Coraggio Consulting
Prince William Board of County Supervisors Meeting, Tuesday, October 20, 2026

Date: Tuesday, October 20, 2026
Place: Prince William County Board of County Supervisors, Virginia
Length: 6h 51m (video)
Official meeting video (Prince William County, Granicus): https://pwcgov.granicus.com/player/clip/3922
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 2026-10-26. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:18:40] all right everyone please find your seats it's 201 on tuesday october 20th we are going to begin

[00:39:11] with the moment of silence all right everyone please stand if you are able for the pledge of

[00:39:29] allegiance all right we are going to move on to agenda item 3a and i need a motion to approve a request to participate remotely so moved second hasn't probably moved any discussion the second

[00:40:00] any discussion all right let's go ahead and take our votes i don't have it on my screen i'm a yes

[00:40:16] we're going to redo that one vote unanimous supervisors bode and gordy absent from vote

[00:40:49] all right there goes one of them all right we can now welcome tom gordy supervisor gordy to the meeting thank you madam chair all right thank you so very much we are now going to move on to agenda item number four and that's approval oh we can do i was going to hold we do have coia statements i was going to hold off but if you want to go ahead and no no no no no no supervisor angry i was gonna wait but i'm gonna let you go thank you madam chair madam chair before the

[00:41:29] board discusses and considers the dcsm amendments for solar canopies and parking areas the transfer budget and appropriation of funds for school field turf replacement issuance of school bond and the legislative agenda i need to declare a personal interest in these matters my wife is a school's employee as a school's employee my wife and i are members of a group which is affected by these matters I will be participating in these matters because I am able to do so fairly objectively and in the public interest thank you madam chair Spider-Man thank you madam chair before the board discusses considers the DCSM amendments for solar calent peas in parking

[00:42:09] areas the transfer budget and appropriation of funds for the school field turf replacements issuance of school bonds and legislative agenda I need to declare a personal interest in these matters my wife is a school's employee as school's employee my wife and I are members of a group which is affected by these matters. I'll be participating in these matters because I am able to do so fairly, objectively in the public interest.

[00:42:28] Thank you, Madam Chair. All right, thank you so very much. Let's move on to agenda item number four, approval of minutes. Can I get a motion? So move, Madam Chair. Second. I'm probably moved and seconded. Any discussion? All right, let's go ahead and take our votes. Supervisor Gordy?

[00:42:44] Aye. Thank you. And I'm an aye. My screen is stuck. So if IT can come when I do agenda item five. We did refresh. It ain't working. Vote unanimous. All right, thank you very much.

[00:43:00] We are going to move on to agenda item number five. Now, we have a number of people who've come out today. So what we're going to do is we're going to hold all photos to the end. After we vote and it gets approved, we will go down and I'll let people speak, but then we'll hold all photos to the end.

[00:43:19] So can I get a motion for 5A? Is anyone willing to second? All right. Any discussion? Let's go ahead and take our votes. I don't know who is the... Can you motion and second? Motion? Vega.

[00:43:35] Okay. Vega. i am a yes gordy hi thank you vote unanimous thank you very much and supervisor la croix if you would like to come down to read the first one and i would like to make sure that the picture's

[00:44:07] up and um i'd like to invite everybody to come down with me if you'd like to all right if we

[00:44:36] can have everyone associated with 5a well first and foremost most people don't know this but i'm proud parent of one of Paul Ebert's prosecutors and so this is a personal honor for me to be able to read this accommodation for him. We begin today by honoring the life and legacy of the

[00:45:16] Honorable Paul B. Ebert who passed away on June 23rd. Paul Ebert was elected Commonwealth Attorney at just 30 years old, the youngest in Virginia at the time. He went on to serve Prince William County in the cities of Manassas and Manassas Park for 52 years from 1967 until 2019, making him the longest-serving Commonwealth attorney in Virginia's history.

[00:45:45] Over five decades, he prosecuted thousands of cases, always focused on protecting the public, seeking justice for victims and their families, and upholding the law.

[00:46:05] His impact reached beyond the courtroom. He was the first chairman of the Commonwealth Attorneys Service Council and led both the Virginia Association of Commonwealth Attorneys and the Prince William County Bar Association. He also mentored generations of prosecutors, officers, and public servants. In 2022, our public library was dedicated in his honor.

[00:46:29] Paul Ebert helped guide this county through remarkable growth, and his legacy will endure in the many lives he touched. On behalf of the Board of County Supervisors, we extend our deepest gratitude to his family and commend the late Paul Ebert for his legacy.

[00:46:51] And I'd like to invite his family down to speak. Chairperson Jefferson, Supervisor LaCroix, and fellow board members, on behalf of my family, I would personally like to thank each of you for such a kind gesture in honoring my father for his 52 years of public service with this proclamation.

[00:47:19] We are truly honored to be here, and we thank you again for such a wonderful tribute. Thank you.

[00:47:34] All right. If we can have everyone here with Sharon Bauckham, Dale City Recreation Center. You're going to do Dale City.

[00:48:02] Oh, Carmen. Greatest Pilates teacher, everyone. Thank you for having us here. All right, everyone.

[00:48:35] So first of all, sometime back in my early years, before politics, I too was a fitness part of the family. Oh, you were? Yes, I was. I worked at Chen, at the Chen Center. Yeah, so I know the team.

[00:48:52] Yes, okay. Anyway, let's go. Next, we celebrate a true community landmark, the Sharon Bauckham Dale City Recreation Center, which marks its 50th anniversary on October 17th. Since opening in 1976, this center has been a cornerstone of the Neopsco District.

[00:49:11] It's the place for exercise, recreation, and connection for generations of families. It exists because of one determined woman, Sharon Bauckham, helped lead the 1971 campaign for a million-dollar bond to build the center. Voters approved it, and five years later, the doors opened.

[00:49:28] She also served as a founding member of the Bel Air Women's Club and as a life member of the Potomac Hospital Auxiliary and Prince William Boys Home Admissions Committee. Her advocacy and leadership made this center possible, and it rightly bears her name.

[00:49:45] Fifty years later, the center keeps growing with the community, With new accessibility improvements to the park, upgraded athletic fields, and planned renovations to the batting cages and picnic shelters. On behalf of this board, we hereby commend the staff, past and present, at the Sharon Bochum for 50 years of service.

[00:50:09] Madam Chair, Supervisor Angry, Mr. Shorter of the board, my name is Rob Belcourt. I'm a recreation manager over at the Dale City Rec Center.

[00:50:25] We like to say that the Rec Center is a place where everybody fits in. So we try to do community recreation one day at a time. And it means a lot to have this recognition here today. And on behalf of the staff behind me, where the magic happens, just thank you very much. And I have to say, I have a little bias with Dale City, because that's where I work out.

[00:50:53] And if you guys didn't hear me, we have the greatest Pilates instructor, Carmen Furman. All right, next, if we can get everyone associated with the National Community Planning Month.

[00:51:08] All right, so Victor Inger was a trainer, y'all.

[00:51:25] We're really impressed by planning.

[00:51:48] Yeah, police and fire usually have a big crew, so thank you. You've proven. All right. Good planning touches nearly every part of our lives, where we live, how we get to work, the parks where our children play, and the opportunities available in our neighborhoods.

[00:52:12] Thoughtful, inclusive planning helps us prepare for growth, protect our natural resources, support economic development, and improve the quality of life for every resident. Planners don't do this work alone. They partner with residents, businesses, public agencies, and this board to build bold visions and practical data-driven strategies for the future.

[00:52:32] And community planning gives every resident, regardless of age, race, income, or background, a meaningful voice in shaping that future. This month, we recognize the dedicated staff of our planning office and other county departments, our planning commissioners, and the engaged residents who work every day to make Prince William County a better place for current and future generations.

[00:52:54] So today, the Board of County Supervisors hereby proclaims October 2026 as National Community Planning Month in Prince William County, Virginia. Director Washington, would you like to offer us some remarks? Thank you, Chair Jefferson, and thank you to the Board for this proclamation of October as National Community Planning Month and the recognition of the critical importance of land use planning in shaping communities today and into the future and addressing issues such as housing and transportation that directly impact the lives

[00:53:31] of residents. I'd like to use this opportunity to highlight and showcase the work of the staff. The planning office, we have most of our department here today. We still have someone in the office. The land use review division, led by Alex Venegas, are frequent visitors to board meetings, bringing land use cases for public hearing and board action. The work of this team, working with community members, applicants, board members, and other county departments resulted in a board's approval of 5,192 housing units and over 11 million square feet of

[00:54:08] commercial and industrial development during FY26, supporting housing needs and economic development in a county. The countywide planning division, led by Tony Alston, are also often at the board bringing items such as the data center overlay district zoning tax amendment, which you wages acted on, multiple CPA requests, and coming soon, the sustainability and resilience comprehensive plan amendment, and the comprehensive zoning ordinance update.

[00:54:41] This team also leads our cultural resources work, such as our effort to create a new historic district for the thoroughfare community, and it also includes our GIS team, who led the creation in FY26 of the two-time award-winning online build-out analysis dashboard, providing lots of data and interactive maps to the public on residential and non-residential development our community planning and revitalization division led by keisha hall is working on three small area plans two of which fetler park in yorkshire we will be launching with the

[00:55:20] community later this year lastly i'd like to acknowledge the staff and the director's office including our deputy planning director david mcgettigan our assistant director for operations Dominika Bui and our executive assistant Ali Pena and also Phoebe Wallace who is our front desk ambassador for all of their efforts to support our department in providing these critical services to the board and the community. While I lead this amazing team as director, the success of the planning office is because of the day-to-day work and dedication of all the staff and our staff who

[00:55:55] are still at the office. We appreciate the board's support of the work of the planning office. We are here to support you in helping Prince William County to be a great place to live work retire and play thank you all right with everyone associated with America Recycles Month come

[00:56:21] down you guys are coming oh I assume you're the champion good to see you I'll be after this I don't know y'all should have had more family

[00:56:43] i kind of feel bad for this crew man after coming after planning what began as america recycles

[00:57:19] day has grown into a full month of action and prince william county is part is proud to take part recycling is vital to extending the life of our county landfill and conserving our natural resources real success also depends on all of us buying products made from recycled materials throughout november county staff and keep prince william beautiful volunteers will be out in our community join them at the sharon bauckham dale city recreation center wait a minute weren't they just here on november 12th motomac library on november 16th montclair library on november 17th

[00:57:55] tin park recreation center on november 18th and bull run regional library on november 20th I also encourage every resident to take the regional I Recycle Pledge online by November 20th. Prince William County has taken part since 2013, and our residents have won the drawing in 12 of the last 13 years.

[00:58:19] Prizes include $300 gift cards for a student and an adult winner, plus a $500 grant for a school, environmental club, or project. Today, therefore, the Prince William Board of County Supervisors hereby proclaims November 2026 as America Recycles Month.

[00:58:40] Let's keep that winning streak going. Recycle, reduce waste, and take the pledge. Mr. Shemmuth, do you have any remarks for us? Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Thank you, members of the board. We appreciate the recommendation. I'm just going to turn it over very quickly to Renaud, and I remember your name this time.

[00:59:00] Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the board. On behalf of the Solid Waste Division, we thank you tremendously for proclaiming November 2026 as America Recycles Month in Prince William County.

[00:59:17] According to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, Prince William County achieved a 47.7% recycling rate in 2025, which is much higher than the state average, reflecting our community's continued commitment to reducing waste conserving natural resources and extending the life of our landfill this year we're excited to celebrate america recycles month with outreach events at local recreation centers as the chair mentioned and libraries throughout november where our staff and keep prince william beautiful volunteers will engage residents and promote recycling education thank you again to the board for your continued support of recycling and

[00:59:53] sustainability in prince william county thank you and again we'll take photos at the end now supervisor bodie if you can come down and the chin family can come up

[01:00:13] next we honor a family whose story is deeply rooted in the history of prince william county

[01:00:53] the chin family the chin family was enslaved in this county from the 1780s until emancipation after freedom tom and mary jane chin and their eight sons oscar henry john robert william fielder george and james you actually are one of the few families that beat me out at seven kids good congratulations lived and farmed on about 200 acres between present-day minneville and telegraph roads an area once become known as agnewville now woodbridge in 1915 the chin family donated the land for the original mount olive baptist church generations of chins have served

[01:01:29] our county and our country in the military as educators medical professionals law enforcement officers public servants and entrepreneurs 35 years ago prince william county named its state of the art library and aquatics fitness complex in their honor it was the first time the county bestowed such an honor on an african-american family since then the chin regional library and aquatics fitness center has served our residents with outstanding programs is the the best one in the county sorry uh dale city on behalf of the prince william florida county supervisors we celebrate this 35th anniversary and honor the extraordinary legacy of the Chin family.

[01:02:07] Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you, Chair and Supervisor Body. In 1989, a 30-year-old stood before a board of Prince William County officials who were soliciting input for the name of the county's newest crown jewel fitness and library complex. She had the opportunity to educate the board about a family with a rich history extending to the late 1700s in the area formerly known as Agnewville. I was that 30-year-old, and it is an honor to celebrate 35 years of the Chin Center

[01:02:45] Complex and the Chin family. With me today are several direct descendants of Mary Jane and Tom Chin, and we are so proud of this honor and recognition. Thank you. Stay here too, Kenny.

[01:03:08] If everyone associated with 5F can come on down. Poetry is one of humanity's oldest art forms.

[01:04:00] Long before the written word, people shared their stories through verse and song. Today, poetry spans countless styles and voices, harricking and challenging the human story across the ages. Through rhythm, imagery, and symbolism, poetry speaks to what we have shared across cultures.

[01:04:17] It captures the heart and soul of a community and gives voice experiences we might otherwise struggle to put into words. That is why we welcome the tradition in our state, in our region, in our local communities of naming Poets Laureate. The title honors practicing poets and encourages writing and artistic expression throughout society.

[01:04:36] Today, we celebrate poetry, invite everyone in our community to take part in this ancient art form, and honor the local writers who enrich us in our lives with creative verse. On behalf of the Prince William County Board of Supervisors, I hereby proclaim today, October 20, 2026, as in the Company of Laureates Day in Prince William County.

[01:04:53] Thank you. In 2014, we had this idea that poetry needed to be a more important part of the county.

[01:05:10] And, you know, 12 years ago is a wonderfully long time for this wonderful group of supervisors to support us and believe in us, especially this man right here.

[01:05:27] He showed up the other day for our poet laureate crowning. We have a new poet laureate in Prince William County, and she's going to really add to not just poetry, but to the wonder of working with the disabled.

[01:05:48] We have five pages of poetry presented for the crowning of the new laureate and a project. And her project is to work with the disabled, and she's going to make sure that part of her working with the disabled members of the county and other places is that they'll find that writing poetry or listening to poetry or working with others who love poetry will be a great benefit to their problems and to their opportunities.

[01:06:26] And I want to tell you that when Kenny Bode, supervisor extraordinaire, came to our program, he was surprised by getting the two-year, we elect a poet laureate every two years.

[01:06:48] We gave him the prize of giving us the most support and the loving, careful support of being a judge for this contest. And we really appreciate your support, your personal support, and along with all of you.

[01:07:08] I'd like to finish by reading a poem before we have Kathy. We do the Poet Laureate Circle together. This is from one of our several books of poetry produced for members of our county and city community who write poetry and want to be printed, and so we collected in books for them.

[01:07:37] Bring the peace along. Bring the peace along, my brother. Bring the peace along, my friend. Let the rivers roll together till the fighting finds its end. from the mountain to the ocean raise your voice and sing this song love is stronger than the thunder so bring the peace along there's a hammer in the factory and a plow out on the plane there's a mother holding babies through the hunger and the rain let her children grow in sunlight let

[01:08:15] her heart be brave and strong if you ever see her crying bring the peace along there's a soldier on the border and he dreams of home tonight he's tired of hearing orders he just wants to hold his wife so lay down guns and anger let forgiveness right the wrong when the world turns toward

[01:08:44] tomorrow bring the peace along thank you hello everybody i'm kathy haley my daughter alexandra was um one of the first two poets laureate in the county and i just want to say that we continue this project in her name as well. Katie Bredholt-Richards was a student in my class once for a year of creative writing. She was actually an orchestra CFPA student for Woodbridge High School's Center

[01:09:20] for the Fine and Performing Arts. And she didn't graduate from Woodbridge. 2007 was her last year there. Her father was deployed and she had to move. She moved back and went to George Mason, got an mfa in poetry and katie richards is our new poet laureate we're very proud of her i hope you meet her soon thank you all right we are going to take roughly 10 minute recess so that we can

[01:09:58] everyone can come down take photos and when y'all see me come back to the board chambers it means we

[01:10:03] all need to come back to the board chambers and get the meeting going so we're in recess i did

[01:12:18] okay i'm sorry i don't see you um supervisor bailey thank you very much madam chair i i just wanted to make mention uh that the item for 6f was withdrawn because columbia gas determined the work they needed to complete could be done within their existing easement and there's no longer needed for construction of an easement so thank you for your efficient work and your collaboration and partnership all right thank you so very much let's go ahead i'd like to call for the votes

[01:12:44] supervisor gordy aye thank you and my screen is still i tried to refresh it's not loading yes ma'am i'm a yes thank you advisor vega is your screen up okay are you a yes ma'am oh and it's yes thank you vote unanimous thank you all right thank you so very much um we are now going to move into public

[01:13:20] comment time i ask that speakers when you come to the podium in the back please start by sending your stating your full name in the magisterial district where you reside you will have three minutes, and the time will be on the screen. I will call people in groups of five. Lorraine, Lauren Stevenson, Dale Penenberg, Liz Cronauer, Charlie Grimes, sorry, Charles Grimes, you put

[01:13:55] your full name, and Jeff Cahill. Do I start? Do I start? You may begin, yes. My name is Lauren Stevenson. I'm from the Gainesville, I guess, district. I live in Manassas, Prince William County. I'm very nervous right now because I am shaking here as well. I'm going to

[01:14:33] Can't get away from the vibrations and the sounds of these data centers that are ruining my life. I've moved three times in the last two years to get away from these data centers. I've accumulated headaches that won't go away to go see a neurologist.

[01:14:48] I don't need to see a neurologist. I know why I'm getting headaches. My body is falling apart with anxiety. I don't sleep. I haven't slept for more than four hours in two years. It's going on and on. It's really bad by the battlefield. I know that the Great Oaks subdivision had a hell of a time fighting Amazon.

[01:15:07] I think they lost out. Most of them have to move and leave their homes that they bought and paid for because they can't even enjoy a cup of coffee on their balcony anymore. I literally have to keep moving my body. I'm almost 60 years old. I feel like I'm falling apart.

[01:15:25] I need this to stop. I need the data centers to stop. I think there's a proposed plan of maybe 30 more going on Wellington Road. And I'm just wondering how all of you guys are sitting here talking about health and this and how you're going to do this and that, how, when your bodies can't function anymore.

[01:15:43] You don't even, and what I'm understanding is this is a certain demographic. I'm part of this demographic. It's called empathy. Some of us have a lot of empathy, and we feel greatly. And I am tired of this feeling. It's a sick feeling, and I don't have $20,000 to move out of this state, which is what it costs to approximately make a move out of the state.

[01:16:05] I'm sitting here shaking as I'm sitting here listening to everybody. Still vibrating. Vibrating here. You can't get away from it when you feel it. I don't really know what else to say besides stop it. Just knock it off.

[01:16:21] You're not only destroying our bodies and our health. You're destroying lives. People's homes. Their purchases. The amount of money they've spent to uproot their lives. Where do they go? Where do we go? I've been looking over the United States. Where can I go to get away from this disgusting feeling?

[01:16:39] Where can I go? Not too many places, Wyoming, Oklahoma, you know, things that are preserved, you know, peace, stillness, something you'd never have here anymore. I feel insane sometimes because I go around and I'm like, does no one feel this? Am I the only one that feels this?

[01:17:01] Talked to several mailmen. No, honey, you're not the only one. He said, you must have a lot of empathy. I said, I'm sorry, what did you say? I said, it's kind of strange that you said that Because I've heard this all my life, but the same, how do you deal with it, sir? Well, I've got to keep walking around because, you know, after I sit down for so long, I feel sick.

[01:17:20] As I'm standing here now, I'm feeling sick. My body won't stop shaking. Thank you, ma'am. I'm sorry your time is up, but thank you. I apologize. Thank you for hearing me out. Next speaker, please.

[01:17:40] Oh, boy. All right. Good afternoon. My name is Dale Pennenberg. I live in the Gainesville District. Good afternoon, Chair Jefferson, members of the board. I'm a resident of Cat Hartman Valley Estates in the Gainesville District, and I'm here to express our community's strong opposition to Supervisor Stewart's proposed directive, Gainesville District Heritage Tourism and Recreational Small Area Plan, Item 12A, on today's agenda.

