly to be considerate of our environment and to work expectations for performance so that we can lay that at the foot of a developer that says, hey, I want to do something here on this piece of land. And the staff would then have those expectations to provide to the applicant. It saves time. It saves money. It saves problems

[08:26:10] down the road if we can be more thoughtful about what to do within the ORPA. So I would urge the board to think about this and maybe commit some staff time and some funds and maybe have a citizen stakeholder group discuss that in a thoughtful manner and see what elements could be incorporated in those expectations that you could provide others in the future.

[08:26:44] And by the way, in the presentation that Mr. Rahman had, we talked about the horse theme. We have institutions in Prince William County, such as the Clearbrooks Foundation, the Center for the Arts, right at Tackett's Mill, that they could take off on that horse theme.

[08:27:08] You could have public art and other things involved, so that might be something in discussions in the future if you decide to go forward with this project. And so with that, thank you very much, and I wish you well in your decision.

[08:27:25] Thank you so very much. Next speaker, please. Good evening, Supervisors. My name is Andrew Dowdy. I live in the Occoquan District, like I said before.

[08:27:40] I've been in the area about seven months now. I have four kids myself, So this was going to be our secluded forever home as far away as I could get my wife from the D.C. area. I'd first like to start with the development and turning the Lost Creek residential area to a B3.

[08:28:02] I don't think it's an adequate segue from a religious temple to a business place to a residential place backing to an SR1. It's just not very respectful of the lay of the land, the people in it, and that's just going to cause more traffic into a high-dense area with the mosque.

[08:28:24] So with that being said, I'll move on from that. People have spoken. The professionals with the county have spoken. You've had people saying no about environmental. You've had people say no about school. In the first presentation, we had 20 citizens say no, and we had one say yes for development, and you guys still chose to go against the professionals and the people.

[08:28:46] I ask why. Ask yourself why later. Location on Hodley. Adding these high densities is just going to add traffic and more traffic in a tight space. You have about a mile stretch there of shopping centers, now Maple Grove, and then Hodley Square. No matter what traffic pattern you do, it's not going to work. We've lived in this northern national capital region my whole life. It's always a disaster. You're not going to turn three lanes into two lanes because then you're getting the whole Woodrow Wilson Bridge effect, the D.C. or Virginia to Maryland effect. We can do all we want, but you just keep piling on this high density, it's never going to work, and all your numbers are

[08:29:24] just statistics. They're not facts. Poor planning of traffic. All we keep hearing from the developer company is I'm going to make an additional left lane. Three left lanes to two, common sense does not work. And making changes to the residential, sir, I appreciate that, but I would expect from professional manner and a presentation manner those changes would be made in a presentation suitable for the common person to see and take knowledge of because otherwise we're just agreeing to what's on the board and I would just like to see before you guys commit to this is an actual

[08:30:01] traffic plan we have all this AI all this technology all these professionals here to say yeah it is good for the development to develop development but what about the traffic pattern What are some feasible traffic patterns that are going to be done by the taxpayers or by the county road workers?

[08:30:17] What is that going to be? What is DOTS going to do to solve these problems before we create these problems? Not to mention we have another thousand homes being built within a two-mile radius at Quartz. And like he said, there will be additional runoff traffic. And then you're turning Prince William County into a Fairfax County, which is an unaffordable place for its own self.

[08:30:37] So this is going to trickle down until we hit Fredericksburg, until it touches Richmond. So I would take this time to think wisely on making these decisions in development in certain areas, or do we improve certain areas versus developing other areas? That's all I'll say this time. Thanks. Thank you. Next speaker, please.

[08:30:59] Hi, good evening. So my name is Julia Novotny, and I'm in the Occoquan District. So I would like to kind of go circle back.

[08:31:18] I've been hearing a lot about ORPA. And the thing that I'm most concerned about is that in ORPA, it sounded like it recommended five home or five acres per one home.

[08:31:34] And then we heard also that when we had the environmental specialist was asked the question, which would be better for ORPA, five acres per one home or the development as currently proposed?

[08:31:54] And he said five acres per one home. That's what was in ORPA. ORPA had been developed over 10 years with a lot of studies, a lot of input, and those were the recommendations.

[08:32:10] And so it just surprises me that one developer can come in, propose something that doesn't match ORPA, and yet this is being seriously considered, which would also jeopardize the drinking water for already your current residents who have moved to the area because we wanted to have areas that were conserved we wanted to have the trees we wanted to have this area and when doing this it's just this area that needs to be

[08:32:47] preserved for the watershed we're not saying that oh my gosh you know Potomac Mills is disturbing the watershed or these other areas are not like they would be more appropriate there are other areas as i've heard also that are better suited for transportation already that there's transportation already multiple omni ride buses going to certain areas and that if we would tap into redeveloping

[08:33:20] some of those areas that that would be better for the community. So currently I live off of Holy Road near Purcell and I decided to try OmniRide and it was very discouraging. I never could get a ride back. Every single like if I during a five-day period taking OmniRide I would be able to get to work but i would show up and one bus wouldn't show up at the time that they're supposed to

[08:34:00] another bus wouldn't show up and it's because we're in an area so even if you add a couple buses we don't have a lot that come through and so like there's other areas where i had people who were like get able to because here we go to stone ridge and stone bridge and it's just very small and so when we have like those other buses such that go to near Potomac Mills those buses come so regularly that if one bus is missed like if one driver isn't able to show up then you have

[08:34:36] another bus and another bus and another bus so people were saying that that was not a big deal but this is just something that we're trying to plan already and saying we're going to rely on buses that that will help with the traffic I just don't see how that's going to especially when we also there's so many like developments that been have been made where they have one entrance this one sounds like it might have one other entrance but again it's all funneling onto holdley road and it's already got too much traffic so i think the other main thing i wanted to point

[08:35:13] out is that by changing this designation going from agricultural to mu3 it's um again not keeping in the spirit with ORPA, but it also sounds like we have a lot of, if we have this change, that we're creating this precedent that, again, will show that other areas can be, like, again, chipped away, that watershed will be continued to be degraded by having these high-density

[08:35:49] projects right next to the watershed so if this is something that you know can happen this time that developers will remember this and come back again and again and again and buy properties already and then say okay now we're ready to develop this and it'll be harder and harder to say no so I think one other thing that people have mentioned is that Fairfax County has also been an example of having five-acre homes per one house. And you can see that that area that

[08:36:29] they try to protect for the watershed in Fairfax County, just across the river, it has shown that those homes that stay treed and that it provides, you know, ample area for the watershed to recharge. So with that, I urge you to oppose the changing of the zoning.