[01:18:07] My concern is straightforward. This proposal contemplates future land use that could directly affect our properties and our community, yet no one has reached out to us to ask us what we as the landowners and residents envision for the neighborhood. We are the people who live on this land. We maintain our properties.

[01:18:27] We invest it in the community. Surely our voices should be heard before the county moves forward with planning an initiative that could influence the future use of our land. Equally as important, the proposed focus on heritage tourism and recreational destinations simply doesn't fit our community of Cat Harp and Valley Estates, a residential neighborhood surrounded by increasingly developed area. It is not an isolated rural community nor a historic tourism destination. We do not want our property designated or planned for heritage,

[01:19:05] tourism, recreational uses that is inconsistent with our community's character and our own plans for the future. We recognize the importance of thoughtful land use planning, but the planning should begin with an understanding of the communities being affected and input from the people who own the land. We therefore respectfully urge the boards to vote no on item 12a and reject this directive.

[01:19:35] Got a minute left. I just am a little confused as how Supervisor Stewart has even advanced this ball to y'all because for me, it's out of bounds. Y'all voted on a CPA to let our comprehensive plan amendment have the study performed.

[01:19:51] And all this amendment does that he's proposed, this short-term plan, all it does is delay that whole process. I think it's a little underhanded on his behalf. He won't meet with us. He won't return phone calls. You all have scolded him yourselves about meeting with the community, and he is still neglected to do so.

[01:20:08] So I please urge you all to vote no on item 12A. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon. I'm Liz Kronauer with the Trails and Blue Ways Council.

[01:20:27] I'm here to encourage you to adopt the Pathways to 2050 Trails Master Plan, which represents a significant step forward in the county's ability to plan and execute projects that will ultimately provide a substantial trail network for both recreation and alternative transportation across the county. I also want to extend congratulations and kudos to staff who put in the time and effort to produce this document. They did it in-house on top of their regular workloads, and their efforts have included the field work and the computer labor to create a

[01:21:06] GIS database of trails, the selection of criteria for prioritizing trail segments, the creation of a large database by applying these criteria to a large number of trail segments, and holding multiple well-run public meetings and public surveys to collect input and get buy-in. A plan with these types of tools is very powerful. You, the board, will be able to use the GIS database to see what potential projects are located in your district. And based upon the priority list, you can see what

[01:21:44] type of connectivity they will provide, what neighborhoods will be served by them, what impacts or contributions any proposed new developments might have on the trail system. In a nutshell, you will be able to see what trail projects, if built, will give you the best bang for the buck.

[01:22:04] Now that you have the means to identify the best trail projects, I encourage you to take advantage of it. This will be best done if you find a way to move forward with a steady funding stream of some amount that would allow Department of Parks and Recreation and Transportation to keep a staff of project managers who are most familiar with pedestrian-scale projects.

[01:22:31] A steady stream of funding allows the scope, the design, the permitting, the bid and construction pipeline for these projects to move forward efficiently and avoids the cost increases and permitting pitfalls of start and stop projects.

[01:22:48] So, I hope that you adopt this plan and use it extensively, and I thank you for your attention and for your support for a robust trail system in Prince William County. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. I'm Charlie Grimes. I'm also from the Gainesville Magisterial District. Yay, Gainesville.

[01:23:10] I want to express my delight at seven years of trails planning come to an end today. There's been a long, slow process, a lot of community engagement, and a lot of backing and forthing about where do we want to build a bike pedestrian network.

[01:23:32] This is an opportunity now for us to do what we say we want to do in our long-range comprehensive plan, build our live, work, play, retire communities, create the spaces where, as I've mentioned before, I can get on my e-bike and get to the ABC store.

[01:23:48] but it's an opportunity for us to follow through on our trails plan, but you only follow through if you fund it. And the opportunity is now going to be in front of Chris Shorter and the rest of you for the 2028 budget to actually implement what we're planning to do. Those of us in the trails community will do our part. We're assembling the volunteers and a variety of different organizations part of the Greater Prince William Trails Coalition have been working with volunteers for many years, we can build low-hanging fruit trail segments. Talk to your Trails and Blue Ways

[01:24:25] council members. They'll point out to you exactly where the low-hanging fruit trail segments are within your magisterial district. That's about 5% of the total trails network. 95% of the planned trails are going to require county funding in some sort for bridges, for permitting, for land acquisition. We will do our part as the folks that will bring you essentially free trails.

[01:24:50] You may get some trails from proffers, you may get some trails from grants, but you're not going to get the trails network that you've planned unless you fund it. So the fiscal year 28 CIP is your opportunity to establish a reliable, steady stream of funding to have the staff that can do trails planning, be shovel ready for state and federal grants, and take advantage of the opportunity that you now have with the trails plan. Thank you. Thank you so much. Before I call the next speaker, I'd like to call up the ones that are going to be following him. Kevin Parker,

[01:25:24] Neil Nelson, Robert Pixley, Tricia Sutherland, and Eileen Sheridan. You can all go stand in the back. All right, you may begin. Ladies and gentlemen of the board, Chairman Jefferson, board members. My name is Jeff Cahall. I'm a resident of the Gainesville Magisterial District.

[01:25:52] and live in Cat Harp and Valley Estates and have since its inception. Our community strongly urges the board to vote no and reject the directive proposal by Supervisor Stewart in the effort of Gainesville District Heritage Tourism and Recreational Small Area Plan Item 12A.

[01:26:14] We are landowners who would be directly impacted by this proposal, yet we have not been consulted by Supervisor Stewart or any other board member. We have had no meetings, no input, or anything asked of us. Our land uses are not contemplated in this proposal.

[01:26:37] Mr. Dale spoke earlier about that, including heritage, tourism, and recreational destination areas. I don't even know what that means. We are simply not consistent with that character. We are not an agro-tourism section or anything like that.

[01:26:55] Our surrounding rural character, we are situated in an area that experienced substantial residential growth and infrastructure development, And we believe that future land use planning should recognize that existence and further that style.

[01:27:12] Our community has no interest in participating in a heritage, tourism, or recreational destination. That does not reflect our character, our neighborhood, or our interest in our landowners. You have received many letters from the other landowners that could not be here today. I know that.

[01:27:27] We further believe that Supervisor Stewart in doing this is simply trying to lay a comprehensive plan that we have for further development of this area. If anybody have any questions on me, I'd be glad to answer them.

[01:27:45] So this is only public comment time we do not engage in discussion. If you're finished, thank you very much. I'll call up the next speaker. Hello, Kevin Parker, Niebsko District. I do support the Trails Master Plan and funding it, but I am here today because I wanted to speak out against the part of the Prince William County legislative agenda that is asking the state to put restrictions on e-bicycles.

[01:28:21] It's human nature to focus on what's wrong, and we're motivated to complain loudly about it. So for e-bikes, this is moving the public discussion. With that in mind, I wanted to talk about the many personal and societal benefits that e-bikes and other micromobility provide.

[01:28:44] Transportation. Many e-bike trips take car trips off the road with all the environmental benefits that come with it. No ground level pollution, there's no tire and brake pad particulates, virtually none, no greenhouse gases pretty much, and less congestion for those who still ride or who still drive.

[01:29:11] Also, it's an affordability issue. Many people without much money, an e-bike costs a fraction of a car. For some households, this is a way to reach a job or have a household with one less car. The costs associated with it are much less.

[01:29:26] I see these devices being used on our streets, on our arterial roads, going up and down and parked at restaurants, where I'm sure the worker used it to get there.

[01:29:43] There's also the mobility. It changes what the suburbs mean because we've built the suburbs around distances that are all about a car. So this really opens up what we can do, and it opens up for people who, like teenagers, who would normally have to get driven, it would free up their parents not to drive.

[01:30:11] So it really has a whole lot of knock-on effects that people don't talk about because people just talk about the one thing they see that is bad. So it has environmental affordability, mobility, transportation, and also freedom.

[01:30:28] People have always been free to walk and bike without a license or ID, and e-bikes extend that freedom to more people. We are often reducing and eroding our freedoms, and I would not like to have our freedoms further eroded in this way.

[01:30:48] Requiring helmets make a bike share system not feasible, and bike helmets reduce riding. I'm out of time, so thank you very much. Thank you. Next speaker, please. My name is Neil Nelson. I live in Lake Ridge in the Akakuan district.

[01:31:11] Please adjust the mic so we can hear you. Thank you. Better. My name is Neil Nelson. I live in Lake Ridge in the Occoquan District. Just stepping closer, just a little closer. We believe in you.

[01:31:29] Okay, I'm also here to speak in favor of Pathways 2035, the Master Trails Plan. I'd like to thank DPR staff for the work they did in preparing that plan. It represents a lot of work. It's significant in several ways.

[01:31:47] The first thing is it just identifies a long list of trail projects with detail or specificity, you know, specific trail projects that can be built. And it also established a ranking criteria to measure the value or contribution that this trail segment would have, and then you can prioritize based on that.

[01:32:07] And there's also some generic methods for estimating the cost of trails based on trail type. So the comprehensive plan includes the mobility chapter with our long-range trail plan.

[01:32:26] The Pathways 2035 is a more intermediate or interim look at the plan. And what we really need in addition to that now is implementation plans for what we can actually build this year and next year in the short term.

[01:32:43] And, of course, the key there is funding for those trail projects. That's what I've encouraged the Board of Supervisors to do, to look for funding for sources, all funding sources for the trails. And also, as a volunteer, I agree with Charlie Grimes' comments that we have a number of volunteers in the community that are willing to participate in this.

[01:33:07] So funding is key. Thank you. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. My name is Robert Pixley. I live in the Coles District.

[01:33:27] My issue here is data centers, and repeatedly, because we're not doing anything. Earlier this year, in June, we were able to host Lee Halliard of the Planning Commission from the city of Chesapeake to give them a taste of what was going on, because they were starting to develop their own plans.

[01:33:49] They have shamed you in terms of what they were able to get done. a unanimous vote produced an ordinance that requires a half mile setback from all residential properties. I don't think we have any. We're 500 feet from Amazon in the Great Oak District.

[01:34:08] They set their noise levels to 60 DBC during the day. That's a significant restriction and would be welcomed in 55 DBC at night. Routinely now it's over 70 at night DBC because we can't seem to pass anything of substance. They even introduced policies that require them to protect livestock from the data center noise. They care more about animals than we apparently care about our people. They added language requiring that data centers will require them to not diminish

[01:34:48] the reliability of the electric grid, something we're starting to see. We need help, and you're not helping. I started working with the PWC 311 system at the suggestion of Supervisor Vega, and it's been a joke. They closed tickets within 30 minutes of being reported at 4 a.m. That's not service. That's just denial. They call it resolved. It's not resolved. They say, oh, we closed them

[01:35:22] because we're going to consolidate them into one ticket. They never did that. It's a joke to finally start seeing maybe we're going to do something with the noise ordinance when the the the sheer dishonor of taking years of work and using the death of one of your colleagues and the military service of another decimate years of work on data noise data center noise and to to get rid of the dcoag that had been set up and was working was coming up with something and it just institutes

[01:35:57] something someone came up with on the board, Board of Supervisors. That's insulting to all of us that you think so little that you would literally use the death of a colleague to get that through because you wouldn't have the votes otherwise. You should feel shame. You really should. I'm done.

[01:36:19] Thanks. All right. Thank you. Before I call the next speakers, I have a Tricia Sutherland, Eileen Sheridan. I don't know if you're here. Ross Nair. Sunny Coffrey II. Stephen Ward. Donna Gallant. You may begin. Thank you. My name is Tricia Sutherland, and I am a Brentsville resident.

[01:36:58] I am someone who has canvassed and knocked on doors and donated to many of you sitting here today. In fact, one... Just bring it closer. Yeah. Can you hear me now? Yes. All right. In fact, one time I was handing out flyers at a polling place, and as many of you know, conversations between opposing parties occur. One thing we all agreed upon was the preservation of the rural crescent and the decrease in development in this county. It literally united us. And it still does.

[01:37:33] This is what your constituents want. There are no words to express the disappointment that I feel regarding land use decisions that have been made in this county. The last meeting I came to, a supervisor said progress is coming whether we like it or not. Another said people need to come with solutions. I just want to say that it's very sad that when the people you represent have stood up here for hours on end speaking against development, you can say it's coming whether we like it or not. And then tax the data centers less than the voters and not demand more for the

[01:38:11] community from the developers. And to say that we need to come to you with solutions, I hope you hear this answer as I offer it. Please listen to your voters. Stop paving over this county and serve the constituents and not the data centers and the developers. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. I think I'm close enough. Eileen Sheridan. I live in the Occoquan district. I'm here

[01:38:50] to talk about trails and in a little different fashion to point out that trails are a prescription for health. And when the Greater Prince William Trails Coalition was first formed at the end of 2018-2019, one of our partners, the Prevention Coalition of Prince William, had just completed the recent community health assessment. And some of the top items in the assessment were

[01:39:26] mental health, obesity, and diabetes. So COVID happened, things shut down, and we tried to figure out what we could do. So starting in 2021, we started the Walk and Talk Wellness campaign.

[01:39:46] Throughout the county, it was a messaging campaign that we worked to have residents come and do exactly that, walk and talk wellness. And now the campaign happens twice a year around mental health awareness and National Trails Day, and in the fall, suicide prevention and public lands day.

[01:40:15] Recently, we've partnered with Postpartum Virginia Literacy Volunteers at Prince William, We have an upcoming event with the Fatherhood Initiative, and it's a resource that the county has that we need to commit to providing that resource to our residents in the communities where they live so they don't have to drive there.

[01:40:50] So supporting the trails plan that's coming and funding the trails plan is good for everyone for public health. Thanks. Thank you. Next speaker, please. how's that work madam chair perfect all right ross snare brentsville district good afternoon madam chair members of the board i support pathways 2035 and i ask you to do the same it gives us a plan to connect neighborhoods with parks schools and other community destinations

[01:41:27] now we need to fund that plan and build trails residents can use i urge the county to include up up to $25 million a year in the FY28 through 33 capital improvement programs for land acquisition, design, and trail projects. Buying rights away early can help turn the plan into real connections.

[01:41:50] And I also call on the board to let the voters decide on a parks and rec referendum in November 2027. It should address our trails and parks, outdoor recreation, and the proposed indoor Sports Complex. These investments support recreation, health, and community life. Let's give the voters of Prince William a clear choice about the direction Prince William County is going to be heading in. Thank you so much for your time. All right, next speaker. Thank you. Next speaker.

[01:42:24] My name is Steve Ward. I am a resident of the Gainesville District. I speak today in opposition to the small area plan proposed by Supervisor Stewart, as well as the plan, the alternative proposed by the Chairwoman. Many of you know me or will remember me from the July 21st vote on the Manassas Preserve CPA initiation.

[01:42:44] I spoke then with a more positive attitude and with a more optimistic view of my district than I do now. Unfortunately, I stand before you today as a man without a supervisor, as a taxpayer without representation, and as a proud resident of Prince William County who is frustrated with what I've watched unfold.

[01:43:01] Despite hours of discussion in the lead-up to that vote, Despite commitments made to me, including from this dais on the day of that vote, despite dozens of attempts to engage, Supervisor Stewart has not engaged with me, with any members of my community, with any members of the private sector who represent the investments that will drive billions of dollars of improvements in the area, nor with any of the other landowners who are assembled in this area to bring about positive change for our community.

[01:43:28] He's not only abandoned me, but with this proposal, he has betrayed his duty to act as a supervisor for all of his constituents, not just a small few. I am outraged by the proposal being brought before you today, but I am not surprised, as Supervisor Stewart seems to be more concerned with kowtowing to the wishes of a vocal minority of 20 professional or semi-professional activists, whom you see here every time a development opportunity is brought to the table and will see behind me than he is with dealing with the nearly 250 individual landowners who represent

[01:44:02] 3,000 acres of opportunity for his district and billions in potential new revenues for his constituents. He's fallen victim to the hyperbole of these activists that somehow convince him that they represent thousands of voices in our community when they do not. To the real issue at hand, though, related to this proposal and to the proposal that's proposed as an alternative, it's meaningless other than to turn away the opportunity that exists today in an attempt to prevent real development from happening now. It's a tremendous waste of taxpayer money, and it is a delay tactic that must be seen for exactly what it is. What it belies is the truth

[01:44:40] that the county and U.S. supervisors do not have the opportunity to tell landowners what we wish to do with our land. You can control zoning and you can help guide and control development, but you cannot initiate a study that proposes future use of our land if we are not willing to be participants in that use. Vote no to both of these proposals. And with a more respectful tone to Chairman's proposal, the private sector has already brought itself forward and spoken in terms of what it sees as economic viability for this area. Listen to the private sector. Let the

[01:45:16] initiations undertake. Let the reviews go forward. Do not put blockers in the way of that, or you will lose that opportunity. Vote no on both of those proposals. Thank you very much. All right. Before our next speaker, I want to make sure that everyone is up here. I have Stephen Ward, Donna Gallant. I'll also call up a few more people. Kathy Kulik, Patrick Harters, and is it Joe Marshall? Sir, you may begin.

[01:45:53] My name is Sonny Cuffey, and I live in the Brinsville District. It is my guess that the proposal of including or approving environmental justice into the Prince William Comprehensive Plan is still being obstructed for some unknown reason.

[01:46:18] Whether it is in the east or in the west end of the county, whether it's the Rural Crescent or the Overlay or the Homeowners Association, justice is indivisible.

[01:46:34] This is an opportunity for the board to approve and to implement environmental justice into the comprehensive plan. Whether it is in the hamlet or the village, injustice anywhere is an affront to justice everywhere.

[01:47:01] It is time that we implement this into the comprehensive plan, which is coming up for review next year. And once more again, please do it and make it retroactive. Thank you for your time, Madam Chair and board members.

[01:47:17] All right, next speaker, please. Before you start the clock, I'd like to defer and switch spots, given that my supervisor is not present, and I would like him to be present for what I have to say. Oh, I'm sorry. Supervisor Gordy is virtual today.

[01:47:36] Oh, okay, perfect. Then I will start. Thank you. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the board. My name is Donna Gallant. I live in the Brentsville District. I stand here today, as I've done many, many times over the last four-plus years, When I asked this board and the previous board not to approve data centers next to residential areas, schools, and national parks.

[01:48:01] Yet many of you continue to embrace and approve data centers and now high-density housing at the expense of every citizen you were elected to represent. Four years, same message, same story, same outcome.

[01:48:16] First, I'll share with you as a resident of over 30 years behind my neighborhood, the approved Mango Farms Google Data Center complex is being constructed. The first building has been built and sits 2,500 feet from my property, and the second building is being constructed, which will bring it 1,250 feet from my property.

[01:48:36] The peace and solitude I have enjoyed prior to the development is gone with 24-7 noise replacing it. The noise is constant. The noise never stops. There is no break. There is no reprieve. There is no silence.

[01:48:53] All because members of this board and previous board members chose developers over residents. I ask you all today, as a previous member of the DCOAG, we worked hard. We engaged experts in the noise and sound field.

[01:49:10] The county spent hundreds and thousands of dollars engaging these industries and experts to ensure a noise ordinance was solid. Before the newly drafted noise ordinance could be presented to this board, there were two actions taken by two sitting board members.

[01:49:26] Supervisor Angry, you made a motion to disband the DCOAG with absolutely no justification and no basis, only that I would speculate the industry asked you to do it, and you complied. Shameful. Supervisor Bodie, you introduced a sham noise ordinance.

[01:49:47] This ordinance has absolutely no scientific evidence behind it and was clearly dictated by the industry as evidenced by the immediate press release from the Chamber of Commerce. Shameful. These actions should be remembered when it comes time for election.

[01:50:04] It is clear the industry got to you, and you again abandoned your duties to represent the people. It's time to remove the sham noise ordinance. This board voted on and implemented a real noise ordinance developed by the DCOAG and industry experts.

[01:50:22] The DCOAG is backed by scientific, defendable, and accord-of-law data. Residents are suffering. Residents are tired of calling and complaining when nothing is done. Someone please have the tenacity to make a directive to bring the noise ordinance issue back up.

[01:50:41] Push to implement a fair and just ordinance for the residents, not the industry. Thank you. Your time is up. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members of the board.

[01:50:59] Catherine Kulik, HRA Roundtable of Northern Virginia. Today, Supervisor Stewart will issue a directive to study the feasibility and appropriateness and scope a small area plan to encourage significant new business opportunities and employment throughout an inspiring heritage tourism and recreation initiative. Prince William County is uniquely well-suited and the Gainesville District perfectly positioned to capitalize on booming heritage tourism, already bringing millions in economic benefit to other localities across the country with similar multicultural and agricultural resources. This plan would leverage ongoing economic initiatives bringing cultural tourism and agritourism together with land use

[01:51:35] policy to create a robust opportunity for new business investment that intrinsically preserves and conserves. Businesses will look for jurisdictional policy that supports their goals before investing in destination-focused enterprises. This inspires visitors to connect with their roots and heritage in a leisure destination. Sounds great, doesn't it?

[01:51:58] This collaborative effort of both economic development and planning professionals in our county to ensure a realistic picture of this exciting opportunity is presented for your thoughtful consideration to initiate a small area plan. The residents of this county overwhelmingly support it, and we hope that you do too. For those that have property that feel threatened, and we've heard them before, there is nothing found. It's their contention that somehow they're left out. Everybody will be brought in once this process starts. Absolutely. That's part of the process. You will also consider the county's noise ordinance and its ability to regulate industrial continuous low-frequency noise for effect on county residents. For three years,

[01:52:37] the Data Center Ordinance Advisory Group will diligently develop what would become the nation's leading policy and regulatory tool to deal with intractable, increasingly pervasive data center noise. And we worked with two of the nation's preeminent experts through exhaustive testing and enforcement analysis. But you never heard the details of this. The experts analyzed years of noise readings many recorded by residents impacted from continuous heavy industrial noise but you never heard the details of this all of this was carefully considered and compiled in long-standing acoustical engineering principles to create a solid scientific basis to justify the

[01:53:16] county's decision in a basis and background document inexplicably this work was eviscerated by unfounded arbitrary alteration of the expert recommended octave band noise scale through high pressure tactics of the data center industry, its advocates, and lobbyists. The public health and welfare, along with professional reputations of highly regarded experts, were harmed and potentially irreparably. We never heard this board discuss the consequences of living with this noise. What about the victims? Now is the time to bring the expert-recommended ordinance

[01:53:50] to a public hearing for the victims. Thank you. Thank you, next speaker. Actually, I only have one person. Before I call up, I want to make sure I have everyone else. I have Patrick Harters. I assume you're Joe Marshall, Elena Schlossberg, Philip Klein, and Brooke Smith. If all of you can come up. Patrick Harters, Gainesville District. I want to encourage us to follow the comprehensive plan and to look at this small area plan that Supervisor Stewart has been working

[01:54:26] on. Tom Gordy on July 21st says, we have a plan, we are following it, and it is working. When we look at the numbers that he discussed, 18,804 homes have been approved by this board. When you look at hand, the organization states that 7,136 homes have already been built in Prince William County since 2021. When you add those numbers together and you look at what we had as a goal

[01:54:57] to COG in 2019, we had a goal somewhere around 26,000 homes. So we are at 25,900 homes that have either been built out or approved by this board, somewhere in that number. So you have a plan, it has been working, and you are on target for the goals. We do not have an approval process that's delaying anything. We simply have a building process that takes time. Any property takes time to develop. Heritage Hunt took over 10 years. We're looking at projects that are bigger in scale. Cat Harpen Valley and we have Manassas Preserve are much larger in scale. Manassas

[01:55:35] Preserve has more homes in it than what we're going to see in Heritage Hunt. I want to give a cautionary tale. What we're looking at is we have assemblages. We have about 4,000 homes that are now in the CPA that we're looking at between Cat Harpen Valley and Manassas Preserve. We have assemblages all over the place. You can look at the maps and you see how many properties we're looking at assemblages. We have Camp Snyder. You will not get a vote on that. Camp Snyder will be up to 20 homes per acre on a 300-acre campground. I don't know if that's going to be 100 acres, 200 acres. We do not know at this point, but that is a lot of homes. When you add everything up

[01:56:13] together and you do a risk analysis like any business does, you look at that could be an additional 15,000 to 45,000 homes. When you start adding that into the 26 or 25,900 homes that have been approved or have already been built. We are way over the mark. And what we're doing is exactly what Supervisor Gordy talked about. We are cannibalizing the reinvestment, the redevelopment that we have in the communities, in the Woodbridge community, in the Manassas community, because there is simply going to be an overbuilt of homes. And when you want the cautionary tale, like at Jacksonville, Florida, 2006 had a booming economy, a booming housing market.

[01:56:48] They had four projects that they looked at. They were very similar to Manassas Preserve. They were out in more rural areas. They also were a tax base where the taxes were going to raise the capital. One developer, after they got their bonds, never built a home. Another had one-third of the homes built. It cost the county hundreds of millions of dollars. Look at the small area plant. It is an opportunity to save in infrastructure and to put development where we need it, where we're reinvesting and redeveloping in the proper areas. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon.

[01:57:28] My name is Joe Marshall. I am from the Coles District. I am also the current chair of the county's Trails and Blue Ways Council. Later today, under Agenda Item 11A, you will see the presentation and be asked to approve Pathways 2035, which you've heard from many speakers.

[01:57:47] The Trail Master Plan, especially focused on increasing recreational trails, active mobility trails, and blue ways during the next 10 years in Prince William County. This is a well-written plan produced internally by the staff and giving actionable targets with estimated cost to provide the Trails and Blue Ways called out in the mobility section of comprehensive plan to provide better health, safety, tourist, and recreational networks across the county.

[01:58:15] Trails and Blue Ways Council worked and advocated with the various agencies over the past four years to help make this plan a reality. The TBC Resolution 2614 fully endorses this document and asks you to approve and fund this plan.

[01:58:32] A copy of this resolution was sent to you last week. It should be noted that the last Trails Master Plan was created in 1993, 33 years ago. I have a copy. It was not utilized as a living document and was never updated, even as events happened.

[01:58:51] For Pathways 2035 and the fact that this was created in-house, it can be used as a much more dynamic plan, guiding and tracking progress. As you will hear, the price tag for the whole plan is significant. The TBC is working with DPR to identify and plan the low-hanging fruit trail segments that may be completed for much less than the plan estimates, leveraging volunteer efforts such as some of those that have been seen at Locust Shade, Long Park.

[01:59:22] With seed funding as needed and staff support, many, if not all of these, could be finished in the next few years. However, to really make progress on the Tier 1 priority trail, significant funding is needed for those trails, requiring more than simple volunteer labor to build.

[01:59:42] As an example, there are several gaps and segments of the Potomac Heritage Trail. And the county needing funding when completed will give you a significant hiking, biking experience and connectivity for both residents and external tourists. Someday, possibly as early as 2031, this could form a backbone from Occocon to Dumfries and Quantico.

[02:00:04] Including the funding for Powell's Crossing in the legislative is one very good step. But grants, proffers and outside sources will only fund a portion. Thus, I request that the county executive and board include substantial make-a-difference funding in the initial draft of fiscal year 28 CIP released at the start of the budget, and also plan for a fiscal year 28 parks and trails bond.

[02:00:30] I hope you appreciate it, and thank you for your support. Thank you so very much. Next speaker, please.

[02:00:57] You may begin. those packets are for the supervisors first of all i want to say uh supervisor bailey and i did not call each other to plan our cool jackets today but yeah uh so my name is elena schlossberg and i'm a resident of the gainesville district and here you have of course the reimagine reinvest and redevelopment uh plan that um that pwca has created as a guide for prince william county as a whole and it's really important it's not just uh it's the three r's you can't do the three r's without the reinvest and the redevelopment, and you also can't do it without, can you see in that

[02:01:35] little corner? What that says is provide sustainable, provide sustainable water. I'm here to urge you to support Supervisor Stewart, who is the Gainesville District Supervisor, and I hope that you will respect his plan. The majority of residents who plan on staying want a sustainable future. What we

[02:02:04] don't want is a repeat of assemblages. In the email I wrote you, I asked you to wonder at why only Prince William County is developing by assemblages. Loudon doesn't do it. Loudon doesn't do it. Fockier doesn't do it. They are not cannibalizing their remaining rural places.

[02:02:32] So this is about science. It's about smart growth. It's about fiscal responsibility. It's about environmental responsibility, and it's about historical responsibility. You have tasked the economic development with exploring a rural economy. That is not going to happen unless you have rural places to create an economy. You've adopted an arts, ag, and overlay district. All we're recommending is that this plan, which is very broad, it's not taking anybody's rights to sell their home away. That's just not fair. What it does do is it provides a really exciting vision

[02:03:09] for everybody. I want you to look at this sheet of paper that I've provided you. There's been a lot of attention to the Potomac River Basin study. Not one more data center east of 95. Look at where all that purple is concentrated in the western end. Okay, you know what that is? That's where this study recommends we need to protect as stewards of a critical drinking water supply.

[02:03:35] that is why the small area plan that has been recommended by supervisor stewart is what you should be voting for this is not about what we want personally this is about what's best for the future of not just the people in prince william county but for the region as a whole so please approve supervisor stewart's small area plan thank you thank you next speaker please thank you for time chairman of the board and board of supervisors my name is philip please please adjust the mic

[02:04:13] Is that better? So much so. Okay. I've lived in Northern Virginia almost seven decades and lived at the same address in the Gainesville District for 39 years. I am asking you, supervisors and members, not to allow the small area plans for tourism, heritage, and agricultural areas to proceed.

[02:04:34] Unfortunately, an offshoot of these tourism and ag tourism ideas are no monies for improved roads and increased noise and traffic. A lot of you will remember quite a few years ago, Disney wanted to put up Disney America here to take and capitalize on the historical nature in the proximity to the battlefield.

[02:04:55] It was five miles away at the time, but that was shot down. People were not in favor of it. Our counties to the north, Loudoun County, has tried for a couple of decades for an increase in agriculture and horticultural enterprises and a lot of money and personnel after that without any real success.

[02:05:14] This past Saturday, I met with clients of mine in Loudoun County to come up with a plan to ameliorate the noise and visible disruptions that erupted next door to them due to the sale of a neighboring property. These noises are coming from a winery-slash-event center.

[02:05:29] They have contracted with us to install large evergreens to help screen. Saturday night officials from Loudoun County were coming to measure the decibel levels from a planned wedding event. The previous event, the noise was so loud in their house, their baby could not sleep, and they were on a large nine-acre property.

[02:05:50] I hear frequent complaints that the change to the area west of the battlefield would ruin it. I have differing opinion and questions to ask people. Immediately to the east in Fairfax County on Route 29 is a quarry, concrete plant, asphalt plant, and a commercial waste processing facility.

[02:06:09] By far, the highest-use parking lot in the battlefield is the one at Stone Bridge that is immediately adjacent to those industries. To the north in Loudoun County is a quarry, concrete, and asphalt plant. Immediately adjacent to the south is Route I-66 and Park Ridge Shopping Center, MVCC Campus, and other buildings.

[02:06:30] The cry that growth to the west would roof and the battlefield is ludicrous considering all the activity on the other three sides. There has been tremendous growth in Prince William County on our end. Heritage Hunts, Piedmont, Dominion Valley, Virginia Oaks, et cetera. All these were large zoned rural agricultural properties.

[02:06:51] We've got direct links to many other properties near or to Loudoun County and other roadways. The concept of agricultural enterprises is very difficult with unsuitable ag soils and requiring hours of hard work and higher paying jobs are easily available.

[02:07:10] Please vote no for these. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon, board. I'm a resident of the Gainesville District and am standing here today in opposition of the Heritage Tourism and Recreational Small Area Plan.

[02:07:29] While preserving local history and expanding recreational spaces, our valuable goals, this plan completely overlooks one of the most critical and pressing crises that I feel like we have in our community.

[02:07:44] it's affordable housing. I've heard a lot of folks talk about the Manassas Preserve and the other areas within Gainesville that are seeking assemblages or are under assemblages now. Bottom line up front is this. We need housing, quite frankly, and I think someone mentioned something about 4,000 houses or families are in the community that are somewhat tied to these assemblages those are those are voting blocks of individuals who are one kind of taking a little

[02:08:18] bit about 12a here in this proposed directive from our supervisor mr stewart so nonetheless i stand here in opposition of that mr stewart supervisor stewart if he would engage these landowners we might could come to some type of agreement through mitigation terms or whatever that may be but I'm afraid the time is pressing and moving quickly and we still haven't had any opportunity with our supervisors so with that again we have missed opportunities and mixed use

[02:08:54] planning here a truly forward-thinking small area plan should integrate community needs quite frankly and we should be looking at you know the smart growth that balances open space affordable high density and mixed income housing options we need that in our communities you want to know why we're growing at the rates we are because dc is still hiring and we'll continue so thank you for your time and i appreciate you can do you just state your name please for the record i'm sorry it's brock smith oh brock i'm sorry yeah you said brook but it's brock i see the c now thank you

[02:09:32] thank you ma'am all right i'm going to turn it over to my colleague supervisor angry for remote public comment time. Thank you, Madam Chair. Looks like we have a few. Chris, is that you with me today? Yes, sir, it is. All right. We have a few and we're ready to go. Our first speaker is Carlos Yanis. All right, go ahead, Carlos. Good afternoon, everybody. My name is Carlos Yanis in Manassas from the Great Oaks community. Just wanted to share my frustration with the data centers that are already built and the ones that are still being built pretty much on my backyard.

[02:10:10] This is something that started over five years ago with the data centers giving us false hope that they would do right by the community and pretty much get rid of the noise. Well, when they eventually went quiet, we relied on our representatives to put pressure and this matter and really address the noise pollution that they are creating I believe that this is something that is not going to go away unless we do something about it just last night at 10 o'clock as I was thinking about this upcoming meeting came to my head the fact is

[02:10:47] is tonight going to be a bad night or is it going to be a horrible night because the noise itself varies each night so is it going to be a noise machine is it going to be a sleep aid it's something that there's just no end to it and it's horrible to leave that way i would ask to everybody in there to think about this if this was you what would you think is the best approach and it's something that happens every single night we still need help and we're counting on you guys to pretty much do right by us because there's nobody else that's going to help us uh get this

[02:11:26] matter taken care of. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Next speaker, please. Next speaker is Michelle Trenum. All right. Go ahead, please. Go ahead. Michelle Trenum, the Brinksville District. Thank you, Chair Jefferson and members of the board. My background is that I worked for a county supervisor for 10 years. I also worked directly with data center developers. Later, I served on the county's DCOAG, tried to be a bridge between citizens and staff. I'm frustrated with how the noise ordinance process unfolded, and I'm asking you to re-look at it. As staff, I attended the

[02:12:04] very first meeting of Great Oak residents, desperately trying to identify the strange persistent noise disrupting their lives. These people weren't looking for a fight. They were just so frustrated and asking their government to help. My own district had already approved data near residential areas. Although the projects hadn't been built yet, we now worried about the Great Oak problems and what that could mean for our district. In response to the noise issue, the DC OAG was formed. We worked with professional acoustical experts to develop recommendations to address the problem, which was that conventional A-weighted measurements don't really capture the

[02:12:41] low-frequency tonal noise that was actually bothering people. Hundreds of thousands of dollars, tax dollars, were spent on these consultants. We invested hours learning, listening, and working to get it right. Then those experts' recommendations seemed to be disregarded. Recommended sound limits were actually raised by several decibels. The committee, which was in the middle of its work, was disbanded and citizens were left without meaningful protections. Several months before the new ordinance was introduced by a board member, a data center developer directly told me the industry wasn't really worried about the committee work because behind closed doors,

[02:13:19] the industry was working on its own ordinance and intended to get it adopted, a version that would not affect data operations. I don't know what happened behind closed doors, but as a first-hand witness to closed doors in our own office, that industry statement said a lot to me, and then the eventual outcome raised serious questions about whose interests were really prioritized, especially with the last-minute ordinance that ignored those experts. Working with upset citizens is difficult, but I have to wonder if the committee was disbanded because the industry had to declare them an inconvenience. Change is possible. I worked for someone who

[02:13:55] initially supported data center development. However, when the noise impacts became apparent, they changed that position and had the courage to publicly acknowledge their mistake to hundreds at a town hall. You've seen politicians nationwide reverse previous positions. This board has forged a new path on data. I would be encouraged to see that new path continued. That's responsible government listening, admitting when circumstances change, and correcting course. So I'm asking this board to do the same on noise. Reopen the noise issue, restore the original DCOAG consultant recommendations, adopt enforceable limits that address low-frequency tonal noise,

[02:14:32] and adopt enforcement procedures that isolate the source. Taxpayers funded the experts. Residents participated in good faith. Y'all have the opportunity to make sure all that work isn't disregarded. Data centers do bring economic benefits, but those benefits can't come at the expense of residents' ability to enjoy. Sorry. Our next speaker is Greg Methering. All right.

[02:14:54] Thank you. Go ahead, Greg. Hi, I'm Greg Methering. I live in the Occoquan District. I wanted to start off. It's been about a month and a half since the last time I spoke at one of these. And I wanted to say at that meeting, it was very unfortunate and very disheartening to see that we, at the start of it had lost some of our supervisors who had stepped out. I reached out immediately after, and I want to thank Supervisor Angry for immediately responding to me in good faith and explaining what had happened and why he had to step out. And that was really important.

[02:15:32] On the other hand, I was met with silence from the chair and silence from Supervisor Bailey. Both of you, do better. When someone reaches out to you with concern about the meetings, respond. We're not always going to agree, but ignoring your constituents, even if we don't live in your district, that is unacceptable. We are the people of this county and I have just sat here all day and heard how you're ignoring them. That's a real problem. In any event, what I wanted to speak about today briefly is that same issue that I spoke to you about last time, and that

[02:16:09] being flat cameras and other ALPRs. Since that time, we have seen counties around us start to take real important action to cut back on the use of these devices, to remove them from their counties. And yet this board sits silent. This is not an issue that can wait. This is an issue that immediately the mass surveillance of citizens must be addressed. We have started to have the courts find that this mass surveillance is unconstitutional and that it cannot be used by

[02:16:46] police departments to continually track citizens without warrants. And yet the county still has the system in place to allow it. Before this county gets sued, before the taxpayers have to shell out millions of dollars to pay for some lawsuit, let's cut it off. You all have that power to tell the police department to get rid of these things, vote to have them out, to cut off the funding, restore basic principle that we can travel without government surveillance.

[02:17:21] Thank you. Thank you, sir. Next speaker. Our next speaker is Rachel Ellis. Go ahead, Ms. Rachel. Hello, Rachel Ellis, Gainesville District. I'm asking you to support Supervisor Stewards Directive for a Gainesville District Heritage, tourism and recreation small area plan.

[02:17:46] Supervisor Stewards Directive is all encompassing as it supports and prioritizes rural agricultural heritage development in this specific area. It is in line with rural preservation and also helps to protect invaluable resources like our watershed.

[02:18:01] We know land use applications will be coming for this area. And this gives the community an opportunity to have their voice for a neighborhood vision. The people that will actually remain here in Prince William County. We know developers drive towards profitability versus what actually is the vision for the area.

[02:18:19] It also allows the board to have a game plan to use when looking at these applications. Without a small area plan for this corridor, we will end up with a hodgepodge of bad high density housing projects that are solely motivated by the sale of overinflated land.

[02:18:35] Projects that will overstress an already stressed area with little infrastructure and minimal fire, rescue, and police services. Prince William County gets one chance to prioritize the rural, historical, cultural, and environmental resources of this area. Once development starts, this landscape is gone forever.

[02:18:54] We also should protect the integrity of the battlefield experience as a tourism destination, and I think there's an opportunity to incorporate that into the future development of this corridor. And as a side note, this past weekend I attended the ghost tour at the Bullhorn Winery, and it reminded me of how special this area is it's rich with history and resources that should be honored with the community vision of the future it's also notable that supervisor stewart's basically initiating a study to look at this area holistically it does not rezone anyone's personal property the small area plan includes community input vision it will not

[02:19:32] just be developers and residents looking to leave the county creating the future of this area as a gamesville district resident i encourage you to support supervisor stewart's initiative i believe he does represent our interest in this area and a vision that we can all get behind and other than the sanders lane vote it often feels like the gamesville district is being silenced other members of the board are determining what happens in our district this directive opens a discussion and is being led by our supervisor not other board members not developers and not homeowners looking to cash out i'm not so dogmatic in my beliefs that that I'm not open to a dialogue, but I do feel strongly when it feels other supervisors are

[02:20:10] leading the direction and oftentimes the destruction of my community. Supervisor Stewart failing means the Gainesville district fails. We are watching who is actively working against him and who is showing up to support him. And as for the noise ordinance discussion, Prince William County residents deserve better. This board knows what the right thing is to do, so do the right thing.

[02:20:31] Thank you. Thank you, ma'am. Next speaker, please. Next speaker is Jessica Grove. Ms. Jessica, go ahead, ma'am. Hi, I'm Chair Jefferson and members of the board. My name is Jessica Grove, and I'm a lifelong resident of Prince William County, and I live in Gainesville.

[02:20:51] I'm here today to speak to you about item 12A, and I ask you to support Supervisor Stewart's directive for the Heritage Tourism and Recreational Area Plan. This is about more than preserving open space, historic places, and our watershed and neighborhoods.

[02:21:10] It's about creating a thoughtful economic development strategy that fills our agricultural heritage and cultural resources, promotes rural agro-tourism, and has the potential to generate millions of dollars in economic benefits from Swim County, which is the opposite of what the cost of infrastructure would be for assemblages of high-density housing in rural spaces.