[08:36:51] Thank you. Thank you so very much. Next speaker, please.

[08:37:05] Hello, my name is Yahya Saad, and I live in the Coles District. We've spoken at length about the future tonight, so if you'll allow me, I'd like to posit an alternative perspective with respect to that future. I'm the father of two young, beautiful children, and it took my wife and I several years to find appropriate housing for our family, and we wanted to live here in Prince William County.

[08:37:31] Fortunately, we found some, but many young families like ourselves and our generation are not as fortunate. We're struggling to find housing at a reasonable price point, and it's no secret that we're facing a housing crisis. People want to be near their families, and they want to have a multi-generational presence here in Prince William County. The majority of my wife's family are in Prince William County.

[08:37:57] And that's key for us, having our family nearby to help raise our children. Often when reasonably priced housing is discussed, we're told, you know, not here because of reason X or not there because of reason Y or not there because of reason Z.

[08:38:16] And the end result is that there's very little suitable space for that reasonably priced housing. The message becomes that no one else is welcome. Continue renting because the American dream is not for you. You will own nothing and you'll be happy.

[08:38:34] We are at risk of becoming a transient county where young families like ourselves are subscribing to live just because it's within a manageable distance of work. If you want home ownership, the message becomes no. Go to Fauquier County, spend more time commuting and less time with your family.

[08:38:55] I understand there are many factors contributing to the housing crisis, but one of those is supply. And that is a key that this board does hold control over. It is within your power to do your part in reining in these runaway home prices.

[08:39:12] Looking at Hoadley Square specifically, I see a proposal that sets a strong standard, in fact, for environmental protection and has adequate funds proffered to support transportation and education. And just as important, it means more housing for the young families that want to call Prince William home.

[08:39:32] Not just some transient location where you subscribe to live Tonight, I'm asking the Board of Supervisors To invest in the vision of a county Where people continue to lay down their roots Not just a place they leave to go to work Not just a place they leave so they can take their kids to Mosaic Not just a place where you are a perpetual tenant Hoadley Square is a step in the right direction And I request that the Honorable Board of Supervisors Vote in favor of the Comprehensive Plan Amendment And the rezoning

[08:40:05] thank you all right before i um get to the next speaker i just want to make sure i call the next group so i had richard welch i guess you're nathan higgins um khalid al um khalil al-hashbi thank you um bribeham um dasid kevin parker um amushbir hassan so if you can all go to the back

[08:40:39] and then I'll have the next speaker come up sir hello I'm Jonathan Higgins I'm Nathan Higgins father it's a school night so school starts in about seven hours or so he's getting up in seven hours so I'm here on his behalf I'm not going to try and re uh retell what Nathan told you you've heard about his concerns with the the school capacity and the traffic capacity on the other

[08:41:16] project and they're the same concerns on this project here the item i would like to bring up is the b3 zoning you know i i do look at that as a very different uh area than the rest of the project you know i am very concerned with the orpa you know i i don't support the project for that reason but the b3 zoning in particular i find um i hate to use the word offensive but i i would use that word. You know, the idea that homes can be bought within your neighborhood and rezoned out

[08:41:52] from under you into a commercial space, convenience store, morgue, whatever the different ideas have been, you know, just drives me in the wrong way. You know, I think a lot of us in this room live in a community that doesn't have an HOA, that doesn't protect us from this sort of intrusion.

[08:42:13] You know, when I purchased the home, you know, my realtor looked at not having an HOA as being a positive thing. I never realized that there was no organization or bylaws protecting me from, you know, having homes converted and rezoned. But that is why we rely on you to prevent spot zoning and things of that nature to, you know, maintain the public confidence that if you move into a neighborhood, it's not going to become a convenience store. And then if the convenience store doesn't work out, become a smoke shop like I've seen in

[08:42:52] some of the other neighborhoods where next to you zoning was allowed and, you know, businesses failed. So with that, I ask you to vote no, and I cede the rest of my time. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening. It'll be good morning soon. Kalita Hajbi, Neabsco District, but I did live right across from this project where it's going to go, Queensdale Estates, for many years.

[08:43:30] So in Queensdale Estates today, there is a property on the market for $950,000. Those properties, when I first lived in the area, were $500,000, $550,000, and basically it's doubled, and that's what's happening in this area.

[08:43:45] So for me, this is the most desirable area in Prince William County, that kind of, that last barrier between eastern Prince William County and Manassas area. So realistically, at the end of the day, this is still a suburban area.

[08:44:01] It's off of a major road. It's at a major intersection, Prince William Parkway and Hoadley. And what we have here is a property that is attached to this major route. And that's where this development is going. What it does solve is instead of having homes at 950,000, this lack of supply, there's five homes in that entire area between Hoadley Road and Richfield.

[08:44:27] that are available for sale. So from Princeton Parkway to Dale Boulevard, that entire kind of square, if you guys can have that mental image, it's five homes that are for sale in that entire area. So that's what we have and that's what we've had for the last couple of years. What we need to solve at the end of the day is a supply issue and this is, we need 2,000 homes in the region just to solve some format of what we have. So for me, the impact for me here as well, So I live off of Dale Boulevard, right behind Andrew Leach Park.

[08:45:03] That's one of the only parks or, let's say, kind of trails that you can access, walking, etc. So between there and Hoadley Road, there's nothing. And I've walked with my kids, with a stroller, with a wagon, from Dale Boulevard all the way to Prince William Parkway.

[08:45:19] And there's no sidewalks. There's no access to really any kind of amenities. So for me, what this creates is a livable, walkable community where I have a sidewalk that connects from Daranur to Hudley Road, or sorry, Prince William Parkway. It creates trails that I can actually walk.

[08:45:37] So if you guys are aware, there's really nothing in that area. I mean, there's no nature, there's no walkable communities. So for me, that's one of the biggest potential impacts for me. I think the applicant's done a great job of lowering the density, so there is a lot of density, but what they are doing is that they are bringing density that matters, and they're creating better product.

[08:46:03] So with the other, the Mapledale proposal, you have a lot of these high-density, smaller homes. This type of product actually brings livable townhomes, usable townhomes. I personally hate the like the rear loading kind of four levels, but just to have a house that you can actually have a lot of space and have a townhouse that has a garage, have a driveway.

[08:46:27] So you're not kind of in these squished communities where one car can come in, one car can come out. So I think this community design has been great. The public area is great. I don't know of any other developer in the region that would do what they can for the public.

[08:46:44] And I think that's the biggest difference between this development versus others. The fact that there's additional parking for the public, the fact that they're realigning the road for Daranur. So I go across that every Friday. I'm a congregate there. And that misalignment, there's been so many incidents there.

[08:47:01] But having just having the ability to pull traffic away and have an actual public road that goes into there, and then having that access to Galveston, not only is it going to support the businesses there, all those people leaving every Friday, but it's just going to pull a lot of that traffic away from that intersection at Queensdale. So those are the major points. Orpa, if you look at the current farm, that's the majority of the developable area that's going to go in. It's really a minor area, an additional seven acres that are going to be cut down, but the majority of Orpa is going to

[08:47:37] be preserved. And I know that's a huge concern, but again, this is a suburban area. It's right off of a major road at a major intersection um and then um so that's it for me um i would uh ask you all to approve it uh it's going to be a huge impact for the area and it's going to bring a lot of people that can live work here i would actually add one thing so for me every single community amenity you have to drive to right so i used to do a lot of sports with fxa i have to go all the way to fairfax to to actually you know have that type of environment or have that kind of community

[08:48:15] center. There's nothing like that here and a lot of times we just need the density to support that type of stuff. We need the density to support community events, community activities, community programs. We need the density to create jobs in the area and have these jobs be local versus having to go to D.C. or Arlington. And same thing for retail. We need density to be able to support long-lasting retail in our area versus we kind of get half-baked ideas over here that last a couple years and they fizzle up. So with all that, I would ask that you vote for approval on this

[08:48:52] project. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello, Kevin Parker, Niebska District. I'm here to urge you to vote against this. I think we need to balance the values of housing and the other environmental values that we have. What we tend to do with water issues,

[08:49:29] like in the book I read, A Civil Action, talking about the pollution in Woburn, Massachusetts, and the book Exposed, talking about the pollution in Parkersburg, West Virginia with the PFAS and the Dow plant, is we tend to cause a big problem and then later go, oh, we have a big problem.

[08:49:46] And then, you know, oh, we have to fix the problem. So it's better to instead with water situation is to say, OK, well, let's try to have a situation beforehand and not worry about the problem after it happens. A lot of what was mentioned about this is a small area in comparison to the whole watershed.

[08:50:12] But I feel like saying that we want to protect the water, Occoquan, but not stick to the rules in this case is like saying you want to lose weight, but not today, because today in comparison to the whole of everything is not really consequential.

[08:50:35] I don't think it's realistic to think that people will use public transit from this location, and the commuting will get worse, and people will have to stick in traffic, and it will be the same issue that the gentleman that spoke for it was talking about traveling in from outside the county.

[08:50:58] You will increase the time on the road. A lot of people can't, you know, be at these meetings and all those people will be stuck in traffic on Old Bridge and the parkway. Eventually, a story will have to be told that the decisions that led to this situation of living and sitting in traffic and how it happened.

[08:51:23] Well, we developed on the edge. Over the decades, the development has moved from 95, you know, marching out in the Manassas direction. And so what we decided to do, instead of having the density that people do want closer in, we said, okay, we want to have this dense development right on the edge of the pattern.

[08:51:46] You know, I've lived here for decades. I see it marching along Old Bridge over the years. So these and all the arguments that I've heard are very persuasive, I think, environmentally, transportation-wise, politically. I think there's really strong arguments that argue in favor of voting against this project.

[08:52:11] Thank you. All right. Before we get to the next speaker, I want to call up my next group. I have Amir Ayyab, Ali Saeed, and I believe a guy named Chris Griffin said you want to sign up. all right? And then that's it for in person. So if all of you can go up. Good evening, Chair Jefferson and the members of the Board of Supervisors. I am Abishir Hussain. I have been part of this area since 1995. So for the last 30 years, I have lived in Manassas, Manassas Park, Nolksville, and now currently I live in Bristow, part of the Gainesville District. First, I would

[08:52:51] like to thank all of you, the county staff and everyone involved for supporting quality development, such as Hoardley Square Project in our area. I strongly support the Hoardley Square Project as it represents responsible growth that benefits both the local community and the county. In the past 30 years, I have seen housing demand and supply and how it impacted on an individual in terms of the cost.

[08:53:12] As many of us know, currently our area faces a significant housing shortage. My daughter, a UVA graduate working full-time for the past three years, is still struggling to find a home that falls in reasonable price range. Increasing our housing supply is crucial to addressing rising costs.

[08:53:29] As we very well know from the economic principle, that limited supply and high demand drive up prices. This is exactly what's happening in our area. So by approving this project, we can take a significant step towards meeting our community's need. We look forward to receive your approval for the Hordley Square project.

[08:53:45] Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening. My name is Zameer Ayoub. I'm a member of this community since 2010. I'm here tonight to talk about the housing affordability.

[08:54:04] As a parent, I'm concerned about the limited options available to our young graduates. That's why I strongly support the project and urge you to approve it. More housing means more opportunities for our children to stay in the community they grew up in.

[08:54:27] Let's work together to address this shortage and build a bright future for our families. We look forward to receive your approval for this project. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Five minutes later, it would have been good morning.

[08:54:52] But anyway, my name is Ali Syed. I would request to give me a little more time because I'm going to mention something that's not just what everybody else said. That will kind of open your eyes in terms of other aspect. I live directly across from the horse farm in the subdivision that has like 60 houses.

[08:55:16] Unfortunately, like these builders that they're providing this space for community, for folks to come and enjoy time, they did not do anything like that for that subdivision. I wish that builder did some proffer, county did some proffer, and had a little bit of land for like a park or something.

[08:55:35] We have nothing across the horse farm. And I was here at the Planning Commission hearing, too, and I mentioned the only place where the kids can go, my kids go, we go to Dharal Noor because I'm a member of Dharal Noor. I pray there. They have a little bit of like three swings, literally, and that's all they have.

[08:55:53] Nothing in this area. So the facts that these developers are doing this, I'm excited about it. Because one of the reasons is that, you know, for us to go somewhere, let's say some sort of park like that, we have to walk around and go to the Penn Elementary.