[02:21:32] Since 2021, residents have lived with a tremendous uncertainty about what the future holds. That uncertainty has divided neighbors, strained friendships, and left many families wondering whether the communities they have invested in for years will still be recognizable in the years ahead.

[02:21:51] Our residents deserve a plan, not perpetual uncertainty. Without a small area plan, we risk a path to work of bad development proposals driven by developers, rather than a comprehensive vision for the district. Once our historic landscapes, rural character, and important natural resources are lost, we cannot simply bring them back.

[02:22:13] This is not about taking away property rights from owners. This is about having a plan for the future. And let's be clear, this directive does not rezone anyone's property. It calls for a study. I also ask this board to remember that public trust is at stake.

[02:22:32] Residents need confidence that decisions affecting their homes, their investments, and their children's future will be guided by long-term interests of this community and the residents who plan to stay here and not cash out and move away. Not by the financial influence of developers or campaign contributions, our community deserves transparency, accountability, and a meaningful voice in decisions that could permanently change where we live. Gainesville has the agricultural, historic, and cultural resources to create economic development strategy that preserves our heritage

[02:23:08] while generating substantial new revenue we should be studying those opportunities not overlooking them failing to plan is planning to fail please support item 12a let's protect our heritage strengthen our economy preserve our neighborhoods and give residents the certainty they deserve let's show that growth and preservation can work together and leave the next generation against bill they can be proud to call home i want you to understand the anxiety of living in Gainesville for the past several years has been unbearable. The decisions this board has made

[02:23:45] is unbearable, and I want you to hear that. Thank you, ma'am. Our next speaker is Bill Wright. Go ahead, Mr. Wright. My name is Bill Wright, and I live in Savannah, Georgia. I am a former member of the county's Data Center Ordinance Advisory Group. I joined that group in July 2024 after the death of Dr. John Liver. Within a year, the DCOAG volunteers had developed an effective noise ordinance designed to address the challenging conditions posed by data center proliferation through collaboration with county contracted acoustic consultants.

[02:24:23] Our draft of August 25, 2025, was described by the nonprofit network Community and Environmental Defense Services as a model for other local ordinances. That recommendation, obtained at a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars in consulting fees and thousands of volunteer hours was never even presented to this board for consideration.

[02:24:45] It was undermined by a developer-beholding county staff and buried by uncaring supervisors. A recent commentary in the Virginia Mercury ridiculed Prince William County for its insincere efforts, providing a blow-by-blow description of its shameless conduct that has yet to be rectified.

[02:25:03] There is no need to recount it. You know what you did and didn't do. The history of data center approvals in Prince William County is stained with ignorance, arrogance, and indifference. Even after freeing themselves from the smug paternalism of Ann Wheeler, residents were forced to endure the destructive votes of supervisors more loyal to opportunistic donors than to the communities that elected them.

[02:25:27] My question to the board is this. Are you content with your terrible reputation, or are you going to repair it? It has become undeniably obvious that everything the public warned this board about for five years was the truth. Yet there has been little contrition and even less corrective action.

[02:25:46] The presentation you will hear today under Agenda Item 11D confirms the ineffectiveness of a noise ordinance whose standards are so low that they cannot be violated. The latest staff recommendation is to wait another six months until things get worse.

[02:26:01] If this board follows past patterns, it will rubber stamp that ridiculous recommendation and bury its head further in the sand. But that awful recommendation also provides an opportunity for redemption if the board is conscientious enough to take it.

[02:26:17] If you are at all interested in restoring faith with your constituents, you will acknowledge the presentation's confirmation of the board's prior error and resurrect the effective noise ordinance the public already invested in. Who will pick up the leadership mantle that is there for the taking?

[02:26:34] The health of your communities cannot afford further inaction. Thank you. That is our final speaker. Thank you. All right. Thanks, Chris. Madam Chair, back to you. All right. Thank you so very much.

[02:26:51] We are moving on to agenda item number eight. Yes, I'm looking. We're moving on to agenda item number eight, public hearings. So I'm going to go ahead and open the public hearings for agenda items 8A through 8C.

[02:27:08] I have two people who have signed up to speak. I have Tricia Sutherland and Elena Schlossberg. Please make your way to the back. Begin by stating your name, the Magisterial District where you reside. And organizations, approved organizations, 501c3, you have up to five minutes to speak.

[02:27:27] If you want your five minutes, please let us know at the beginning. So I have Tricia Sutherland and Elena Schlossberg.

[02:27:48] Hello again. My name is Tricia Sutherland, and I am a Brunsville resident.

[02:28:06] I am here to speak about the rezoning from M2, light industrial, to e-commerce. So what I understand from what I've read is that this will impact the property on Bristow Road across from my home, and Bristow Station Battlefield Heritage Park will be, the area will be a distribution center across from the park, and the square footage is more generous with this e-commerce designation.

[02:28:32] No surprise there. Perhaps they're going to add more buildings to the existing structures, as again, no surprise, the land has already been cleared. The issues I share today are, one, there was no posted road signage about this public hearing, so it fails to offer proper public notice, as is required.

[02:28:51] It is not only unfair, I would also consider the legal implications of improper notice. Two, the way the e-commerce designation is written, surrounding communities have to be taken into account. I am not seeing a lot of consideration of our community with this project, so if they are going to make this an Amazon or whatever distribution hub, they need to hear from people of the surrounding community.

[02:29:16] As one of those very residents, I can assure you that I have been ignored by my supervisor, and his staff and a number of my emails and voicemails remain unanswered. And my family is impacted by this project on a daily basis. Three, the e-commerce designation also requires that buildings facing the Manassas battlefield are green or brown, and I'm paraphrasing here, and the building facing Bristow Station battlefield is not meeting that requirement.

[02:29:46] One can infer that this is written into the zoning guidelines so as to blend with the natural landscape and not detract from the experience, the solemnity, and the beauty that the battlefield deserves. Bristow Battlefield deserves that respect as well.

[02:30:05] As one docent during a Battlefield tour referred to it as that monstrosity over there, it could be better camouflaged, and frankly, the developer who paid five times the asking price for the land can afford to camouflage it better. I ask that this requirement be written into the zoning guidelines and that Bristow Station Heritage Park be included in the revision.

[02:30:25] We take a moment of silence at the beginning of these meetings, and I ask the board what that means to you. As of this moment, the men who died in that battlefield and the people living near it today are not being honored. This needs to be brought back to the table and done properly if we want to tout this county as a great place to live, work, retire, and play. Thank you. Thank you. Next

[02:30:48] speaker, please. Can I have Elmo, please? My name is Elena Schlossberg and I'm a Gainesville resident and I represent the Coalition to Protect Prince William County. Don't know that I'll need five minutes, but just in case. So first of all, I really appreciate the words of the first and only speaker. I think that may represent that not enough people understood the impacts of the

[02:31:24] e-commerce overlay, which is a problem. And so I just printed this out because, you know, you hear a lot in Prince William County, why can't we get those Fortune 500 companies to come here? Well, there's a reason why. If you look at the counties that these Fortune 500s go to, they do a couple, they do several things. One is they definitely protect their historical resources, of which really Prince William County is quite unique. We have, I believe, more in one place than any other

[02:32:00] county. They protect their natural resources, their water, you know, their important, their air quality. We are not doing that. And there is reliability. And the concern, not just for the citizens who live here, but also for the businesses themselves, when you have these kinds of incompatible uses, creates a problem. So, Bristow is a destination place. What are we doing

[02:32:35] to promote it, just like the battlefield. What are we doing to promote these irreplaceable resources? I mean, you can't build these somewhere else. You can't pretend like you have important battlefields. They exist here before us, and we are not being good stewards. So I don't know actually how you fix this, and I'm not going to pretend like I understand how you, but I think the recommendation for putting in better guidelines, there should be a significant

[02:33:11] buffer. I'm not suggesting that this long-range land use can change. It's clearly from the outset was inappropriate, but we can't go back in time. But, you know, where there's a will, there's a way. There should be a way to protect the people who are going to want to come to Bristow. So if we want to start changing the impression that people have of Prince William County, we're going to have to do better we're going to have to act like um we don't want just want to turn into you know the

[02:33:46] worst parts of Alexandria that are overbuilt and industrialized where people drive by 50 miles an hour and they're like what that plaque say they don't stop they don't care we want people to stay here we want people to look at Prince William County like we have something different than everybody else and right now we're not doing different we're doing the exact same thing that everybody else is doing. And so once again, I don't know what the solution is, but I'd like you to create a way that if you are next to historical assets, that you create some kind of a setback or

[02:34:22] buffer to protect that. It's the least that we can do. So thank you. All right. Thank you very much. I'm going to turn it over to my colleague to see if we have anyone online. Do we have any online? Yes, sir. We have one speaker, Greg Mathern. All right. Go ahead, sir. Hey, good afternoon again, Greg Mathurn in the Occoquan District. I was wanting to speak just regarding the bond measure and just say that absolutely we need to be doing this. We need to be working

[02:34:59] on improving our schools and investing in them. My only concern here is that with so much of these things, we're damned if we do, we're damned if we don't. If we increase taxes immediately to pay for these things, people are going to scream and yell about that. If we do it this way because we are deferring these costs to the future, we're also damned because people are going to be complaining about that. My point here simply being, it feels like so often in these cases,

[02:35:32] we wait until the school is in a worst case scenario and we have no option. We must immediately act. We can plan better. We can do better. Now, most of that is on the school board. The school board has got to do better and got to communicate that but it's a process between both of these bodies and i just want to encourage us to do more long-term planning on this to think this out we're looking at all these other things long term about how we're going to bring business into this county and we're failing in our most basic thing which is to the residents to the children who are

[02:36:11] going to school here we've got to do a better job planning absolutely we need to approve this we need to continue to spend money on our schools. I encourage you all to vote for the bond measure on the schools. But I also, again, encourage more long-term planning. We can do better. We must do better so that we're not put in this situation where it is going to look to some like we are grasping quickly to solve a problem and waiting until we've gotten to that stage. Thank you.

[02:36:42] Thank you, sir. Madam Chair, back to you. All right. Thank you so very much. I'm going to go ahead and close the public hearings for all the items under agenda item number eight um before I move forward and ask for a motion did anyone have any questions of staff supervisor um supervisor Bodie then Vega yeah thank you madam chair um my my question for first question for staff just go back down the line of what miss Sutherland was asking and I guess part of this might be for the county attorney too the notice I know that this isn't a traditional rezoning it's an a zoning ordinance update that looks at an overlay is there a difference in how we do notices around

[02:37:18] that? If so, what are the notice guidelines? Madam Chair, members of the board, I'll defer to the planning office with regards to the notice that they provided for this item. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the board, and Supervisor Rody, thank you for your question.

[02:37:34] Yeah, any overlay district is treated for notification purposes like a zoning text amendment, so it does not, unless it's down zoning, a property does not have notice requirements similar to a zoning map amendment that would modify the underlying zoning district. So there aren't any signs posted or anything like that like we would do with the rezoning? That's correct.

[02:37:58] Appreciate that. That's good context. My second question sort of goes to Ms. Sutherland's concerns and questions. We looked at this zoning tax amendment before when you guys were initiating it. Now it's coming back. Can you add any additional elaboration on some of the things that were discussed as concerns in regards to buffering setbacks, guidelines around coloring, and things like that?

[02:38:23] So a lot of that was taken into account when it was initially zoned to, it's already existing underlying zone of M2. So that is in place. There's, you know, development rights to develop that as an industrial, light industrial area.

[02:38:41] So those things are already taken into care of And the e-commerce overlay district adds additional requirements as well as additional benefits. But that is not the subject of the actual text.

[02:38:59] It was not a subject of what the board initiated. Sure. So my last question, Madam Chair, is to be clear, is there really a way for this text amendment to at all alter or override what was already done in the underlying zoning? And are there any other protections that are being added by this change in the overlay?

[02:39:20] Good afternoon, Chair Jefferson and members of the board. Ahmad Bezat with countywide division. So we just expanded the e-commerce overlay district to add this parcel. And just to mention, this parcel has already been developed with the class A industrial buildings.

[02:39:38] And it's already zoned M2 light industrial. We are just adding, expanding the e-commerce to allow fulfillment center and distribution centers to be put on these buildings. We are not adding any other like restrictions or as David mentioned, we are not touching the buffer requirements or that's outside of the scope of like review for this specific case.

[02:40:03] And also we had the planning office has already sent a written notice notice regarding this case to the surrounding property owners despite that we are not like this not mandatory but we have done that. Thank you. Supervisor Vega. Thank you Madam Chair.

[02:40:23] I have a few questions about item 8A. Ms. Weldon would you be the one to answer those questions and as she makes her way up item 8A is to authorize the issuance of one or more general obligations of school bonds in excess of 362 million dollars and so um thank you miss weldon considering the recent meetings that we've had both joint and in the finance and budget committee meeting we've been made aware to include the budget work session that we had last week

[02:41:00] of the pressures that our county coffers are experiencing maybe experiencing and how we have to prepare for said pressures. Is there any way that we can know? The staff report says that if market conditions are unstable or unfavorable, the county will not execute some or all of the refunding bonds. Do you have examples of what would fall under this? Let me, hold on, I may need

[02:41:29] assistance on that. Lily, Joe. Thanks, Joe. Good afternoon. Tim LeClaire from the Finance department so that clause has to do with interest rates the interest rates right now are not favorable so there's going to be probably no refunding taking place thank you for that did we take into consideration the previous meetings that we've had to perhaps reevaluate this ask so we had a we had our annual

[02:42:09] debt meeting with the schools, and they reduced it from $259 million down to the $170 million. Okay, thank you for that. Ms. Roble, is this ask a legal requirement for us to take action on here today?

[02:42:25] To move forward with this, it's legally required. Okay, thank you for that. The reason why I wanted to ask these questions is because as we enter into the budget process, I want my colleagues to be very aware of the situation that we have here, not just when we think about the county budget, but also as we move forward.

[02:42:44] And I do want to be on the record leaving for my colleagues and for county staff as we navigate this process that we're going to have to take into consideration redistricting. We heard it from the chairman of the school board. I don't have any more questions for you. All these are just comments from my colleagues. Thank you. He made mention that it's something that the school division has to do.

[02:43:03] I think that once that does take place, it will give us a better understanding and a clearer picture as to what we're going to prioritize when it comes to renovations and or the construction of new schools. Also, I want to be very clear that we have to take into consideration the decline in enrollment.

[02:43:21] For those of you that took the time to actually read the staff report and what is being asked of us here, there is a lot of investment being asked, and I think that as, again, we navigate these waters, we have to take into consideration what is being asked, what the need is, and what the data shows.

[02:43:37] And so, Madam Chair, I just wanted to be on the record of highlighting those few things. And I want to thank county staff for answering my questions. And I would ask the people doing that during discussion time. Ms. Weldon, if you can come back up. Mr. Clerk. Madam Chair, do what during discussion time?

[02:43:53] So when we have comments, I have questions. And I would really like for us to have our comments during discussion time. So I have some questions for you following up with what my colleague said. The schools pay for the bonds they take out, correct? That is correct. So the money we give them for revenue share can also be used.

[02:44:12] And from what I understand, that's what they use to pay back the bonds. Yes, that is correct. All right. That's all I had. Thank you. So before I, if there's anything that anyone wants to separate out from the public hearings for a vote, because I can call for individual motions, is there anything, otherwise I will call for this all at once.

[02:44:31] Is there anything anyone wants to separate out? I'm sorry. Madam Chair. Oh, Gordy. I forgot. SG. All right, go. I have a couple of questions. Okay. Staff related to 8B. So just, just for clarity, the, you know, can you, can you tell us when those, that land was zoned to M2?

[02:45:04] We can get that for you. Just give us a minute. Okay. I believe it was some, at some point in the 1980s, correct? That sounds correct. Yes. So I just want to, you know, clarify for the record, I, I, I, um, and this has been a very frustrating part for me.

[02:45:23] And, and, um, I appreciate the comments that were brought out by, uh, the speakers today. And I'll, I'll save some comments for, um, after the motion is made in discussion, but, uh, I just wanted to put it on the record, make sure everybody understood that, that we are dealing with an issue here that goes back um uh 40 something years so um i appreciate the work that has been done i appreciate the comments that were made today and i'll have further comments after the motion is made all right thank you and i'm so sorry tom that i missed you all right is there anything

[02:46:00] that people would like to um perhaps vote on individually if so jump in the queue if you have anything you would like to vote on individually all right then i would like to go ahead and get a motion for 8A through 8C. Move for approval. Second. It's been moved and seconded. Supervisor Vega, did you have something? No, I'm ready to vote. All right. Did anyone else have anything?

[02:46:28] Hold on. Yep. Supervisor Bodie. I'll let Cordy go first since he can't actually put himself in the list. All right, Tom. Thank you, Madam Chair. Again, I appreciate the comments that were brought forward today. I've absolutely empathized and I have met with the developers to talk about lighting, setbacks, colors. But again, this land was rezoned back in the 80s to M2 before anything

[02:47:02] else was developed around there. There were some farms across the road. And the unfortunate part is here we are in the 19, or from the 1980s to the 2020s, and are trying to address issues that were failed to be addressed 40 years ago. But we have no leverage as a county due to the lack of proffers on these sites in order to be able to deal with those types of issues. So it simply has been just trying to have a request of the developers to create some setbacks. And to their

[02:47:41] credit, they have moved a little bit back. Their site plan, which was approved long before I was on this board already had their sites laid out where the facilities were going to be. And none of that has changed in terms of the overall square footage.

[02:48:00] And this e-commerce overlay does not add more buildings. It does not add more square footage. It simply changes what happens inside the building. And so the idea of trying to protect the historic area is something that we continue to work on.

[02:48:18] I've asked for more trees. I've asked for dark skies lighting because we also have birds returning to the battlefield that we've not had in the area for a very long time. And so just trying to find ways to deal with an existing zoning that doesn't give us any real tools to be able to address the concerns that we have here in the 2020.

[02:48:43] So, again, we're working on it. We continue to engage with the developers on this. And clearly, my desires for the protection of this battlefield and the other areas, I mean, hopefully by the end of this year or early next year, this battlefield could be expanded by nearly almost 800 acres.

[02:49:06] And so these are things that we are working on to remember the solemnity of this area, while at the same time also trying to protect our environmental concerns in this area. Again, I appreciate the thoughts and the concerns.

[02:49:22] I empathize with them. We've been working on that for three years to address those with the developers and try to do that within the bounds of what limited authorities that we have given the proffers on this site and the existing property rights that the owners already have.

[02:49:41] So I appreciate it again and turn it back over to you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Thank you so very much. Supervisor Bode. Thank you, Madam Chair. And one of the other reasons why I want to let Supervisor Gordy go first is I'm going to go in a completely different direction and talk about 8C very quickly. Restore physical therapy, Pilates, and fitness. I'm excited to officially welcome them to the Occoquan District.

[02:50:00] This small business adds the growing constellation of health and wellness services available to our residents. I appreciate the applicant's efforts to mitigate potential impacts, be a good neighbor, and I'm happy to support this application. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you so very much, and I love Pilates too. All right. Since there's no more comments, let's go ahead and take our votes. Supervisor Gordy? Aye.

[02:50:25] Thank you. Vote unanimous. All right. Thank you so very much. We're going to go on to agenda item number nine. That is county executive time. Mr. Shorten, the floor is yours.

[02:50:41] All right. Thank you very much, Madam Chair, members of the board. Just a few updates, and then we'll get to item 9A. There were no directives issued during your last meeting. There was one directive closed during the last meeting, which was the directive to research disposal options for dredge materials, and that response was sent to the board.

[02:51:03] The board was also sent an update on the directive to establish a zoning district in the Occoquan Reservoir Protection Area, which included text and next steps in terms of timing. Since your last meeting, I've sent the board a few notices, including one informing the board that the directive tracker system is now live on the county's website, and we certainly ask that you continue to give us updates if there are any improvements or changes that you see that need to be made to the platform.

[02:51:39] I also sent the board an update from the planning office on House Bill 153 and Senate Bill 94 regarding high energy use facility assessments. As outlined in the memo, staff believes many of the issues identified are already addressed through existing county review processes or by other entities with the appropriate regulatory authority and technical expertise.

[02:52:03] However, as a reminder, staff is seeking additional policy direction from the board regarding any further site assessment requirements it would like to see staff evaluate. And finally, I sent the board an update on the Purchase Development Rights Program, as well as reporting structure updates on fire and rescue and the zoning office.

[02:52:24] You heard it earlier this afternoon from the planning office, the Center for Digital Government named our planning office's online build-out analysis dashboard as a 2026 county government experience project winner.

[02:52:41] This is now the second award the planning office has received for the build-out analysis, so certainly wanted to recognize just the phenomenal work of our planning office and our IT team. All right. And with that, Madam Chair, I'm going to turn it over to Glenn Loop, who's going to walk us through the 2027 legislative agenda.

[02:53:08] Glenn, I will turn it over to you. Glenn Loop, legislative liaison. Hopefully there's not too much walking left to do because this is a process.