[08:56:10] We can't use that during the class hours. In fact, one time, I didn't know that, and I took my little children over there, and the principal came out running saying, hey, you can't be here during school hours, even though there was nobody using it. I was like, oh, I'm so sorry, you know. So that's the frustration that we feel.

[08:56:27] Anyway, so moving on, the reason I wanted some extra time is that we all grab a word, like a trend word, buzzword, ORPA, ORPA, ORPA. But I can guarantee you, I don't think I thank the folks that are here today. Thank you, Executive Shorter.

[08:56:43] Thank you, the chairperson and other folks for being here past midnight and listening to us babbling. Anyway, going back to what I was saying, the buzzword ORPA, we all say ORPA, ORPA, but go ask the residents. 99% doesn't even know what ORPA is. I can guarantee you that. And the reason I'm saying this right now is that, Orpah, what is it, really?

[08:57:05] Never in the history of mankind, putting a dam on a river has been beneficial to the natural life. But here, we are calling out Supervisor Baudet saying, hey, you made a commitment that you're going to protect the natural life.

[08:57:21] No, if you protect the Orpah, you're not protecting the natural life. You're protecting the dam that was built to build a reservoir that's dirty. So let me give you a little bit of understanding what that really is. It's like a fountain over here, a water faucet, a fountain, and there is a bucket next to it.

[08:57:39] The extra runoff goes into that bucket. Supervisors, will you drink out of that water faucet or that bucket? Where will you drink out of? I will not drink out of that bucket. I will drink out of that water faucet, which is Potomac River. But guess what? We have polluted Potomac River.

[08:57:55] So you as supervisors, I think you should look at the bigger picture, because we as residents, we're just looking at this little chunk of land. and we are talking our heart out. So you look at the bigger picture and say, no, you know what? We'll clean up Paramek River, have the state go in, have the feds go in, clean up all that, get rid of this whole ORP or whole reservoir, which is dirty, which is nasty.

[08:58:18] And, you know, trying to fix it is just not going to work out. Trying to fix it is almost like asking executive shorter, that tree behind him over that little pot, can you please water that? Can you please put sunlight on it? No, it's not going to work out. It's fake. So that reservoir is almost like that, you know, trying to fix something that's broken.

[08:58:37] And we are all out here. We have heard a lot of folks that talk about positive about HOA, that not having an HOA, the land is taken away, rezoned. No, HOA doesn't stop that. We have heard at the Planning Commission folks come in and say that snakes are getting into the home because of these subdivisions or this building that's going to happen.

[08:58:56] No, that's not going to happen. What I want to say right now, which other folks haven't talked about, is that in 2021, there was a resettlement. Afghan refugees, which is what I told in the planning commission hearing as well, they were brought over here. They helped us overseas. I'm a veteran, so they helped us overseas, right?

[08:59:15] So we tried to resettle them over here. The housing price is so high, like the gentleman just said, almost a million dollars, so they cannot purchase a home in this area. So these townhouses that's going in, they are more reasonable in price as opposed to those single family homes that are on this area.

[08:59:34] And then there's bidding between the buyers, even though I don't believe in critical race theory. But some of my friends like that kind of sounds like it when you have single family homeowners bidding on housing and you have low income folks that can't get in here in this area.

[08:59:50] And one thing that I will mention to you is that, you know, these folks, like I said, the Afghani folks and the other population, you will see them on March 29, is it March 29, when there will be the Eid right behind there. There will be 10,000 folks, every batch that will come in, almost 30,000 folks will come in here.

[09:00:08] These are the same folks that were resettled in other expensive areas and they moved in this area. So you are actually providing a means for these people to stay here. So come election time, I can guarantee you these folks, when you come, and I request you to come on the Eid and tell them that, hey, guys, we approved it.

[09:00:27] We let those housing happen. And so you can move into those housing cheaper homes compared to the single family million dollar homes. And you can thank you. Thank us for that. And I can guarantee you they will thank you for that. Thank you.

[09:00:44] Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. Hello, everybody. I'm not your average Joe, but I am your average Chris. My name is Chris Griffin. I'm currently a Coles resident. I am also a 40-plus year born and raised Prince William County habitant. My parents raised me, went through the school systems to show my age a little bit. I have a 22-year-old who still lives with us, which is fine. I was the first

[09:01:20] graduating class of Forest Park High School when it was brand new. Yeah, go Bruins. I passed by, I grew up in Montclair. I've had the thanks to live in most of the jurisdictions up there on the county supervisors, and I want to thank the county supervisors, county attorney, and the county executive.

[09:01:43] I know you guys don't get some recognition very often, so thank you. I've passed by that horse farm for a long time. I took my wife there many times, our small son. It was a great time. It's become a landmark for Prince William County.

[09:02:00] But I want you to know, I can hear the title now maybe in some of the papers going something like this. County approves new rezoning for Hoadley Square opening for development. But wait, there's more. New residents will also get a courtesy cut through recommended for the police to direct for hundreds of traffic, but only on Fridays.

[09:02:24] HOA clubhouse signage. Come sit with us on Fridays and stare at traffic going past our white picket fences while we discuss dues and inspections. By approving these rezoning, you are opening Pandora's box in a rabbit hole for making Prince William County more unaffordable for some middle-class constituents.

[09:02:43] A lot of people are not staying and retiring in Prince William County. I know I have the work, the luxury of being able to work with a lot of people through my small business, some even in this room as clients and just old friends. It's a pitch. You need to understand your stats.

[09:03:00] Currently, some sources are saying there are 75 currently undeveloped properties within Prince William County. A thousand homes are currently for sale. There are approximately 1,500 homes that are available for rent. I think we should focus on some of that and try to make those more obtainable for our existing residents and encouraging them to come in.

[09:03:22] Average new house cost is $600,000. We don't have an available home option for some. We don't have an available home option. We have an available affordability option at the cost of others and long-term residents.

[09:03:39] In regards to the young gentleman that was up here, 10% of his age are going to be able to afford a home of that magnitude on a single income. Since JR Real Estate comes from Fairfax, Prince William County is a land grab. What they do are they are experts.

[09:03:56] But you need to understand, everybody in this room, we are experts at being constituents and residents of Prince William County. You need to listen to us. We are all here. We're late. It's a long time. Some of us have work in the morning. Some of us don't. JR specializes. Entitlement specializations include rezoning, comprehensive plan amendments, special use permits, subdivision and site planning, buy-write entitlements, proffer amendments.

[09:04:26] The group acts as a bridge between landlords and national home builders like D.R. Horton and N.V.R., taking on the risk of entitlement procedures before selling a ready-to-build development. Who knows what's going to change once it goes through? Time and time again, we have seen the estimated cost go higher and higher from what staff originally tells you or what developers or so buyers would tell you it's going to cost.

[09:04:51] We've seen that time and time again, where either you have been misinformed or you have been lied to, whether on purpose or indirectly, I don't know. Let's find actual local Prince William County groups and companies and developers to work for our own area and build our own area support local and small true businesses to do this bidding for you i enjoy seeing a lot here from being a long-term residence and i think because we all know the situation for the current horse farm there are a lot of smart people in the county

[09:05:25] if it is something that is wanted i think the county board and people in the area should come together and help the farm owner if they want to decide to stay and allow her to be able to stay and afford where she's at and take care of the horses rather than selling it to a community developer or find somebody that will buy it and keep it as a horse farm there's a lot of people that are involved in this county that are smart and able and willing to do that our own people i know you can find somebody to do that rather than building and building and building let's work on making things more affordable i appreciate everybody's time thank you so much for being here

[09:06:04] and um i really hope that um we can come together now that we all know what's truly happening let's support it's a historic i'm going to say historic landmark i remember it as a kid i've loved it i hate to see it go um and i don't think people are going to be very happy about watching traffic come through a new subdivision only on fridays thank you all right next speaker please uh good

[09:06:39] Good evening. My name is Brahim Dawood. I live in Nipsko District. I've been living there for more than 15 years and we always thank me and my wife and two beautiful kids and always thinking to relocate to this area because we attend the Dark North Masjid as well.

[09:07:01] We always bring kids here in Prince William County to do some sport activity running. And we always have a challenge finding a community center as well and an area where I can spend time with my kids doing sport activity.

[09:07:27] And I'm also looking for affordable housing here in my desired area. and I'm here tonight to support this Hardy Road Square development and I want to thank you as well for your attention.

[09:07:50] All right, thank you so very much. Do we have anyone online? Let's check and see, Madam Chair. Do we have anyone online, Chris? Good evening. The one person we did have online has dropped out. Okay, well, thank you for your assistance.

[09:08:06] Thank you. Have a good night. Back to you, Madam Chair. All right, thank you so very much. So I'm going to go ahead and close the public hearing for agenda items number 13B and 13C. I would like the applicant and staff to be prepared to ask additional questions based off of what they've heard.

[09:08:28] And I do actually have a question for the applicant, if you can come up. You know, we've heard Dr. Jack had asked for a courtesy review for LOCA. I'd also like to see one in Midco. Is that something the applicant is willing to do? Yes.

[09:08:45] Okay. And the question, I guess this is for staff, more or less, because we've been hearing a lot about high density. There was mention for Maple Valley Grove that was more of suburban. When I think high density, I think of the Mark in Alexandria. You know, that's a very dense, very urban, you know, multifamily.

[09:09:06] What is the difference, if you can say, from a planner between suburban and high density? How would you define the difference? Well, I think we could look at the comprehensive plan in our transects. We have six categories of transects.

[09:09:21] The top transect is the one that needs, can support the highest level of transit, which is our high-capacity transit, like our VRE stations, and that six is 100-plus dwelling units per acre. The next category down five is 50 to 100 dwelling units per acre, And it looks for bus rapid transit or some other kind of transit that way.

[09:09:50] And so as the transit service level goes down, the density goes down. And so we're talking about our three, transect three, which is really a suburban, a moderate density that doesn't need intense transit for service and doesn't support with its density intense transit like high-capacity transit.

[09:10:15] So it is not high density, and I would say high density are our transect five and six. All right. Thank you so very much. Supervisor Bode. Thank you, Madam Chair. Dave, don't go too far. There's been talk about, you know, the line of where ORPA should start, where it shouldn't start, you know, what tributaries and waterways things feed to. There's a discussion about the body of water that's on the front edge of the horse farm right now. Could you talk a little bit about that and from a planner's perspective where those lines are drawn and sort of what that means on a larger perspective?

[09:10:51] Sure. Well, first, the comprehensive plan is a guide. And we'd like to use a big fat crayon to draw those lines so they're not really very well defined.

[09:11:06] But since we use a computer to draw them, they end up being much more precise than we intend them to be. But generally, the ORPA line was following the watershed line that we had mapped.

[09:11:22] We have that map for the whole county, different watersheds, sub-watersheds. Those were developed on USGS quad topo topography, and so those are not super accurate, and we always want those things to be field verified with the site plan and when they come down to it.

[09:11:45] So where the real line is for the watershed really needs to be determined at a later date. um than than this and that's why i say we use a big crayon and we use it as a guide and and not as a precise measurement is not the best way to use it appreciate that i wanted to see thank you for that david did did the applicant want to add anything to that piece based on their own findings they were looking at the site and their analysis yes so the applicant actually looked at the county

[09:12:23] mapper map, and then also looked at what DCR has on their map, and then ultimately it will be field verified. So to the left is Prince William County's watershed map, and to the right is the DCRA watershed map. So this is the map that is based on Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation.

[09:13:01] Their map is more updated and accurate than Prince William County mapper, and if you look at that map, it goes like this through the development. It was hard to see on their map, so what we did is we mapped it ourselves using the county mapper percentage and the DCR percentage. So county mapper has 10 acres going to Neabsco Creek. The DCR map has about 12 acres going to the Neabsco creek our environmental consultant did the preliminary review of what would be required

[09:13:41] at the time of site plan and determined there's probably about two to three percent more that is actually going to neapsco that would be verified at the time of site plan and submitted to the county for review thank you you're welcome supervisor vega thank you madam chair follow up for dave dave when did um the county discovered that these um lines aren't and i quote super accurate i don't know that we've uh what do you mean by discovered that well this is the first

[09:14:20] time that i hear about about this well yeah the applicant uh brought that uh to our attention uh last week but okay so the applicant brought it to to your attention last week and now the position is is that um the lines are not super accurate got it um i have a question um for

[09:14:44] jonelle jonelle when did the commercial component get added in the process i can look through the submissions i believe it was the third submission so is that before the request to initiate the cpa that was after the request okay what was the reason for it again so i so the zoning ordinance specifically says when you have a pmr over 50 acres you have to provide an area of non-residential