[02:53:25] This is the culmination of a process that began within 45 to 60 days of the veto session in April. And so everything that's in the legislative agenda now has gone through the review of the legislative committee. We've met with each of you, each members of your staff, each of the solicitation from the department heads.

[02:53:49] And the document that you've got in front of you is really an encyclopedia of about 125 or so legislative positions in one form or another. What we put emphasis on this year, though, are the new items, which are highlighted in yellow in the document that's in front of you.

[02:54:09] We had the joint meeting with our legislative delegation last week. All accounts, that was well-received. And the items that are new to the agenda were also seemingly well-received with just a little feedback and comment.

[02:54:29] What we want to be able to do is within 24 hours of like tomorrow is upon the approval of the board of this year's 2027 legislative agenda, we need to immediately start soliciting sponsors and patrons of the bills that are requested in this agenda.

[02:54:46] So with that, we noted last week with you and the legislative delegation, the 10 new items. I'll quickly recap that it's the one to revise the parking requirement mandates, the procurement limits for transportation towing practices of concern the adult detention center authorities for walk-ins feasibility on the bottle recycling program budget amendments for the subtly road improvement project which is a combination community and economic development initiative

[02:55:21] the funding for the palace creek crossing which i heard some about earlier in this meeting funding for the Foundation and Soil Management Program and the Virginia Railway Express Woodbridge Station improvements, and we throw in on top of that the other requests from the police department on e-bike regulations, which again are anticipated to also be reflected in the Virginia Association of Counties legislative agenda.

[02:55:48] You're soon going to be receiving, if you haven't already, the draft VACO legislative agenda. We will cross-reference that agenda with this agenda, and next Wednesday we have a regional meeting of all of our brethren legislative liaisons from northern virginia to address those things on a regional basis of significance so with that we'd be glad to take any questions in the more expansive document or the seven new policy items and four new budget amendments being

[02:56:20] requested in the 2027 session supervisor bailey thank you madam chair go ahead thank you so much for your extensive report today. I just wanted to thank you for, you and your team, Nikki, thank you for just compiling this for us.

[02:56:42] I just want, just for the public to know, we had a very robust, enriched discussion last week with our delegation to make sure that everything was compatible, cohesive, and we are not on separate agendas, but cohesive agendas.

[02:56:59] And so I just want to thank you and Nikki for guiding us in that direction. And it was robust. It was good. I just can't say any differently than that. And the assurance that we will have collaboration, strong collaboration, going into this session to achieve what we need to achieve for the community.

[02:57:21] So just thank you. I do want to note that the pre-filing period has begun. And as of this morning, I could detect several, several hundred bills are already pre-filed. So that kind of tells me where we're going with this session of the General Assembly.

[02:57:39] There are bill limits, which is another reason we need to expeditiously get this agenda in front of our delegation. Yes, they received it, but they're going to get a follow-up on are there particular items in this agenda of interest to them? Who wants to sponsor what, if you will?

[02:57:58] But I think with the bill limits and what I saw this morning, there's going to be easily 3,500 pieces of legislation filed in the 27th session. Could you highlight for us what those sponsorships look like in terms of advocacy? In terms of individual members?

[02:58:16] Just high level. I think there are particular items in this legislative agenda in the 10 new items, both budget amendments and policy items, that have particular appeal to specific members of this delegation. Some members of the delegation have already expressed interest in sponsoring some of these measures.

[02:58:36] So it's time to pick and choose. Does that help you at all? Yeah, pretty much, pretty much. Thank you, Madam Chair. Any other questions? All right. Thank you so very much.

[02:58:52] We have a resolution in front of us. Can I get a motion? So moved, Madam Chair. Second. He hasn't properly moved and seconded. Any discussion? Supervisor Bode? Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. Just very quickly, I want to thank Glenn and the team, as always, for your work throughout this.

[02:59:10] I know over time we've made this process more involved in what have you. Also want to commend the legislative committee and Sue Azarvega and her leadership in that over the past few months. I really appreciate all the work that's been done, and I appreciate especially how we've been able to sort of drill down into specific issues.

[02:59:26] I appreciate, Glenn, you highlighting some of the newer additions that we've talked about, including the VRE station, accelerating the Long Ridge project. And, you know, stronger support in air and water quality monitoring, particularly in equity in this areas. E-bike safety regulations.

[02:59:43] We know that e-bikes are being talked about. We've had folks talk about it during public comment time today. There are a lot of hot-button issues. Really appreciate you all helping us stay on the pulse of what our constituents want us to help advocate for. And that's Supervisor Bailey's point. We're looking forward to assisting and empowering you as we enter the General Assembly session next year.

[03:00:01] Thank you, Madam Chair. All right. Thank you so very much. Nice to know the speakers. Let's go ahead and take our votes. supervisor gordy aye supervisor vega thank you vote unanimous all right thank you so very much i am going on to agenda item number 10 county attorney time madam county attorney thank you madam chair members of the board this afternoon in closed session we will have consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members pertaining to the discussion or the consideration

[03:00:36] of the acquisition of real property for public purposes to include for a senior center a library or other public purposes where discussion in an open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position, litigating posture, or negotiating strategy of the public body. We will have a personnel discussion relating to the appointments and officers of the Potomac and Rappahannock Transportation Commission. We will have a personnel discussion relating to the performance of members of executive leadership slash management. We will have consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members regarding specific legal matters requiring the provision of legal advice by such counsel pertaining to employment law, where such

[03:01:14] 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 and briefings by staff members regarding specific legal matters requiring the provision of legal advice by such counsel pertaining to the safety and security of county facilities and property, including regulation of weapons on or in county facilities and property, where such consultation, discussion, or briefing in an open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position, negotiating strategy, or public litigating posture of the public body.

[03:01:46] And we will have discussion of reports or plans related to the security of the McCourt government building complex and other county government buildings and facilities and the safety of persons using such building complex buildings or facilities, including briefings by staff members, legal counsel, and law enforcement or emergency service officials concerning actions taken to respond to related threats to public safety.

[03:02:10] These items are appropriate for closed session pursuant to 2.2-3711A, 1, 3, 8, and 19 of the Code of Virginia. So moved, Madam Chair. Second. All right, let's go ahead and take our votes. Supervisor Gordy? Aye.

[03:02:26] Supervisor Vega? Oh, okay. Are you a yes, ma'am? Thank you. Vote unanimous.

[03:02:43] All right, thank you very much. I'm going to turn it back over to Mr. Shorter for our agency time. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. For item 11A, this is both a board action.

[03:02:58] We're going to, before board action, we're going to do a presentation, and I'll invite Acting Director Janet Bartnick to come down for the presentation, well, to introduce the presentation, and we are asking for the board's consideration on an item related to adopting the Pathways to 2035 Prince William County Trails Master Plan, and with that, Acting Director Bartnick, I'll turn it over to you.

[03:03:24] Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the board. Janet Bartnick, Acting Director of Parks and Recreation. It is my pleasure today to share with you the Pathways 2035. Trails matter to our community, and we know that both in the 2019 and the 2024 needs assessment surveys, not only did trails come up as the most important assets we can put in our community when it comes to recreation, but also when we even consider what we've already invested in, in terms of a priority investment rating, trails come in as number one.

[03:03:58] I know that the Trails and Blue Ways Council members who were here earlier and a few other advocates already told you about the benefits of trails, so I won't bore you with that. But instead, I'll just tell how impressed I am with the work of the team that did this in-house planning study across three different departments, led by our planning manager, Patty Packel, and her team at Parks and Recreation, working very closely with our friends at the Department of Transportation and Capital Construction, as well as the planning department.

[03:04:25] This staff team did an amazing job of doing a lot of community engagement, working with our Trails and Blue Ways Council very closely, members of your offices as well as the general public who just absolutely love Trails and Blue Ways. So with that, I'll introduce Patty Pakula, our planning manager, to get the ball rolling on the presentation.

[03:04:43] Thank you. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the board. Patty Pakula, planning manager, Prince William Parks and Rec. And do I just click or do the, I'll use the mouse but I don't just, oh, there we go, there we go.

[03:05:06] Hey, learning to new technology. Hello everybody. So yeah, I'm here to present the Pathways 2035 study as Janet mentioned. We did this in-house with the project team which included myself, Robert Boyd, David Crager, Janelle Pridemore and Catherine Gonzales, our GIS analysts from PARCS, slowly Bryce Barrett from Department of Transportation and Capital Construction and the planning office. Yolanda Hipsky helped us while she was here with the planning office. It was a heavy lift, but it was finally getting a lot of the information that we knew we had

[03:05:44] put together and compiled in a manner that we can use it. So why was this plan needed? Well, trails have been around a long time and have been very popular in the county. we really started back when we were the park parks department was the park authority with the plan in 1993 that was our first real effort at planning but it was really a parks document at that point and really looked at just the greenway corridors in we've had different iterations of it since the histories in the plan itself we went back and looked through and and

[03:06:24] talked about how we've kind of grown trails in the county um in 2008 we moved trails into the prior well 2008 we moved them into the park the comprehensive plan but they were still what we call recreational trails or park trails were still looked at kind of separately from the active mobility and the shared use paths so we were still as agencies kind of out there planning trails but but we weren't really making that connection of how do they actually connect to each other and how can people use them in their everyday lives.

[03:07:01] And then in 2022, we finally got around to merging trails and the active recreation mobility trails into the mobility chapter of the comp plan, and in that document made the directive to do this comprehensive countywide trails plan.

[03:07:24] So how does that fall in the agency documents? I'll call another plan is obviously you have your comp plan and the different chapters thereof. We have our parks and rec chapter. Again, we have the mobility chapter.

[03:07:40] The parks chapter calls for our sub-document, which is the parks and open space master plan document that we do. And again, the mobility chapter called for this countywide trails master plan to look at everything, including taking a step into looking at blueways, which we were getting a lot of inquiries from the public to start looking at and making our waterways more accessible.

[03:08:06] We had that as a directive in our different plans, but again, how do we make those water trails? So this is, and these are all, again, driven by goals in the strategic plan. So we tried to tie in the strategic plan goals into the goals of the plan.

[03:08:27] So sync, I'm going to get that word wrong, but the synchronization of the plans is also on a good structure in that you have the comp plan, which is a 40-year document. You have, and then our sub plans are 10-year documents.

[03:08:45] We do our parks and rec master planning on a 10-year horizon. That currently is falling on the 10-year cycle, so 2020, 2030. And so it happened by chance that this plan now falls on the five-year increments.

[03:09:03] So we hope to update this plan in 10-year increments, and we named it Pathways 2035, so that the next update will be done 10 years from now. So what was the plan scope? The plan scope, again, we had a lot of citizen feedback through our trails, and Blue Ways members, and then the public comment.

[03:09:26] And we really wanted to identify gaps. All the departments have been out there. We've been planning trails. Transportation has been implementing them with their roadway projects. We've been implementing with our park projects. We seek donations from development proffers to expand our trail network.

[03:09:44] But over the years, we've had a variety of situations where we may have gotten an easement, but no trail construction, and then did not have the funding to build the trail. And again, we've had all that data in various sources, but we've never kind of put it all together in one document.

[03:09:59] So we really wanted to take the deep dive, identify the gaps, and then start to prioritize the gaps so that we can know in advance when to move these trail projects forward. We get grant requests or opportunities quite often where we know, oh, that trail would be a great opportunity to go after that grant.

[03:10:23] but we don't have the legwork in place then to be able to apply for that grant on a timely manner. So we really wanted, again, to wrap all of that in. We wanted to look at trail mileage. Like I mentioned, we're looking at blue ways for the first time.

[03:10:40] We wanted to take into consideration the inter-jurisdictional connections. We work with all the surrounding departments in the Northern Virginia Regional Commission to do different planning studies to look at how we relate to the larger region we wanted to look again at the bike routes and the multimodal access and even try to address our equestrian trail partners and that's mostly through obviously the recreational trails that we have and of course with any plan anybody's going to ask you as soon as you put a plan forward how much is it going to

[03:11:16] cost to implement. So we wanted to do our best at cost estimating. I'll talk about that more later, but it's really, this is a high level planning document. So these are high level numbers, but we just wanted to put that forward so that that can be part of the conversation when we move projects forward and discuss what the next priority is. And then maintenance needs. I'm sure you've heard from presentations in the parks department and other departments that deferred maintenance is a big expense that's no different in our trails network so we really want to take this

[03:11:52] use the information in this plan to set up a prioritization process similar to this to now begin looking at our deferred maintenance needs across our trail network for parks a lot of our trails have developed out of social trails so they're not always built in a sustainable manner and where there may be subject to erosion so we wanted to start to get an idea again where the trails are so again the first part is to to start with looking at what are the existing conditions and where are you at so as I

[03:12:30] mentioned active mobility trails would be the projects that are overseen by DTCC shared use paths we did not go down to the level of sidewalks we went as far as sharrows and paved shoulders along roadways for the bicycling network and then recreational trails would be those managed by the parks department key things here are in the active mobility trail network having 291 miles of planned corridor I think you can already see probably in project that's

[03:13:06] going to be a high number to build and I'll let Bryce talk more about that on the recreational trails just to clarify we have an existing category those are trails on the ground right now we have a planned category that means we have an easement in place but the trail not there so we may have secured the easement from a development proffer or other things but they did not build the tear trail and then we wanted to separate out what we called proposed trails those would be the gap fillers in our network where we don't have anything currently

[03:13:41] in place to advance that so those are mostly where we will need a easement to complete that network and those show up as your dotted lines in the mobility chapter trails map and in the maps in this document so that that really can help us as park as planners to be able to now know it's been in our heads of where we need these things but now we have it in a map to really be able to see where we may need to go out and negotiate with landowners or talk with land development applications when

[03:14:14] they come in to determine where to fill those gaps in the network and then by surface type for the park trails interestingly enough when I get to talking about figures just notice that most of the trails in our network are the natural surface trails because that's how that's me a lot of these are our again our green white trail corridors which follow the streams the stream valleys in the county so they would be natural surface they would be on the lower end of the budget numbers

[03:14:46] when we get to that point so i'll let bryce discuss active mobility uh thank you patty uh chair jefferson members of the board my name is bryce barrett i'm a principal planner with the department of transportation and capital construction and i also have the honor of serving as our bike pay coordinator in our department really excited to come to the board today to talk about active mobility component of the pathways to 2035 plan early on we we realized that the motivations for users of trails for recreational trails versus active mobility trails

[03:15:24] are fundamentally different you know from an active mobility perspective you're looking at getting access to work you're looking at getting access to shopping or school and you're typically trying to take the shortest route possible hopefully you know completely without any gaps or anything like that gain access to transit facilities so that you can you know participate in the larger transit network in the region whereas recreational trail users may not be concerned whether or not their recreational trail has access to a bus stop so as we moved into the the prioritization exercise, we knew that we needed to look at the prioritization of these

[03:16:03] different types of trails differently. So we have nine overall categories that we used as our criteria for creating the prioritization, with safety being the standout as it was a unique criteria just for the active mobility trails. Now, when we're talking about safety in this context, We're talking about safety from a trail user and their interaction with motor vehicles, not overall general safety.

[03:16:33] So while safety is obviously a concern for Parks and Rec and our recreational trails, it just wasn't the context of what we were looking for as part of this prioritization exercise. So a good example of kind of looking at things differently, kind of similar to what I was saying earlier, is access to public transit facilities.

[03:16:53] That was a high priority from the active mobility standpoint, but it was weighted a little bit lower with the recreational trails. So with this prioritization criteria, we were able to evaluate all 200 segments of our active mobility trail network.

[03:17:13] It was a total of 291 miles, and the distribution that's being shown on this graph here is looking at the total number of segments and their overall score. What we found with this was within expectations, we had a couple of projects that kind of bubbled to the top as they met all or most of the prioritization criteria.

[03:17:39] So those stand out as having the greatest need based on our assessment. And then as you start kind of getting back to the middle of the pack, you start seeing more trails that fall within a more average range.

[03:17:58] So breaking it down further, we decided to evaluate trails in a tier. So we evaluated tier one trails as essentially the top 20 percent of the ranked trails in the active mobility component. This graph shows the breakdown of that.

[03:18:15] The bars themselves are measuring trails in miles. So the Brinsville district has the largest number of miles because they also have the longest stretches of facilities that remain to be built. Whereas some of the more dense districts like Woodbridge or Potomac have a lower mileage count, but they might have a higher number of segment count.

[03:18:39] One of the key things that we really wanted to point out here was that there was a really good distribution of trails in this tier one category within every magisterial district in the county with at least having four trail segments in these 42 trails that were identified in the top tier one.

[03:18:57] Taking a little bit closer look at some of the facilities that rank the highest, this is the top 10 of the active mobility trails, and a lot of these really are not surprises to us.

[03:19:13] Minnieville Road, Old Bridge Road, completing segments of Route 1, these are priorities that the county has had for quite some time. You also have other trails that we have actively been working on, like the Holy Road Shared Use Path.

[03:19:28] We recently completed a VDOT STAR study, a strategically targeted affordable roadway solution study that specifically identified increasing multimodal access along Holy Road. So the findings that we got from this really coincided with some of the other projects and studies that we're already actively working on or have recently completed.

[03:19:49] The second part of the analysis, aside from the prioritization, that we really wanted to kind of tackle was coming up with some planning level or preliminary cost estimates. That helps us from a staff level because it can help create the conversation.

[03:20:07] We frequently evaluate grant programs and selecting the right project to make sure that it's competitive is the key to actually being awarded those funds and being able to move forward with those funding opportunities. So we decided that we would try and tackle the idea of kind of high-level planning cost estimate with the understanding that as these projects were selected, then we would further refine the cost estimate based on the project's scope and scale. So the first challenge we needed

[03:20:42] to do was come up with a per mile construction cost per facility type. So we looked at recently completed projects to determine what the construction costs of those projects were and then kind of scale that up to a per mile ratio. So we did that for our shared use paths, our bike lanes, our charrows, and unfortunately for paved shoulders, that is a little bit of a unique situation because the idea is that those are located primarily on our more rural roads, and we're hoping that through the VDOT's pavement program we can find opportunities

[03:21:17] to potentially pave in place or widen or expand the shoulder to provide a little bit of additional comfort for cyclists or pedestrians who may be using that facility. So the first estimate, you know, the length of the facility times the cost per mile to construct that type of facility, that gives us an overall construction estimate.

[03:21:40] There's a couple other factors that we needed to take into consideration. First is that primarily the vast majority of active mobility trails are actually located within VDOT right-of-way. That means that there are design standards that need to be met based on the state requirements.

[03:21:58] There's permitting costs that need to be built into the trail projects, and there's the overall design and engineering of those trail projects. So generally, about 40% of the construction costs is a good estimate for doing that design, engineering, permitting, and design, engineering, and permitting costs.

[03:22:23] Then we knew that there are a lot of other factors that also need to be taken into consideration when you're looking at trail construction. First is availability of right-of-way, if there are any environmental or watershed or stormwater drainage issues that need to be addressed.

[03:22:39] Maybe there's steep slopes or contours that may need retaining walls. Those types of treatments will up the cost of a facility very quickly. So we decided to come up with a range for the final cost for these trails, a high estimate and a low estimate, applying either a 20% contingency or complexity factor or a 60% contingency or complexity factor.

[03:23:03] And ultimately, what we ended up with was a pretty high number for estimating the cost of our tier one trails. 450 million to about 600 million would be the cost to build out the 76 miles of trails that were identified as the top 42 segments.

[03:23:21] That is a high number, but it's something that we We see at a regional level as well. NVTA recently completed in 2025 an analysis looking at kind of funding future bicycle and pedestrian facilities in the region.

[03:23:38] And at a regional level, I think the high-level cost estimate was somewhere around the tune of $30 billion. So this isn't a problem that Prince William has, you know, alone. It's something that we're going to have to tackle at a regional level, at a local level, and quite possibly a state and federal level as well.

[03:23:58] And with that, I'll pass it back over to Parks and Rec. Okay, so we did the same analysis, again, then for our recreational trails. We used, again, the same prioritization criteria.

[03:24:15] So Catherine, our GIS analyst, was the nice person who took all of these interests, and we got these criteria from the public meetings that we held and the feedback that we got as far as what the citizens wanted to see out of their trails.

[03:24:32] And of course, the number one points were connectivity. And so we used these criteria to individually rank all of the trail segments, and like Bryce mentioned, the safety was not applicable to the rec trails.

[03:24:49] We measure safety in other methods. So, again, with the distribution, we had 140 total segments, and in the 118 miles, our high score was a 39, and so we felt that the distribution, again, followed transportation, and we felt it was in a good range, and from this distribution, we then took our tier one.

[03:25:20] So, we broke, and it's not clear on these slides, but it's in the plan. we broke the groupings of each of the trail categories into tier one tier two tier three just to be able to have a full list of everything and then broke it out by score when i i'll talk about that in a minute with about the tiers so but in tier one for the recreational trails we ended up with 40 54 miles that scored in our tier one range again that breaks down to a little more in brentsville and that's simply because of all the arms that go off of the broad run greenway

[03:25:56] pretty much um and then a fewer segments in woodbridge um that's not to that doesn't mean we have um we don't have trails in woodbridge we have a lot of trails in woodbridge um it's just on the priority ranking and the tiers this is how they came out um oops back how do i go back technology is not my friend you can go both ways with it okay there we go i think we're here

[03:26:32] all right so out of our tier one we just wanted to list the top 10 um again with the stress i want to make with the study is we don't this is how they scored we don't intend for number one to be built first number two to be built second number three to be built third we rank them by score we want all tier one facilities to be considered equal to each other it all just depends which district may come up or which project may come up first as a priority dependent on other factors and we can say that it is a tier one project

[03:27:10] and it can advance that way so again these are the scores there's a lot of segments of the Potomac Heritage Trail in here I think everybody agrees that's one of our big you know our big initiatives right now is to build that out obviously we have the pals a lot of our greenways and so we really wanted to look those that capture those the point the interesting point of this slide is that most of our top 10 are actually fell in the proposed category which if you remember is the area where we still have to go out and secure the land in the

[03:27:47] right-of-way so that direct staff that we have our work cut out for us to be begin to bring these to fruition and move them forward so that'll be another factor that needs to be considered as funding of becomes available and projects move forward are they in the proposed stage are they in the plan stage and how can they go forward so at the cost estimating we looked at the history a few of our recent projects in the history obviously we have like I mentioned the natural surface trails which surprisingly still cost about 425

[03:28:24] thousand dollars a mile to build that sounds like a lot but it breaks actually just breaks down to $80 a linear foot so if if you break it down to the foot it's not too bad and then six million dollars would be something like our boardwalk segments that we're doing at Featherstone and other projects that we've done with the neabsco boardwalk for instance um so again it's a wide range um and we want everybody you know we we want to we wanted to give the numbers we knew we'd be asked for them so to build just the tier one facilities the 54 miles of tier one facilities um for recreation we

[03:29:04] came up with 68 million to 326 million now if you remember back to that earlier slide i also noted that a majority almost 80 percent of our planned trails that we won't need to build our natural surface trails so they would fall at that lower end of the budget the higher end budget would be if we're building a lot of boardwalk in those 54 miles so again it's just it's a range um to drive additional discussions as each project comes up and we begin to work out the design parameters

[03:29:38] for each trail segment they're intended to be a first step so then as i mentioned we also included blue ways analysis this was a first for us um i have to say at first we didn't quite know what we were doing i'll admit that um we know we want to get access to the water we weren't quite sure how do you go about evaluating how aware and how how are people going to paddle so we put it out there to the public to get more feedback on that um we were able to find out from our paddling community that they uh with the still water in prince william county we're not you're not floating

[03:30:13] a long distance you will be paddling um and that the patent the desired length of our distance between paddling stops is about two to three miles um if they can go one directional great if they have to go and come back that has to be a consideration taken and you know that's taken into consideration so what we did again with our great gis help we were able to look at we took on The image on the left is looking at where we have existing put-ins and take-outs.

[03:30:47] We use Fairfax County sites as well because they do provide access for residents to go over to Fairfax and put in on the waterways. So we looked at where that is and we mapped out two to three mile distances. So basically anything in red is really not currently accessible for a paddle.

[03:31:04] We didn't dive into water depth, flow rates, or any of that. That's a little bit beyond our expertise level at this stage. So we just wanted to look purely at distance. And so, again, the red areas would be kind of outside bounds, not much paddling access.

[03:31:23] We then have a number of sites, for instance, where we've proposed to put a site launch at our Sinclair Mill site, which is under development or in site plan review soon. We've got other properties all along Broad Run. the county is blessed with a lot of broad run frontage. And so we looked at if we're able to, we didn't get into the site analysis yet, but if we are able to put a launch at those facilities or get people to the water to paddle from those locations, where does that go down?

[03:31:56] So you can see the broad run because of that, the fortune of having all of the land that we have with Broad Run Linear Park, we could potentially make the Broad Run go from red to green with implementing those recommendations.

[03:32:13] So we just use this as a baseline data, then to make a proposal that we want to, A, look at, continue to do our due diligence and planning for water trails in Prince William County. and we've worked with tourism on input into the maritime study that they've been doing.

[03:32:34] And then the second is we really want to take another look or an additional look at broad run and see how we can potentially advance that ahead of all the other waterway, again, given the existing resources that are there. So it turned out into an eye-opening analysis for us as well.

[03:32:54] We didn't know where we were headed with it once we started it, but we do like the end point and being able to drive those directives. So in the plan, I would say we plan to plan, so we have more tasks that come out any time you do a plan like this.

[03:33:10] So we also want to take in the next 10-year horizon of this plan, along with pushing those, you know, promoting those projects to move forward as many as we can. we acknowledge that the Parks Department has trail design standards that throughout this project process and the public comment pyramid we found are kind of outdated and need to be updated so we'd really like to update those standards we want to start working building our partnerships there's several trails that are planned along utility corridors in the county and so

[03:33:48] we'd like to work with our partners in the utility industry to look at where we might be able to co-locate trails and utilities at a greater rate safety and education programming coming out of Department of Transportation and Capital Construction Bryce is very active in those outreach programs looking at whether anything that's coming out of this plan make create the need for a comp plan update in the future again I mentioned our recreational trail maintenance plan so we're currently in parks are looking that picture on the

[03:34:25] bottom right is the great work that our crews recently done completed out at the cat Harpen Greenway trail north of Silver Lake Park for anybody that had ever used it you know you lose your shoes in the mud and so they've been really good at getting out there and now we want to try to apply a similar process like this where we can start to prioritize our trail maintenance projects just like we prioritized our trail construction projects so that's a next step um you heard several of our trail advocates mention the low-hanging fruit projects those are intended to be some of these

[03:35:04] small sections that may be you know a few hundred feet to a mile that really fill gaps where we maybe have the easement but just haven't had the ability to build a short natural surface trail we have volunteer groups that are are perfectly capable of doing that for us so with a few work days we may be able to complete those gaps lowering the number of projects that are increasing the number of projects that come off the list and then again expanding on-road bicycle facilities rural

[03:35:38] bikes with bicycle facilities and a big one coming up that also needs funding is the wayfinding signage implementation plan we get comments at through our trails and blueways council and all of our meetings about the lack of signage on our trail and we've had a difficult time keeping up with we're blessed in adding new trail but our some of our current signs are deteriorating so and then just missing in general.

[03:36:09] So that's something we definitely want to look at. So how about the implementation and where do we go from here? Again, the primary focus on the Tier 1 segments. Again, we have Tier 2 and Tier 3, so we have a lot of projects to choose from.

[03:36:28] Anytime there's an opportunity, we want to look at all options, you know, so that's not to say that the Tier 2 and Tier 3, we don't want to look at them in this 10-year horizon. we want to be able to look at all of them across the board see which ones make sense and then begin work on those action items that i just mentioned work with the trails and blueways on the low hanging fruit and then again as everybody's mentioned those advocates had mentioned funding will basically drive a lot of it we want to work to try to include as many projects as we can in cip

[03:37:07] projects um staff is very dedicated and looking for grants both in parks and in dtcc um and just trying to move this project forward or all projects all of these projects forward to the extent possible but it was a was a big lift but we're happy to have it done and hope that we can make a lot of headway moving forward i think that's it thank you any questions hold on supervisor boating thank you madam chair thank you patty thank you bryce thank you transportation and capital construction, thank you to Parks and Recreation, thank you for economic development and tourism, and

[03:37:46] everybody else who put, la-di-da-di-everybody, exactly. I also want to thank, obviously, Neil and Eileen, who are my folks on some of the various coalitions and bodies that helped contribute towards this. So I had a couple questions, probably for Patty.

[03:38:04] One, I know that back in 2022, the Trails and Blueways folks had an aspirational trails map how much did that inspire what you all came up with with this so the aspirational trails map i'll speak for charlie grimes the aspirational trails map was really driven by the greater prince william trails coalition and their efforts to get a handle on the mapping that drove the mobility chapter so a lot of that got incorporated when we did the mobility

[03:38:39] chapter update and this is really the mobility chapter broken down into those details so it it drove it quite a bit appreciate that in terms of especially you sort of talked about some of the uh efforts will be towards like signs and place making and wayfinding um specifically on the segments that are part of the potomac historic scenic trail heritage scenic trail um how much have you all if at all have interacted with the northern virginia regional commission nvrc because they're doing a lot of work around that too and i know that they've been talking about especially

[03:39:15] in terms of resources and partnering with regional uh organizations towards that effort yeah so we communicate with nvrc regularly um they're kind of the manager of all the northern virginia land managers and the conduit to through the national park service um so we work with them once we build a trail segment it'll be designated as part of the potomac carriage trail by the national park service and then we'll be able to place the logo on it um and get it acknowledged as part of the system so we're we're continually in communication with both the park service and nvrc appreciate

[03:39:55] that segments thank you and my last question and you sort of talked a little bit patty is that part of this especially for the proposed ones that are proposed as an example is getting right of way whether that's from private entities homeowners landowners what have you i know that you all have done an excellent job doing that as part of the ocagon greenway sort of been that's been the maiden voyage of a long-term multi-year effort you know each segment by segment you know property owner by property owner and then also hoa is getting that done how much has that experience informed your plans on how to do that now on sort of a county wide scale not only for frankly the uh

[03:40:32] the trails but also the blueways because I would imagine that some of the blueways your potential place we're going to be putting in taking out other than places like St. Clair Mill we're going to have to look at private property or things that are adjacent to private property. Right yeah we definitely work with all of the individual homeowners we don't want you know we can't we don't force them we want to talk to them about the the benefit that those easements provide we've been very blessed with what we've been able to get along the Occoquan Greenway and again with these other with these other systems we've got trail advocates out there that

[03:41:06] have helped us out in certain situations in Occoquan with a reroute and then we actually have landowners who have donated dedicated land or easements for trails in different areas so we're learning as we go we would have would have always been nicer to get the trail built back in the day when we were getting all of the proffers for these trails um i've been at the game for since 1999 i hate to say but um so we've we've the the amount of um easement that we've got out on broad run in particular is um if we

[03:41:46] can ever get all of that built i think the the community just will really appreciate all those connections being made we've got a lot in place um but yeah we can we can learn we're always learning lessons on how to implement it and expand the system thank you and since 1999 thank you for being at this since you were five years old patty thank you i wish all right supervisor bailey i'm not going to say anything past what he just said but i want to thank you for this is great this is great news and you're making mr charlie grimes happy i look at he's smiling but um i wanted to

[03:42:26] ask two questions one is i know we're we're coming out of the arper fund cares act era and that helped us a lot are we towards the end of that in terms of improvements and where we were with old stuff did we are we pretty good and that going forward um when we talk about the the ranking and where we are are we pretty good with the beginning coming out of the arper fund and cares Act phase? Yeah, I mean, we're always looking for new opportunities. You never know at the,

[03:43:02] I don't want to speak on behalf of Megan Landis and DTCC, but I know that you never know when that next round of federal funding is going to come up. And we're now, I know DTCC is working with creating a group on looking at how can we now fund some of the active mobility segments with more grant applications now that we have the background data we're going to do the same for parks and rec um so i think a lot of the arpa funding was some of the smaller in park trail networks we were able to get completed with that yeah and maintenance yeah and maintenance and so

[03:43:40] but we're we're just going to continue to always look for those opportunities and again this is that's what was lacking before this plan is we didn't have that um boost well we knew what we knew what we needed but we didn't always have the time to pull the applications can be very extensive and require a lot of background and you need a lot of budget and you need a lot of site design and you need to have some of that work already done and so we were a little bit behind the curve and sometime missing out on those opportunities just because we we weren't far enough along to be able to push them across the finish line and I think this plan definitely

[03:44:20] will help more of those projects move forward that way. Yeah, yeah, it's a great plan. So the other question that I have is when you talk about grant funding, and I know it's been minimal in terms of federal funding, that's been kind of quiet lately, but, you know, what does that look like in terms of not just the grant funding but the partnerships?

[03:44:39] You mentioned partnering with some of the utility companies. You know, what does that look like to make it actually happen? Because I think that is a low-hanging fruit for us. Well, and it's getting, it's, we've worked with Prince William Water to look at if there's opportunities when they go in and do a project.

[03:44:58] It all comes down to the landowner and making sure that there's deeds in place. But if Prince William Water is going to be doing work in an area, is there an opportunity to leave a trail behind? Same with the high tension lines.

[03:45:13] Like when they go in and do the upgrades, is there the opportunity to share and access or share that point? And so those are just conversations that we need to have with those utility holders to see if that's something we can partner on and then obviously address the underlying landowner issue as far as securing easements and rights of way on those properties where those connections are needed.

[03:45:38] And then lastly, my last question is, when you talk about number 10 on your list, the Potomac Historic Site National Trail, that's a big one. What's the high-level strategic plan in terms of, I know we have it in our legislative priorities, and we have to keep working at it, but what do you see high-level that we can get it through?

[03:46:06] Because it's a big plan, a big project, but we want to make sure that we're getting appropriate funding to complete it. Right. And so staff has been asked to, you know, contribute to that request, the recent legislative request to try to fund it at the state level.

[03:46:23] We've also, we've completed with some federal highways grant funding, we recently completed a gap analysis study to look at how we can get the trail in place from Belmont to the town of Occoquan.

[03:46:41] There were three gaps. There was one from the town of Dumfries, through the town of Dumfries to Prince William Forest Park, and then there was one, the third gap was coming out of Prince William Forest Park and connecting back to Route 1. So we had to hire a consultant, and those studies are complete.

[03:46:58] So now we know where we intend to locate the trail and what type of infrastructure is needed. Now, again, then we just continue to advance those with grant applications and seeking funding. And then, obviously, we're working on the plan for the Powell's Creek Crossing between leastlvania and potomac shore so it's it's a long game and nothing happens overnight so we're just we're pulling together all the pieces we have the planning done essentially for all the pieces now

[03:47:34] it's to it is that effort to find that funding um and and get those those in place supervisor gordy i know your hand must be tired thank you madam chair um patty bryce thank you all so much for uh all your hard work on this i also want to shout out to uh liz kronauer and steve cover our trails and blueways uh commissioners from the brentsville district who are um never shy with uh you know speaking to us about uh the trail priorities in our in in the brentsville district

[03:48:11] and the county as a whole um i just uh i really appreciate one of the things that you guys said earlier about this being a living document um rather than uh as kind of what was said about the early one it was just kind of planned it was but it was almost sort of like put on a shelf but um you know we often talk about we need to be planning 25 years out what do we want the county to look like 25 years from now and um this plan gives us a great starting point um or it's actually not a starting point, but a great continuation of all the work that's been done, but really gives

[03:48:49] us, I think, that long-term view of trails, of blueways. I mean, we're about to have the maritime study presented, and there's some crossover with that as well. But when we think about the priorities of our county, what people say they want, this is what they want. This is top of mind. And you also said earlier that this is about health and well-being. And what I love about it, there's another word that I would use, is it connects our communities. You know, we built

[03:49:27] neighborhoods, but really didn't link those neighborhoods. But these trails now will help us get out of our neighborhoods into a common place so that we become one community and we begin to have shared experiences with one another outside of our just simple our simple neighborhoods um so again i just want to commend you um for the hard work on this and appreciate the vision and the foresight and all the hard work that's gone into this um but as has been said you know without any money behind this um you know it is just another uh document that can get put on the shelf

[03:50:05] so i think this is something that from a budgetary standpoint we need to start prioritizing and finding ways to putting this plan into action. And I really don't have any questions, but just, again, commend you guys for the hard work that you've done and look forward to the continued work on now the implementation phase as we partner together going forward.

[03:50:29] Thank you. Thank you. And if I may also commend Liz Kronauer. She was instrumental in the 1993 plan. Liz Kronauer's name is in the 1993 Greenways and Trails Plan, and her name is in the mobility chapter.

[03:50:49] Her name is now on this plan. She has had our stamp on trails in Prince William County, and she also served as the trail planner for Fairfax County for most of her career. So she's more dedicated than me.

[03:51:08] That's an understatement. Thank you. Wow. All right. I don't see any other speakers. Speakers, thank you so very much. Charlie, Merry Christmas. Well, actually, that's when Charles, that's when we get to the budget season. Okay.

[03:51:24] All right. If there is nothing else, I would like to go ahead and get a motion, because I see Rick coming down. You're not on trails, are you, Rick? Good. Okay. So can I get a motion to move this forward? So moved. Second. All right. Hold on. I got to choose. I'll choose Stuart.

[03:51:42] All right. Supervisor Gordy. Aye.

[03:51:58] advisor vega thank you vote unanimous all right thank you so very much mr shorter all right thank you very much madam chair so with item 11b uh we're looking for a presentation on the i-95 bidirectional express lane study and we're going to have director of dtcc rick canizales introduce our vdot partners who are here with us to do the presentation rick i'll turn it over to you. Thank you, Mr. Shorter. Madam Chair, members of the board, Rick Canizales, your Director of

[03:52:36] Transportation and Capital Construction. Thank you very much for giving us and VDOT an opportunity to discuss this very important project, the I-95 bi-directional expressway lane study. It's looking at doing bi-directional lanes on the 95 corridor, where right now only one direction exists. As you know they go north in the morning, they go south in the afternoon, and in the weekends it will vary depending on the need. So with this I think you'll look at a facility similar to I-66 and VDOT is here to talk to us a little bit about it as they're going around

[03:53:11] the region and discussing this with all our jurisdiction members that are part of this as well as our regional entities such as NVTA. With that said, today we have our VDOT administrator for Northern Virginia, Mr. Bill Cutler, is here to introduce the study, and he has his team here, other VDOT staff, as well as floor representatives, which is the company that is looking to move forward with this project.

[03:53:41] With that said, Mr. Cutler. Thank you so much, Rick. Madam Chair, members of the board, it's a pleasure to be here. with you today. Thank you so much for having us. Of course, I'm Bill Cutler, the leader of VDOT's Northern Virginia District, where we proudly serve Arlington, Fairfax, Prince William, and Loudoun counties. And it's nice to see you in your home environment. Often I see you at ribbon cuttings and groundbreaking events or with Chair Jefferson at the NVTA or also with Supervisor Angry at TPB. So very nice to see you all. Thank you so much for having us again. And I want to

[03:54:19] take a moment also to thank Rick Canizales and the partnership that we've had at VDOT with Prince William County's Transportation Department. You know, he's leading one of the largest local programs in the Commonwealth, and that's pretty impressive. So we very much appreciate that strong partnership. We're also delivering a pretty darn big program as well, and I want to recognize Mr.

[03:54:44] Dick Burke in the audience who I think you're most familiar with. He's my liaison to Prince William County, our Transportation Land Use Director. And just last month, Mr. Burke won a Commissioner's Award, which is a statewide award presented by Commissioner Britch. So I want to recognize him in this room. He did not know I was going to say that. But again, thank you so much for all of the partnership, the work you're going to do. I'm going to turn it over now to our Krishna Poturi, who is our Northern Virginia District Mega Project Director, and he's leading

[03:55:20] our feasibility study of modifying express lanes on Interstate 95. Thank you, Bill, Madam Chair, members of the Board. Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for this opportunity to provide an update on the I-95 bidirectional express lanes study.

[03:55:40] Like Rick mentioned, the project kind of looks at opportunity to convert 95 express lanes into two directions. I'll quickly start with an overview of all the express lanes in the region. we currently have 97 miles of connected express lanes, providing additional travel opportunities for commuters, supporting regional mobility, and benefiting communities we serve.

[03:56:06] What you see on this graphic here is the green line is the 95 reversible lanes, and 395 is reversible, but all the others are like 66. We have express lanes in both directions, And we are currently working on two different studies, 495 Southside, which goes from Springfield Interchange all the way into Maryland to Maryland 210 across Woodrow Wilson Bridge.

[03:56:36] And then the other study we are working on is the 95 bi-directional project. And we are here today to focus on the 95 bi-directional project. So what you see here is that the existing 95 lanes currently terminate near exit 133 at Route 17 Interchange in Stafford County.

[03:56:58] these lanes operate in reversible configuration serving traffic only in one direction during peak periods they generally operate in northbound direction during morning peak and southbound direction during evening peak and not one only throughout the day on sundays this reversible configuration presents limitations and doesn't completely address the traffic challenges that are faced along the corridor the purpose of this current study is to evaluate the benefits and impacts converting the corridor to a permanent bi-directional express lane system VDOT and

[03:57:32] Transurban represented here are conducting environmental studies and preliminary engineering activities to evaluate the feasibility of this project the study extends approximately 45 miles all the way from Franconia Springfield Parkway in the northern Virginia to the Spotsylvania Parkway in Fredericksburg area under the preliminary concept the corridor would provide three express lanes in each direction in the northern segment between Franconia Parkway to Prince William Parkway and then it would transition to a two express lane system in each direction extending all the

[03:58:09] way to Spotsylvania Parkway you see on that graphic there at the very south end and the two typical sections kind of show the three express lanes in each direction in the northern segment what's shown in the purple is the existing system which is reversible and then what's shown in orange is the new lanes that would be constructed as part of this project, if this project moves forward, that would give us an opportunity to run express lanes in both directions 24-7.