[09:15:19] so a commercial area with that commercial area and the pmr district the only commercial area that is permitted is b3 so we understand that the comprehensive plan when they look at zoning designations they have b1 b2 as implementing the pmr district the implementing commercial is b3 and that is the least intense commercial use what we did commit to doing is this area here the proffer specifically says that that use that residential um that home on that g pin shall

[09:15:56] remain as a residential use and so when we do that this here remains as the residential use and then this is that b3 area so the lost creek folks have the the residential use remains and then we have the buffers and the undisturbed open space area okay so you you're saying it's a need yes okay and um i don't know dave if you want to come up or i'm struggling a little bit with this because the county um the staff report also highlights that the addition of commercial use

[09:16:33] is incompatible with the orpa designation we don't know what type of commercial development is going to come we've been given a list right of potentials but um you know again it adds to the discussion of what all is going to be thrown into the reservoir so so so i'm a little confused can you help clarify my confusion? Yeah. Some of that area is being changed to MU-3,

[09:17:08] but also some of that area was not in the original initiated comprehensive plan amendment. So that's why we mean it doesn't reflect the ORPA, because it's going to remain ORPA. It's not going to be changed by the comprehensive plan amendment, because it wasn't included in the original property boundary that we used to initiate the comprehensive plan amendment, and we can't change what was initiated. So therefore, that remains an ORPA, and so therefore

[09:17:43] COBRA analyzed it as if it was still ORPA. Okay. And then talking about the impacts to school, and in my opinion, the lack of mitigation, how did we calculate the monetary contribution?

[09:18:01] what formula how how did we land at 499 620 i believe um so as part of the application when you're doing i'm a reasoning application you have to do a proper impact analysis the state code says essentially that you can only mitigate your impacts via monetary contributions for schools fire and rescue public safety essentially fire rescue police parks and recreation it also says if there's not a plan in the cip to address the lack of something so here

[09:18:40] there's not a plan in the cip to address the lack of schools um or a new school coming online then you don't mitigate your impacts that's basically c1 of that proper it then says but you can look and still offer what the developer seems as reasonable um we hired a company that does these profit impact analysis they look at the number of schools and they do their calculation in order to tell us what is that reasonable amount for the monetary level of service for schools and that's how we came up with that number thank you for that and i'm not going to ding the applicant for that um because i don't think it's appropriate but it's another fine example of poor planning and

[09:19:19] moving projects without addressing underlying issues all right does anyone else have any additional questions all right thank you so very much with that supervisor body yeah thank you madam chair um it's my understanding that that some folks may feel differently about the cpa versus the rezoning so i'm going to do them separately if folks don't mind i move 13b for approval all right 13b has been properly moved and seconded any discussion on this supervisor

[09:19:53] are you still in the queue did you want to talk or is it left over but since you offered why not why not here we are again the door has been opened folks and it's not going to be closed and i want you all to remember this i want you all to remember this for those that are pro for those that are that are against this is the standard that is being set by the majority who decides to vote for this project um for the cpa initiation and i'll reserve my comments for the rezoning that's about to follow all right does anyone else have any comments all right so then I'd like to go ahead and call for the vote on 13B.

[09:20:31] Yes. Thank you, Supervisor A. Motion passes 6-2. Supervisors Gordy and Vega voting nay.

[09:20:48] All right, Madam Chair, if you don't mind. Go ahead. I also move 13C for approval. All right, 13C has been properly moved and seconded. Let's have our discussion. I see Supervisor Bode, you're first in queue. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. So, one, I wanted to thank all the residents that came out tonight.

[09:21:05] I know it's been a long night. It is now night. No longer is now morning. Welcome to Wednesday morning, everyone. I want to thank staff for all the work they've done on this. I want to thank the applicant. I know we've gone through a long journey with this. I know, as was said before by Dr. Jack, well, put it, you went and you did the work and you went above and beyond to the applicant.

[09:21:23] You iterated. You went to the community. You came back. I mean, we went essentially from where you started to where we are now. You had a 35% reduction from your first submission in units. And not only did you lower the number of units themselves, you lowered the intensity.

[09:21:40] There were multifamily units in that first round. You had a lot of more denser units in the first and second round. And now we're at a much more, as was said before, a suburban-type development that keeps a lot more of what the community asked for. Also wanted to commend you for offering at various times, trying to figure out ways to mitigate other issues that you had no control over, that you didn't necessarily have a plan to.

[09:22:06] The folks in Lost Creek and Brent Forest, you had that initial connection that wanted to give them another way to get out and to turn left on the Holy Road without having to sit there at their one way in and out. The folks of that community, I know we had a joint community event with them.

[09:22:22] They rejected that, so you moved on from that. Wanted to, though, still thank the community for continuing to meet with me, meet with my office. We had quite a few different meetings around this proposal especially, and we heard you. I do not see this as a death of a thousand cuts, as has been remarked by some folks.

[09:22:40] I see this as an area as a bridge, linking existing residential religious uses to a major commercial employment center and the government complex. Done responsibly, infill protects more land, not less. Wanted to also talk about traffic, what's different here, as was said before.

[09:22:58] There's significantly more contributions toward transportation for this project than the other one. And if you talk about this holistically, which everyone said, I agree with you. These two projects link together. There's interparcel connections. There's a roadway network, which will give the folks of Maple Valley Grove another way out other than Galveston Court and vice versa.

[09:23:18] Those things fit together. Folks will be able to, in talks with both applicants, there will be conversations about joint use agreements around the amenities. So this is not going to be just one isolated community. This will be a holistic community. that's why i pushed so hard to make sure that these two projects came in on the same night i know and i appreciate the constituent who shared her story around not being able to get home i can tell you that a number of us on this board also sit on the prtc omni ride commission that's the type of feedback that we need because no one should be able to take an omni ride bus and not have an omni ride bus to take them back home so that's feedback we can use and it still underscores the fact that there's a lot more work we need to do around making sure that our uh our internal traffic

[09:23:57] network as it pertains to transit is better and actually serves the needs of folks. You should be able to ride to work and ride back on an OmniRide bus. So I hear you and I appreciate that. I also wanted to just hone in on the water quality here for a second. Folks are right that protecting the Occoquan Reservoir is not optional. The guidance exists there and why this case matters is this zoning includes proper protection that currently do not exist under our current zoning ordinance.

[09:24:30] We are still working to get there. Ms. Studholm talked about it earlier. We've had meetings around the ORPA. We've had meetings around updating the zoning ordinance to meet the need for this moment. However, there are things that I wanted to highlight again that meet that ORPA moment. Well testing. Heard a lot about folks that are on wells adjacent to this property. The folks to the west, in the Brent Forest, folks to the north. I hear you on wells and the applicant has committed to well testing. Baseline afterward to make sure that they're not adversely impacting people's wells. If there's any indication that they are, they'll make people whole. Water quality monitoring

[09:25:07] support. That's in there too. High performance stormwater management. Jellyfish filtration. I know that sounds a little bit wonky and silly, but it actually works. Low impact development and nutrient credits are capped. So they're not buying credits somewhere else to offset the fact that they're actually polluting the water here. They're not doing that. They're doing the right thing here.

[09:25:25] The last thing I'll say about all this is I know, again, I hear all of you as it pertains to the change that this will represent. I'm not dismissing anyone's input. We've been applying it for the last two years that this project has been working through it. This record shows this plan has changed materially because residents showed up. Fewer units, less intense buildings, changed circulation, increased protections, and enforceable propers. My job as supervisor is to weigh the full public interest, neighborhood impacts, infrastructure, water quality, the county's long-term plan where jobs and services are growing. Again, this connects to a larger picture on what the county

[09:26:02] center is going to be in the next 20 years. We've pulled, again, all those other proposals that have come across to the board over the last three or four years to put density elsewhere and outward we brought them here to this part of it so you don't you don't have it farther out in the suburban or the semi-rural area thank you madam chair thank you so very much supervisor vega thank you madam chair uh again thank you to everybody that showed up the applicant and to county staff um you know folks we often get put in between a rock and a hard place in the sense that when developers come to our office they always talk about projects having to make financial sense financial sense financial sense we don't know the breakdown the

[09:26:41] details of their of their of their financials so we kind of take their word for it but as a county supervisor my job is to make sure that my constituents interest are represented i represented in every single land use application that comes before my desk why do i highlight that because it's very very very important well i understand that developers need to make money you should not put a price on something as basic as a human right when it comes to having access to clean water no amount of credits, no amount of proffers can guarantee you that or give you that. And so it's

[09:27:17] frustrating when we have applications come before this board, be presented to the community, that can be better, that the district supervisor can work harder on to improve. And I think that that's the most frustrating part about this entire process, is that our job as elected officials is to make those applications better by bringing your concerns to the discussion table. There's a lot about this project that I actually like. I like the different types of housing that are being offered. I like the product type. But at the end of the day, how do we solve the overcrowding issue?

[09:27:52] How do we solve the issues with traffic? How do we resolve the issues of adding additional strains to our public services? It comes down to the density. It comes down to the density. But there is never that willingness to really meet in the middle because there's always that we have to make money it has to make financial sense and we as a board have to figure that out we have to figure it out it is my opinion that the community should not in any way shape or form be forced into an either or scenario between housing and or clean water we talk about trying to solve one problem

[09:28:27] by creating so many more and this is a reality that we face in this county for a very long time and it's in many ways kind of uh ridiculous that i have to keep saying the fact that folks are not opposed to growth we are a growing county we are the second largest county in the commonwealth of virginia there's a reason why people want to come to prince william county and we can tackle the affordable housing crisis we can tackle the overcrowding in our schools we can tackle the crumbling infrastructure if we're really serious about doing it this is going to pass but this i will promise to you all i am going to continue to be a hawk when it comes to sustaining sustainability

[09:29:06] measures when it comes to talks about the environment and how do we put additional protections because we can't have it both ways folk we cannot continue to speak out of both sides of our mouths either we care about sustainability in the environment its entirety or we don't or we don't it's that simple it's that simple i thank the applicant for coming to my office and for meeting with me but this cake was already baked because i asked about density and i asked if we could talk about that and the answer was no because the district supervisor had already bought in to what was being presented to me. We have to be serious about coming to the table in good faith to really

[09:29:43] negotiate to make projects better. I also believe in property rights and my heart breaks for the landowners. You have every right to sell your property but it's my job as county supervisor to ensure that I do look at things holistically. That while you're going to sell your property and probably move out of the area I have to pay attention to what's going to happen for those of us that remain here and for the ones that are to follow. So Madam Chair I will be voting no for those reasons. All right. Thank you. And Supervisor Bode. Yeah. Sorry, Madam Chair. And I'm not going to go back and forth. This is just as it pertains to the motion itself. I know there was a courtesy review that was requested. Just want to make sure that County staff updated the proffers and they're

[09:30:21] good to go. So the proffers have been updated to include the courtesy review. All right. So I just want to restate my motion to be proffers dated 12-17-2025. Correct. Thank you. Thank you. Do I need a second since we're updating it? Okay, it's been properly moved and seconded. Is there any further discussion? Supervisor Bailey. Madam Chair, I'll be brief. I just wanted to thank the citizens that came out and spoke on behalf of, lend their voice to how they feel about this.

[09:30:53] I totally agree. You are entitled to good, clean water, but you're also, all citizens are entitled to have shelter and have good homes to live in and attainable houses to live in. Everybody in Prince William County and in the state of Virginia. And that's what we are focused on to make sure that everybody who lives here wants to be here, can raise their families here and could afford to live here and have a decent life. And that's something nationally that everyone is suffering from, not just in Prince William County. And so how do we do that? We do that by

[09:31:30] Making sure that the comprehensive plans and planning period is holistic, totally holistic, as we grow. And we have no control on how we grow. And we've been growing for a long time under old rules and old housing.

[09:31:49] And so we need affordable housing, attainable housing, not just Section 8 housing. We need housing. And so I commend the developer for working with the staff to make sure that there's a little bit in the pot for everybody. And to Local Pelk, thank you so much for your ability to think broader.

[09:32:11] We respect that, and we appreciate that. Don't always agree, but we come to the center as much as we possibly can for everybody, and that's essential. And so thank you to the citizens again for coming out and speaking. but your alienable right is also to have shelter.

[09:32:30] Thank you, Madam Chair. All right, is there anyone else? All right, then, let's go ahead. I'd like to take the vote. Motion passes, 7 to 1.

[09:32:49] Supervisor Vega voting nay. All right, thank you so very much. Just so everyone knows, we're going to next go into public comment time. After we do public comment time, we still have an item that we've got to discuss in closed session. After that, we'll come out and we will certify, And then at that time, we can adjourn.