[03:58:40] What we have here is a stick figure. It's a very preliminary conceptual layout of what we envision this city would entail. This shows the 95 segment in Prince William County. North is pointed to the right.

[03:58:57] The gray lines or the horizontal lines show 95, the purple lines or the express lanes in the center, all the vertical gray lines are the side streets with interchanges. What we do here with the study is take opportunity to improve some of these access points.

[03:59:15] Currently, all those ramps are reversible. We have to build some new ramps to convert them into bidirectional, and sometimes we are looking at some new access points as well. One of the things I would emphasize here is the project is still in its early stages of concept development and feasibility evaluation.

[03:59:36] VDOT and Transurban is working collaboratively to collect field data, conduct preliminary engineering, and evaluate potential traffic, environmental, and right-of-way impacts. Based on our preliminary assessment, a significant portion of the improvements would be accommodated within the existing right-of-way.

[03:59:52] However, additional right-of-way may be needed in certain locations, particularly where there is grading and some stormwater management facilities. These requirements will be better defined as engineering advances. We recognize the potential right-of-way needs and impacts to adjacent properties and we are doing everything to evaluate those impacts and our goal is to minimize the impacts to the properties.

[04:00:18] Another thing is public engagement is an important piece of this study period. We anticipate holding public information meetings in 2027 followed by public hearing in 2028. These activities will provide opportunities for residents, businesses and stakeholders to learn more about the concept and provide input.

[04:00:40] Our concept schedule anticipates feasibility determination and record of decision. That would happen more in year 2028. That would be after all we complete our feasibility analysis and go through the reviews and get all the approvals, including Federal Highway, that is when the decision would be made.

[04:00:59] Approximately, we are anticipating that to happen around fall 2028, and since this project is being developed as a P3 project, we anticipate getting into a commercial agreement with Transurban in 2029. So our immediate focus is to understand the engineering and environmental constraints, evaluate the feasibility, and to engage the communities and stakeholders along the corridor As we continue evaluating the concept, we are remains committed to working collaboratively with the county and the public.

[04:01:31] We appreciate board's continued engagement and look forward to keeping you informed throughout the study as the study progresses and we determine the appropriate path forward for the corridor. That ends our presentation, and we can take any questions. Thank you. Well, thank you, Madam Chair.

[04:01:58] Well, I think you already... I was just curious, really, about the timeline on this. Like, you know, I know it's a study now, but let's just say it's a good thing. We want it. When do realistically we see something like this?

[04:02:14] So we anticipate the study to conclude 2028. And if everything goes per plan, we anticipate construction start 2030, 2031 timeframe. Okay. And then just one more follow-up question. No, no.

[04:02:31] Are you, I know it's a study, but are they working, are you working with Omni, right? This is such a benefit for our bus system to be able to deadhead back on an express lane to then pick up more passengers and move around. It's the game changer for OmniRide, for the bus. So are they going to be working with really transit with OmniRide?

[04:02:51] Because this is a huge game changer for that. It is definitely all our current transit funding allows for that. And we fund some of the transit improvements. And along with this improvement we are making, we see an opportunity to have those transits go both directions, more reliable travel.

[04:03:10] That is what we are focused on so that the buses can get back in time in both directions. Thank you so much. I'm sorry, I step away. Who's next? Bodhi? Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for the presentation, Bill. Good to see you as well in our natural habitat here in the board chambers.

[04:03:29] Just a quick bead off of that. You know, coordinating with OmniRite makes total sense, and I hope we can, as this begins to roll down, pun intended, there can be a quicker or closer collaboration with OmniRite and obviously the folks down south in Fredericksburg, Stafford, what have you.

[04:03:46] My question goes to, though, you know, as it currently stands, I'll just be up front about this, with the current reversible configuration, if there's an accident going in one direction, sort of blows open the entire system.

[04:04:03] Like, everyone is stuck. What happened? Yeah, game's over. One of the things you guys are looking at as part of the analysis for this is, hey, let's say, for example, in a situation where this goes through, now we have bidirectional, but there's an accident on the north side, is there a way, I guess my question is, is there a way to revert it in an emergency situation or if there's an accident to revert at least part of it back to a versatile situation whereby you're able to sort of reroute and and be able to deal with road closures, catastrophic events, what have you?

[04:04:38] Yeah, so if I understand right, so if an accident takes place in, like, an express lane's pointing northbound, and then an accident takes place, and then is there an opportunity to reverse? So the one thing, the current reversible system is operated by gates, right?

[04:04:56] So it takes, that is how we make sure that the traveling public can safely get in an express lane system and get out. And it would take an effort to do that, but I'm sure we can, there will be lanes and it would more be like a temporary operation which we can figure out a way.

[04:05:16] So one of the things we considered during the design is access for emergency vehicles and the crossovers. And that is something we will start looking at in more detail and we look for opportunities where if a situation like that happens, what would be our fallback plan?

[04:05:33] that we'll be able to use these crossovers to kind of use temporarily. So that is something we look at as we progress at the time. Appreciate that. And my last question, Madam Chair. Thank you for that. That makes total sense. In terms of... Lost my thought.

[04:05:52] No, no, yeah. In terms of the actual right-of-way, you're obviously going to look at that, like you said, a lot of it can be done within the existing right-of-way. I know that's been said in other venues as well. But in terms of right-of-way where you might have to take additional right-of-way from likely public but sometimes private entities, what have you.

[04:06:14] Is there an opportunity to, going back to our previous conversation, allow for there to be trails and things that go along 95? Because I could see in a situation where you obviously, if you can do it all within the center right-of-way, you're not going to have a lot of opportunity to do that. But if you have to take right-of-way on the outsides, are there other multimodal opportunities to have trails that run alongside the alongside 95 and what have you yeah i can try to answer that because like you said most of the most of the construction will happen in the median there will be places where we will be widening to the outside and there will be grading but the corridor is extremely tight right now and

[04:06:53] we are doing everything to kind of fit all the lanes within the right-of-way by narrowing the shoulders and looking at opportunities to do that right but one thing we are looking at is for any of the cross streets we are touching if there is a a bridge let's say that is being replaced we are looking at opportunities where we can provide a bike facility or a pedestrian facility there appreciate that that was actually going to be my last question comment i appreciate that because as you said there are legacy crossings you know one uh bridges my district to supervisor la croix district on the on princeton parkway and we've had to now sort of figure out how to retrofit

[04:07:33] legacy crossing which has large pedestrian utilization like you see there's basically a natural trail there now from all the people have walked and biked and taken their lives as our own hands so they get to get across there so that any opportunity that you have to look at this as part of that I think it would be a great service of the public thank you yeah definitely we're looking at all the responses we got from the scoping letters there are some of the that's some of the trails you mentioned for identified there so we are taking back to the drawing board, looking at each one of those, whatever we can accommodate, we will do our best to accommodate as part of the project. Thank you.

[04:08:11] Supervisor Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. This is exciting. I have two questions. One is, and it may be totally, and Rick, this may be a Rick question. Will this have any impacts on the Van Buren extension?

[04:08:32] Thank you for the question, Supervisor Bailey. No, this will have no impact on it. The Van Buren project is funded by MVTA dollars to be a parallel facility to both I-95 and Route 1, and it will continue to do so and serve that purpose as well. Okay, I just need to hear that.

[04:08:49] I just need to hear. And then the other question I had was, in the excitement that we have about this, and I know citizens will welcome this, but how do we bring them along with understanding this bill? You know what I mean?

[04:09:06] Making sure that the marketing piece and the explanation piece and there's no confusion, you know, we have to bring the citizens along with the process. What does that look like? So that is, today is our first step to come in and give you a brief overview.

[04:09:24] And this is, even though we don't have anything laid out, we want to lay this groundwork and we are getting ready to do our campaign, social media campaign, and get the messaging out right. So we are in the process of doing that, and we will start engaging stakeholders and community groups and start doing, like, as we get into 2027, you will see more of those small group meetings happening, and we anticipate a lot of public engagement throughout 2027 to address their concerns and also make sure that the messaging is right.

[04:10:01] A lot of public engagement. Yes. Yeah, thank you so much. That's very important. enough time for all that public engagement and then we have Michelle Holland here from mega project she's our public involvement coordinator and she'll be the point of contact for anything public relations so we we make sure that we address any concerns that come yeah thank you thank you congratulations dick thank you mention all right supervisor Stewart then angry thank you very much for your presentation I think it's a brilliant idea

[04:10:36] um kind of a no-brainer uh especially for this area and the amount of traffic we deal with i think all of us here and when if we go down to richmond in the morning and the traffic's heading the other way i know for me personally i'd love to like i wish i wish but it's never there when i show up but um but so once let's say you know with your timeline that you mentioned earlier if you start in 30, 31, when do you project to be finished?

[04:11:07] It's about a five to six construction years, like the construction season, so five to six years is what we are anticipating right now. It's pretty fast-tracked for such a large project, but we are doing our best to kind of push that into that five to six-year time frame.

[04:11:24] Okay, great. Thank you very much. Thank you, Madam Chair. And Supervisor Angry. All right, thank you, Madam Chair. And I did have just two more questions, but I recall walking into the, Secretary Donahue had the transportation meeting at Fairfax.

[04:11:41] I got to sit in and just kind of, I walked in kind of a little late, and I was saying, oh, man, the express lane, if it was going the other way, I could have jumped on. So not making it about me, but I do believe and recall that this wasn't high on the state's list because my question is to funding.

[04:11:59] Like, I know once we do this study, then the state's going to get involved. And we always talk about, you know, if Delegate Franklin was on this board, the first thing we'd be talking about is how much is the state going to get in on a concept like this, which we absolutely love. But is there any kind of thought to, like, how that funding piece would work between state, us, local, and all of that?

[04:12:20] And how high is it on the priority list even right now with the state? It is one of the top priority items for the Secretary of Transportation. definitely this is a key project for the region that definitely is evident from all the places he talks about this project. Regarding funding, this project is being delivered as a P3 project with Transurban. So the way it would work, I'll try to kind of quickly run through this a little bit. We are doing the feasibility analysis and we are doing the environmental studies traffic analysis and all that and Transurban is also doing the same

[04:12:59] thing with respect to cost estimate how much does it cost for this project to deliver and then they're working with their financial companies to kind of fund the project so the 2029 timeframe you look at is when we would know how much of it would be transurbance share in it and how much would be V dot or Virginia share we are hoping that this project would be delivered with zero public subsidy that is still yet to be confirmed after we do all the feasibility analysis and and we run the numbers we will know

[04:13:33] that but that is where the next two years we will know the answer all right supervisor gordy thank you madam chair um thank you for this presentation um i'm to be honest with you i'm uh i'm concerned Because of the experiences we have on 66, as it relates to our hot lanes, I mean, your slide five kind of shows you my concerns in that the travel lanes are filled with cars and it's congested while the hot lanes are free moving.

[04:14:14] I think the intent of these lanes is to help us reduce congestion, but on 66, it hasn't reduce congestion and all and because the the cost to get into the hot lane can be very punitive at times um and and they're quite most often it costs ten dollars just to get out of prince william county to go into fairfax from manassas um and most people are not going to pay that ten dollars so i you know you you just made a comment about you know trying to do this without any public

[04:14:49] funds. But, you know, if our intent here is to get after congestion, to help keep our people freely moving, maybe we need to put some tax money so that we can reduce those tolls to encourage more people to use the hot lanes and try to make better use of the travel lanes to keep traffic moving. But right now, it seems, I mean, I had to go to D.C. for a COG meeting, and then I had to hurry up and get back out to Prince William County. And because I had a very little time,

[04:15:23] it cost me $75 to go from DC to Prince William County. Insane. And so I'm asking on behalf of our residents for us to look at what is it going to cost us? I mean, if the intent is to reduce congestion, how do we get to better toll rates that actually help us reduce congestion? And so, And I know, you know, the transurbans got these formulas or whatever, but but, you know, I can drive 75 miles per hour in the hot lanes where everybody else is sitting going 10 to 15.

[04:16:00] You would think there would be some level of balance between a better balance between those two. So that's just my comment. I just feel we've got to, you know, if the intent is to get after congestion, we've got to figure out a way to get the rates at a level that actually reduce congestion instead of further encouraging.

[04:16:20] That's just my comment. Thank you. Yeah, thank you for the comment. If I may, just the way I would see that is, and you're right, sometimes during highly congested times, there may be an increased toll.

[04:16:38] But the way we look at toll lanes in Virginia, it's not just toll lanes. I would call it motor choice lanes because we allow HOV3, they go free. And then also we use toll lanes for bus operations.

[04:16:56] So bus operations also are free in toll lanes. And the one other thing we did on 6 to 6 is allow trucks on toll lanes or hot lanes, right? What that does is it takes away that truck volume from the general-purpose lanes and pulls them into the express lanes.

[04:17:13] That would alleviate some of the congestion. And in general, the express lanes moves more people because we are making sure that the people change their travel patterns or travel behaviors.

[04:17:30] They decide to carpool more often for work. There are park and ride lots, the express lanes projects are funding. Because of all that, we see a significant shift in how people decide to travel. The one thing about congestion along these interstates is we cannot build more general purpose lanes because that's not going to help us in addressing the congestion.

[04:17:55] But the one thing about toll rates in general is something that is a function of congestion on the GP lanes, too. And sometimes, depending on where you are, if it's inside the Beltway on 66, there could be some high tolls.

[04:18:13] It just depends on where you are in general and what time of the day and what the congestion is. So we are looking at it. That's why the 95 corridor with the bidirectional, we are looking at possible solutions.

[04:18:29] So that will give us opportunities for people to kind of use other modes of transportation, right? So if bikes go free, we are pulling trucks from the general purpose lanes, which 95 Corridor has a huge percentage of trucks.

[04:18:45] If we make some of those trucks go to express lanes, we feel like there will be a reduction in congestion and general purpose lanes will move better. Yeah, I appreciate that. And but I would also make the point that, you know, you know, the community, the getting three people in a car works during commuting hours, but it doesn't work outside of commuting hours.

[04:19:10] Right. So, you know, but there's still a lot of traffic between commuting hours, particularly on 95 and particularly in the summer. And so, you know, 95 is a major travel route. These are not commuters. And so you can have heavy traffic even on Saturdays. And so, you know, the HOV piece of that is not always available, you know, just simply because of the day of the week or the time of the day.

[04:19:42] And so, again, it's, you know, our efforts here, I think, needs to, you know, I'm hopeful we can come up with a better pathway forward, no pun intended, in terms of trying to create that balance to use these lanes to offset that congestion to keep traffic moving.

[04:20:00] But I appreciate your efforts. I'm not discounting anything that you guys are doing. It is a complicated issue, but I know from the Brentsville constituents and their frustration with 66 and the cost associated with that, that this is something clearly, you know, we want to see these things highly utilized to the benefit of the community as a whole.

[04:20:24] Thank you. Thank you. All right. Are there any other questions? Big no. Forever hold your peace. Thank you so much. Duart. Thanks again, Madam Chair. So just kind of to speak to Supervisor Gordy's point, is there a way, because you kind of brought this up about when there's more traffic, the rates go up, which, I mean, I know that happens on 66 and it occurs to people, it's kind of predatory. Is there a way to do a flat rate?

[04:21:03] yeah sure there is not realistically this is a supply and demand and it's a it's a choice we're providing it's not a flat toll if you did a flat toll you'd probably end up with the lanes loaded and stuck you know whichever price you think is fair there's a ton of people that will be willing to pay that and so when the demand is higher the price needs to go higher so that we can manage the flow and what we are trying to do is not move more vehicles we're trying to move more

[04:21:37] And it has shown that we're able to move more people with managed express lanes through the HOV, through the buses that go for free, and the vehicles that do choose to pay, the drivers that choose to pay, they are able to move more efficiently and it's attractive to them.

[04:21:59] We also have studies that show a lot of folks will just use them once in a while, not an everyday occurrence. So when you have that urgent thing you need to get to, you're interested, you're willing to pay for it, you hop on it.

[04:22:14] Otherwise, maybe you can hang with a little bit slower traffic in the general purpose lanes. So it is managed. It's the fundamental basis of this is supply and demand. The supply is set by the number of the lanes. demand rises and lowers in order to keep those lanes moving you you do have to raise the price to to control the number of vehicles in there that's fundamental to the design and it's it's been very successful I do also want to say with the buses I believe we had studies that show we have 2,500 buses 2,500 buses on our

[04:22:53] express lanes every day even Fairfax County Public Schools is using the express lanes for free is to get their students to and from schools in Fairfax faster so I expect Omni rides definitely going to see this as a big advantage for them as you were describing earlier thank you got it and the and the final piece is where does the money go to so initially if this does go through because we're still in a feasibility study we don't know this is all going to happen

[04:23:25] yet for sure, but that's the idea. Then we would go through the P3 procurement where Transurban is in the corridor, and so we would work with them. The concept would be that we would hope that we would be able to negotiate so that there would be no public subsidy for it, but perhaps there might be a small public subsidy, but hopefully not. But since they would come forward with the billions of dollars to pay for to construct this,

[04:23:59] then they would receive the tolling money as a result of that for the decades to come. However, our agreements are often such that we also secure an annual funding payment from our concessionaire, and that money is something that we're able to provide towards transit in the corridor.

[04:24:25] So that's happened on 66 outside the Beltway, 66 inside the Beltway, and BTC gets to choose how the money that's told there is used for transit interest, and we have it on other parts of our system as well.

[04:24:41] Okay, and final question. So during this planning process, do we get to be at the table to plan how much of that money goes to regional transit as a function of percentage of revenue collected? Well, the percentage part would be a negotiation at the much higher level than me.

[04:25:05] So that would be at the secretary's level. But what I would say that I would expect that you would have an opportunity is for the money that is agreed upon that would come annually for transit, that you or this body in some manner would have a seat at the table on how that would be dispersed to the transit agencies.

[04:25:32] So I expect that OmniRide, under this concept, which we've been doing on other parts of our interstate, an organization like OmniRide would have some advantages. They would receive some benefits from this, I would expect. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair.

[04:25:50] Supervisor Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll be quick. Is there any engagement at all with this next phase with entities like Uber and Lyft? Are they engaged in this process at all?

[04:26:06] And I'm asking that because a lot of times when you talk about moving people, we get an Uber and Lyft to get to where we need to get quickly. And so a lot of times, I don't know about anybody else, but I ask them, are you going to get on the HOV?

[04:26:21] Are you going to? And they go, no. So I'm just asking, is that an opportunity in the next phase of this, you know, in terms of moving people? Yeah, we can definitely engage the businesses and Uber and Lyft would be like a key part of it.

[04:26:43] But I'm not totally sure on whether the Uber and Lyfts can ride for free in the express lane. They still have to pay. But I think from an access standpoint and from origin destination where people are going to and what are the commercial areas where it attracts more people, definitely we will be engaging with transit and Uber and Lyft we consider as transit in terms of moving people.

[04:27:12] So we will be engaging them and talking to them about their routes and things like that so that we have that planned in our design. Yeah, just a nugget. Yeah, I appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you. All right.

[04:27:31] There is no one else in queue. Thank you so very much for this informative presentation. A lot of questions, a lot of interest. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Mr. Shorter. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks again for the presentation, and thank you to our VDOT partners for all of the work that we do together, and, Rick, for your leadership.

[04:27:51] With item 11C, Madam Chair, we're going to hear a presentation, and Kevin Costello, our Director of Tourism, is going to open up the presentation for us and introduce our presenter this afternoon. Kevin, I'll turn it over to you. Go green.

[04:28:20] No need to break ice twice, right? Good evening. Since it's 6, instead of a good afternoon, I'll say good evening, Madam Chair and board members. I'm Kevin Costello. I'm the Tourism Director in Economic Development and Tourism, and it's my pleasure to introduce you to the Maritime Industry and Placemaking Study For short, we'll probably refer to it as the Maritime Study for the rest of the evening.

[04:28:46] And here we go. So today we're just going to provide an overview of the findings. And I'm going to introduce you to Rich Obermeyer here in a minute with Fourth Economy. We're going to identify the findings and the recommendations from the study.