[09:33:09] If anyone's a betting person, I'm saying 2 a.m. I always go long just in case, just in case. All right, so public comment time. All right, I'm going to let people file out. Goodbye, Alex.

[09:33:33] All of you. Good job, Reza. We know you. I can't remember. I was looking at the thing. I don't know what she's talking about, but okay.

[09:33:59] All right, everyone.

[09:34:17] We have two people signed up in person for public comment time. Mr. Clancy McQuinn and I.E. Johnson. We haven't seen you in a long time. All right. Are we ready?

[09:34:36] Yes, sir. Madam Chairman. Okay. I have a couple things I want to bring up on citizens' time. First of all, and I brought this up before, but I'll keep on until I hear something positive about it. We need a county policy of what we're going to do with school board property when it's turned back from the developer by the school system.

[09:35:01] And I have proposed before that the policies should be that the priority should be community gardens. We have a shortage of places where people could grow food in the county, especially as we increase the densities all over the place.

[09:35:16] Two, this idea of the county getting involved in using taxpayer money to repair foundations and places where the geotechnical work was not done is just absurd.

[09:35:33] You know, that's what second mortgages are for. And I'm going to be really hard on this thing if you guys decide you're going to use my tax money to fix somebody's foundation. Three, require data centers in the development standards form to use geothermal cooling.

[09:35:59] If we make them do geothermal cooling, it'll stop using our public water supply to cool the things and send it down the road to be retreated in a sewage treatment plant. Sixth, my last one is I'll bring this up again.

[09:36:20] We need a county ordinance for noise on vehicles because these guys are running around demonstrating. You can hear them six blocks away with the noise they make. Montgomery County has put noise monitors in, and they issue tickets to people for doing that kind of stuff.

[09:36:41] And you have the authority to do it down here, and we can do something about all this disturbance in the neighborhoods. And I thank you very much for taking a moment to listen to this. God bless you all. Merry Christmas. Thank you so very much. Next speaker, please.

[09:37:05] Hello. How are you? You didn't respond back. How are you, Madam Chair? We are wonderful. I can barely hear you, so make sure it's done. here. Look, I'm getting rusty. Hold on. I can do this. Tell me, is that better? That's better. Okay, awesome, awesome, awesome. Good to be back. I'm so thankful. Good morning. I had to change my speech. Good morning. My name is Aene Johnson, and I am from the Woodbridge District. This morning, I continue to stand before you as a wife and a mother and relentless advocate for foster families

[09:37:41] and foster children here in Prince William County. For 33 months, you guys have heard this before, but I'll keep repeating it. In 28 days we had the honor of loving a child affectionately known as Bumpy. Bumpy was not just a child in our care. Bumpy was family, a sweet little boy. He was deeply loved. He was cherished every day and he was held close in our hearts. What happened to our family? My husband as well as my children. I was actually pregnant twice while advocating but what happened to my family was absolutely horrible. Instead of support we faced retaliation. We were

[09:38:16] laughed at outside the courtroom by DSS workers. Yes, we were. I reached out, well actually someone reached out to me and actually took Bumpy from me and then laughed. DSS workers, this was under your watch, Mr. Shorter. We were mocked and we were accused of becoming foster parents just for money. My family actually lost about $30,000 to date advocating for Bumpy, but we did it for money.

[09:38:38] Mr. Shorter, to this day, those accusations remain uncorrected. The Prince William County Department of Social Services even went out of their way, I promise you, after I spoke initially at public comment, and I don't know if I've said this before, to make sure that we were no longer allowed to be foster parents.

[09:38:57] You have the pageantry of having DSS workers posted up online and saying how much you care about foster families, but when I spoke at public comment, my family was no longer allowed to be foster parents. Today, I heard this board talk about programs to support families and children.

[09:39:14] But what good are those programs when the system punishes families like my own and don't protect the foster children? What good are those programs when families are silenced for speaking out? I will continue to speak, Mr. Short, I told you that. Our lives, our fight is not in vain.

[09:39:31] It was not in vain when I helped to tuck Bumpy in that night when he cried. It was not in vain when we made sure that Bumpy had clothes on his back, food on the table, and support in school. It was not in vain when I gained legal knowledge as a pro se litigate, skills I never had before, but needed and used now to protect my family.

[09:39:52] It is not in vain when I navigate for a 504 plan and an IEP, when I advocate for my children, when I speak with parents about autism and what it truly means. 1 Corinthians 15, 58. Therefore, my beloved brethren and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor of love is not in vain.

[09:40:16] I stand here today steadfast, unmovable. What is it? Morning, right? Steadfast and unmovable. I know what I said. Knowing that my labor of love for Bumpy was not in vain. Mr. Shorter, I've said this to you for nearly three years. I hold you accountable for what was done to my family.

[09:40:35] This is not about policy. This is about transparency, dignity, and children who deserve better. Thank you. And do we have anyone available online? So there is no one online. So what we're going to do, thank you so very much, we are going to go back into closed session to finish our discussion.

[09:40:54] We will come out, certify, and then adjourn. Thank you.

[09:41:18] We are back from closed session.

[09:41:34] First, I need to certify. So moved. Second. It's been probably. Yeah, Bodie and Bailey. Yes, it's been probably moved and seconded. Let's go. That's okay. Get the votes up.

[09:41:59] Vote unanimous. Supervisor Ingrid absent from vote. Oh, boy. All right. We have a resolution. Wait, hold on. I'd please kindly ask that we refrain from sidebar conversation so we can get out of here.

[09:42:15] Supervisor Gordy. Madam Chair, I'd like to move that the county executive send a letter on behalf of the Board of County Supervisors to Dominion and the State Corporation Commission stating that the Board of County Supervisors is concerned with all proposed lines of the Noakesville to Bristow, what do we call it in this project, sharing concerns for the constituents impacted by the proposed routes and encourage Dominion and the State Corporation Commission to underground the lines and for the county attorney to assist with the review of the letter.

[09:42:53] Second. I will take the second. Everyone, is there any additional discussion? If not, let's go ahead. need to. I'm trying to get us out of here. Vote unanimous. Move for adjournment. Second. All right.

[09:43:14] Thank you so very much. So there's already a motion for adjournment and it's been properly seconded. So unanimous. All right. Thank you. This is our last medium of the year. Happy holidays all.

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