[04:29:03] And then later on, Christina will come up to the podium and talk a little bit about potential community priorities and some implementation considerations that are going to be outlined in the study. and talk a little bit about next steps, which would include funding resources and funding considerations, because there are several recommendations in the study. And to implement those, we'll have to have that conversation. Just a little background. In fiscal, leading up to fiscal year 2025, the board put monies into the budget for us in economic development and tourism to do this study. In June, we put together a scope of work and worked with our procurement office to

[04:29:43] go out to bid on the study and we engaged Fourth Economy to do the study. And so we've been working on that since November of 2025 and here we are today to present the findings of that study. So within the scope of work we had some assigned project goals. The first was to assess the current state of Prince William County's maritime industry along with our waterfront development opportunities and related tourism assets. You've heard a little bit about that tonight with the Blue Way Trail presentation so how do we engage the public and the visitors to get out on our water

[04:30:18] and that was a part of the study we're looking at identifying highest potential opportunities for activating that waterfront again that blueway trail would probably rise to the top of that particularly through placemaking and fostering economic growth we also examined potential strategies for attracting maritime related businesses and how support how to support our current maritime businesses. We have about 11 marinas in Prince William County, so we spoke with them and talked about how we can help support their business model. We also looked into creating public access, encouraging more tourism development, so getting, again, the community and

[04:30:56] visitors out on our water to engage them in the waterfront. And then finally, we're looking for actionable recommendations for waterfront infrastructure for public access, how to program that public access and the waterfront and potentially hosting some events that can enhance our county's waterfront. So I'm going to introduce Rich, come on up, Obermeyer from Fourth Economy, and he's going to go over the study with you all. Thank you. Hey, good evening, everyone, Madam Chair, board members. Thank you for the opportunity. Yeah, I really want to thank the team. It's been a great experience working in the county and working with a lot of the leaders

[04:31:33] here. So I'm going to go through our presentation. I know you've been here a long time. I do tend to talk fast. I'll look for anybody telling me to slow down if I get too fast. Kevin mentioned obviously what this was. I do think one of the things here is this was the first time that this study's been done here in the community, the maritime industry and waterfront placemaking, and I think one of things we took care to make sure in the future if this is replicated, the way that we did the analysis, the information that we're delivering is something that can be dug into again in the future, and so we're turning over all that methodology for the community. The things that Kevin had just mentioned, there's really seven work streams that were part of the work that we engaged in. And so you see those here. And so it varied. It was both the idea of tourism and

[04:32:12] waterfront and also sort of the industry side of it, too. So it was an interesting mix between those two. And I think it dovetailed well as we got into the study. Well, I'm just going to go ahead. So I think the first area, so here's the punchline kind of executive summary for what we found. So you see up on the left, you know, the strengths that we saw. Certainly there's waterfront assets in the community um you know that support the recreation you heard about some of those already um definitely there's a significant number of public lands marinas and high performing destinations like lee sylvania we heard about even over performing at times um you have a workforce here obviously with the marine base here so we think that's a foundation for emerging opportunities

[04:32:51] more that industry side of the the business on the right you see the opportunities that you'll see recommended throughout really looking at expanding water access again we've heard blue Way quite a few times. Also, the idea for mixed-use recreation and tourism growth in a few of the development areas that you see. And then some of the emerging blue economy segments align with existing strategies. So think about innovation, the things that are coming out of the Potomac Science Center and the like. Some weaknesses we found as part of this, really public access to the waterfront is limited. I think you'll know that. You know, I think the core maritime industry today is small. Something we thought we'd see more, but it's pretty small right now. Something

[04:33:30] we'll talk about. And then infrastructure gaps, really indirect access in most cases to the waterfront, some of the barriers with rail, water-based transit, and parking issues, all were things that were brought up during the course of our research. And then threats, certainly environmental regulations, you know, state-related activities that are being passed down. So some of those are good, right, but they're also limiting developable land. There are dredging requirements, so to expand some of the activity, the dredging, and who pays for that, and, you know, what's that increased cost. Right now, it's a lot of this burden on the marinas. And then competition,

[04:34:07] so, you know, the work that we're doing, thinking about waterfront amenities, everyone's trying to figure out how to get better access to their waterfront, so thinking about what that looks like relative to other locations in the region. So key findings, I'm just going to go through each one of those work streams, kind of with a slide each. So really thinking about the placemaking analysis, I think it's been mentioned we have 60 miles of waterfront, primarily for environmental conservation, some recreation, and some single-family homes.

[04:34:36] The majority of the access points are private and many led by the HOAs in the community. The waterfront is very active in an event destination, so we have some numbers in here about what that looks like. It really is serving the community as a recreational asset.

[04:34:52] It brings in some tourism as well, but really is that access for the community. And, yeah, just limited available private or county-owned land for future development and some zoning activity that's limited some of that development in the future. You can see this map.

[04:35:08] I think the point here is 26 miles of the Aquacon River and then 10 miles of Potomac River shoreline. So, you know, we're nerds. You'll see maps and data in a lot of areas in here that you can study later on. And, yeah, some of the current waterfront uses you see, yeah, definitely a significant amount of boating we're seeing with those marinas, Active recreation, that hiking into the blueways, fishing and outdoor recreation is something that we definitely saw in the numbers.

[04:35:34] You have some signature events, Aquacon, the Riverfest, Craft Show. We heard about the strength of those events and tracking in tourists. Also, some of the issues relative to transportation access because of traffic. And anyhow, you see these other events that are here. So we see some programming that's going on to support waterfront.

[04:35:53] Throughout this, I think working with the team, we made sure we were engaging a wide variety of public stakeholders and community stakeholders throughout. And so you see them listed here. And some of the takeaways here. So from that engagement, we heard a lot of excitement about the waterfront and people thinking about and envisioning what it is.

[04:36:11] But again, that limited access is something that concerns folks and is something we need to think about. I think there's definitely demand for recreation. You heard it earlier. I think the needs assessment continually showed both trails and water access is something important to people. And so, yeah, and also thinking about inclusive access.

[04:36:27] So how do we make sure when we think about those access points that it does serve the entire community in the future? And then folks also brought up the potential for a clear waterfront vision, thinking about the waterfront as a unified resource, and really how do we create a vision in terms of the land use and the planning and the zoning to make sure that that vision is adhered to.

[04:36:48] and also think about the economic development and the recreation side of that as well. So is there an opportunity to create more of that vision for what the waterfront means to this community? Yeah, and some other takeaways we saw is, yeah, definitely marine tourism development. The towns, both in Aquacon and then Dumfries, who's envisioning this waterfront district, really see that as an identity for their economic future and are really trying to lean in on figuring out how to help that grow.

[04:37:13] We got really excited when we visited George Mason and the Potomac Science Center, Their vision for, like, research and development activity in that industry side of it to grow the job numbers and potential businesses here and attract investment was important. And then, yeah, again, I've mentioned transportation hurdles. I won't belabor that since you've talked about transportation a good bit.

[04:37:32] In some of the analysis, so we do a lot of blue economy, ocean economy work around the country. And so we've created a definition for Prince William that aligns with a lot of that work and work that's out there. And so that's something, again, as a resource, you'll be able to replicate that readily in the future. What that tells you currently is that the punchline here is that there's about 155 jobs, so pretty limited.

[04:37:54] And most of those are in the areas like boating, fishing, and marinas are the main areas. We do see some growth opportunities relative to the strengths in R&D and technology that exist other places in the county. We think that can play into the waterfront access and some of the things that we'll talk about, which is the next bullet there is the Potomac Science Center.

[04:38:16] Yeah, and then right now there's industrial use. some industrial use, and so future blue economy activity in those areas is going to be limited. Oh, I went too far. How do I go back? Oh, really? Oh, excellent. Here you go. It's very sensitive. Okay, good. Yeah, and so when you look in the report, you'll see there's a very broad definition of things that are enabled by having access to water. So that could be like the industrial plant, like the Vulcan plant that I mentioned. You know, the water access is important for it being here in this community. So if you take that very broad definition of direct and then the broader people that are supported by water you see a bigger number of jobs it's there mostly just to

[04:38:54] say like that that's why those folks are located here or how they're benefiting from that really that core though is that 155 jobs and of those we see really you know maybe some retraction that's going in some of these are point in time because of what's happening in the economy sometimes you'll see some slight ups and downs I think it'll probably be flatlined for the most part in terms of the jobs that you're going to see in these sectors that are here that are listed here in this chart. So we didn't spend a whole lot of time other than thinking about what do the marinas really mean towards the sector and towards the job potential here. So some of the growth

[04:39:30] opportunities that we see, certainly the marine product research and development. So there's a lot happening around the globe, if not around the country, around unmanned systems and things like that. And so something even that we spoke with the folks at Potomac Science Center about. And so you see an opportunity here potentially to grow some of that industry because of access.

[04:39:50] to the Navy base and to other defense assets. But there's also commercial activity happening in this space that's pretty exciting right now, that there's a lot of blue economy growth we see around the coast up and down. Similar to that is the smart marinas and recreational innovation.

[04:40:07] We're seeing electrification of the boating industry in sectors in some places, both inland like up in Michigan and other places on the East Coast. We're seeing a lot of focus on electrification and industry growing around that. And then water and environmental intelligence, so technology is starting to come into play relative to smart watersheds and being able to create monitoring systems as we think about the impacts of climate and what's happening is really being able to use smart technology to be able to manage those things for our communities.

[04:40:37] And the last thing we heard about is fish processing. So the blue catfish is both something that's here, right, and it's both a challenge, but it could be an opportunity also relative to not just blue catfish but other sort of fish processing. There's new technologies in that area as well that you could see growth in this community.

[04:40:55] Yeah, and so some of the commercial and industrial uses that we wanted to highlight. I mentioned the Science Center a couple times. I think that's probably the thing that's on the waterfront that we saw the most opportunity for future growth. Not directly at the Science Center, but spin out from the research and development that is happening.

[04:41:11] It could be happening there. We do see the marinas as being there's 11 marinas. I think they could be a key driver, are a key driver, and could be even more. But, you know, they fall short because they're more just a local recreational asset. And so there's probably some opportunities there.

[04:41:27] I mentioned Vulcan. I think, you know, it's relying on the water. It's going to be an ongoing industrial use, you know, for that property there. And then also a similar one is Possum Point, which I think at one point there are some thoughts about what the future of that. But it's definitely expanding now because of the low demand for data centers and other industrial uses.

[04:41:46] Did it again. So, yeah, marina. So I wanted to focus a little bit on marina. So, again, I won't go through all these numbers. I mean, they definitely have an impact in the community. There has been growth overall in that you see here some numbers in terms of 117,000 visitors.

[04:42:02] Ninety-two percent of those are your residents. So it is a quality of life asset for residents currently, but you're seeing a small amount of tourists, I think, that can grow with some investment that could happen there. And you see some of the spending. And so we kind of crunched some numbers to show what their economic impact is because we were thinking about how do you think about them more as an asset?

[04:42:21] rather than just a small business vendor? Is there something more to them relative to the quality of place that we need to be thinking about? So we'll see some good data in the report about what their impact is. These are some things that they told us. So we've had a couple conversations with the marine owners. I think definitely they view the collaboration.

[04:42:38] They were excited to have the conversation and tell us about their needs. And so you see some things here, especially the dredging is a big-ticket item, and it will continue to be that. And so how do we think about who bears the cost of that? Is there more of a public-private partnership or something else that can come into play there to think about dredging?

[04:42:55] And obviously, fuel costs these days are hammering a lot of our marinas, so that will continue, at least in the short term. So, yeah, so making waves. So, yeah, we all have used weird language here today. So, anyway, we're making waves with our recommendations.

[04:43:11] So, yeah, on the maritime side, yeah, I think we see the Science Center. I think the proximity of defense assets, it could be an interesting demo location for companies to come in to showcase their technology to folks out of D.C. who have, this way they have less restrictions to travel to places to see technology.

[04:43:29] And so we had a kind of couple brainstorming conversations about what that could look like. And so there's a nugget, there's something there. But also just what they're doing right now in the extension of the peer and the proposal that's there, that was sort of happening as we were talking to them. And so it's been exciting to see that progress, at least through the planning stages right now.

[04:43:47] We think that's a real opportunity. Yeah, and I think we do think establishing the maritime industry is one of the county's industry clusters. We think because of the technology push overall and those kind of investments that are happening, I think it should be one of the target industry clusters going forward.

[04:44:04] Yeah, public access, I think, as we've talked about, you know, despite the 60 miles of shoreline, much of it's inaccessible. And so I think, you know, is there more opportunity to invest countywide in boat launches and slips, more public access? And, again, you've heard about Blue Ways.

[04:44:21] So we strongly endorse that. We heard it from everyone that that's an opportunity to connect. And then also we heard about the youth experience. I think we want to make sure that the access is inclusive. And so thinking about folks experienced through the waterfront, through school or extracurricular activities, a lot of folks don't recognize.

[04:44:38] You hear from folks that don't recognize the asset that is the water, depending on sort of where you live in the county. And so we think that's an opportunity to get more exposure there and embrace that. And then, yeah, the marina support modernization. So I think we're in our conversations, like where we ended up, we saw the existing benefit that the marinas provide.

[04:44:58] I think there's probably some opportunities to supporting marina modernization. We've seen this in some other places around the country where there's, unfortunately, like there's a couple of big folks that are coming in and buying up smaller marinas. like the ones you have i think we see more of an opportunity to leverage up and have the current marinas kind of grow their portfolio grow their um the quality that they have and so through one of the things we're recommending is through a business association uh that could be informed and really to them to work collectively to uh focus on bigger economic outcomes and the strength of the marinas um yeah and then zoning and technical assistance there's some things relative

[04:45:33] to like replacement and things like that that uh they could use some support in like you know by right maybe is one of the zoning recommendations that could come out to help support marinas do redevelopment and repair in the future. And then waterfront visitation and tourism. I think the idea of destinations, we heard it certainly in Aquacon. I think the idea that a couple opportunities here, one is like really looking at a marquee countywide waterfront event and thinking about the logistics of that, the transportation and even the staffing. Aquacon works with the county but they have a limited staff and so are there opportunities to sort of increase that

[04:46:09] activity and bring more people in uh with more support and similarly how do we create a unified county waterfront brand so is there an opportunity to create a brand that does create that exposure not just for residents but for tourists that are coming in um and then yeah the waterfront the in the future i think just making sure what you have right again even what's limited and what's available i think making sure there are clear standards and strategies for any future waterfront projects that public benefit is included in that so yeah I think thinking about protecting the existing sites is one of the areas we want to focus on thinking about intentional zoning tools with that is there an opportunity to create

[04:46:47] something like a waterfront development zone that creates standards that apply to current or I'm sorry prior to future waterfront projects and is there a land acquisition strategy so if something does can become available is there an acquisition strategy to expand that waterfront access I won't go into detail.

[04:47:06] One of the things, there's a couple of tools that we provided. There's an implementation plan, and then there's some ways of kind of thinking about as you deliberate on sort of what you should focus. So it's kind of a pretty simplistic, but it's a way of really thinking about the scoring criteria of feasibility of yellow is moderate. Obviously red is more difficult.

[04:47:23] Same thing with the dollars. It's just a way of thinking about each one of the recommendations that we've made and what's the level of difficulty and the cost that may be incurred as part of that. So we've done that through all the recommendations that are in the plan, as well as in thinking about the timeline too. Feasibility is both level of difficulty in terms of requirements, or law, or any of those kinds of things, and then it's also sort of the timeline that it's gonna take to actually activate something.

[04:47:48] So you see all those, you'll get a chance to dig in on those things. Oops, and I did it again. Wow, man, now I got it. So now I'm gonna turn it over to Christine to do the next part, and be gentle on the click.

[04:48:04] - Okay, got it. Yes, that's what I'm known for. Thank you. Good morning. Good evening, board members. Christina Wynn, Economic Development and Tourism.

[04:48:22] Thank you, Rich, for that. I did want to just pause for a second and really point out Kevin Costello, who has been managing this project, along with Jim Garris and Tanya Jacobson. And this has been a real opportunity for economic development and tourism to work together on a project that works together um that that we can cohesively look at an area and and develop not only an economic development strategy but a tourism strategy i think from what you saw very quickly rich thank you for going through that so fast um is that there is a wide variety a broad range of opportunities

[04:49:03] and each of those opportunities really vary in scope and size and cost um right now you know we have nobody in the county or an economic development tourism that is focusing on these efforts and so really looking forward and in some cases some of those opportunities actually cross over into the planning department or public works or some of these other different areas and so we need to be mindful of that moving forward if the board wants to move forward with you know really diving in and looking at more of these opportunities, we need to look and prioritize some of the

[04:49:42] recommendations that were brought up in the study. Look at the feasibility and really come up with a scope and a plan and be able to come back to you with that so that we understand what resources. They provided a high-level plan, but we really would need to kind of dive into it a lot further and then so at this point we're really considering this was a budgeted initiative in fiscal year 25 we're considering with this study which the the study itself was about a 50 page document it will be

[04:50:19] posted on PWC works page probably by the end of this month we wanted to do this presentation just in case there was any feedback or anything that we wanted to some last-minute changes but we consider really the maritime industry really a closed opportunity if the board wants us to or any departments to move forward we would need that direction and that support and so with that I think I am

[04:50:52] done thank you all right so questions looking over a supervisor hold on okay gordy go all right thank you madam chair hey this is very exciting um i'm so happy that we're finally talking about this um as anybody who knows me knows i'm a voter i know i fish the potomac um and so you know i've spent a lot of time on the water um i know pretty much every nook and cranny uh from quantico up to

[04:51:26] Occoquan. So the one question, a couple of questions. So I look at this from the water side and I see this study was done mostly from the land side to the water side, but there's a couple of things that I would like to ask. So the first question is the fact that our border with Maryland is on our shoreline, do you see that as a limiting factor for us? No. I think, again, I think part of it is that it goes into the planning.

[04:52:00] I mean, we also had conversations with NOVA about the parks, right? Sorry, I always get that wrong. Yeah, I mean, similar. Like, I think there's jurisdictional opportunities for collaboration. I think that's part of, depending on the path for implementation, I think there are some things. We've heard anecdotally that there's also, like, on the boating side, that I think, and that's something that with the marinas, like, there could be opportunities because there are some crowding in some of the areas.

[04:52:23] We'll see if that stays. But, yeah, I think it's more of, I think it's opportunities for collaboration more than limiting. Okay. Well, I appreciate your opinion because I've just always wondered to what extent that could hinder us. The areas that are within Virginia that were clearly are the bay areas, but a lot of, and that gives us the greatest potential for, you know, utilizing the waterfront, but those are, and you got into this, most of those bays are just grass flats. They're not very deep. And depending on the tide, you know, they could be pretty shallow. So the dredging

[04:52:59] issue is clearly a challenge. And I've had conversations with folks, and even like Tim's River Shore, when it was there, I mean, there were, I mean, they literally had to, there were boats that only could go so far, and then they had to be shuttled in just simply due to the shallowness of all of that. So I appreciate you highlighting that. I will also say I appreciate you pulling out the invasives, both the catfish, the blue cats, and the snakeheads, which incidentally

[04:53:33] are phenomenal for eating. The diet particularly of the blue cats are ranger clams, and the meat is very sweet. So it's very different from other places. And so I think it would actually help us in controlling that invasive species and encourage more people getting out and commercially catching it if we had a market for it. And that's pretty much what happened to the snakehead when we started selling it in restaurants. Now they're hard to catch. They're harder to find because people are

[04:54:06] going after them. The last thing I want to offer is getting up the Occoquan, you know, accessing commercial sites from the water is also very difficult. My family and I were cruising up Occoquan, thought we would go up to Belmont Bay to maybe go to an ice cream shop. But if you go out of the marina, you can't get back in because the gate locks behind you. So it kind of shuts off the commercial access from the water to the commercial. Um, and then once you go up the Occoquan, um,

[04:54:45] you know, you've got a couple of restaurants, uh, that you could maybe get your boat into if they're not filled. Um, but then even Occoquan has some, uh, boat parking, but it's, you pay for it, uh, but you can only use cash. Uh, so, uh, you know, and, and going up the Occoquan, going up to get some ice cream or going to have dinner, um, it's somewhat as a limiting factor if you're trying to come up from the water side as well so i think that's you know i really didn't see a lot of that covered in the report but that to me i see that also as something that how do we make it better

[04:55:19] and easier for folks to approach the land from the water side um any thoughts on that yeah i think i mean there are some in the public access and the recommendation area i think that's one of the areas we saw especially in that aquacon area is like trying to identify an area to create new public access uh you know places yeah from the water and i think and it goes throughout all the way down um yeah even around the potomac around the science center so like if you go down that route even further down like i think there's probably an opportunity for you know public access on either side of that or either edge of that area um so that's in the report yeah i didn't

[04:55:57] have a new presentation that called out but yeah yeah now again i appreciate all the hard work look forward to further how we work towards an implementation plan here and some steps that we can take on this. Madam Chair, I've texted you. Due to my work commitments that I have here, I was not expecting us to go this long today. I have a hard stop in about two minutes due to an event that I'm committed to. But I did want to say that the noise ordinance conversation, um my intent is to uh bring up uh to evaluate options on that and bring a directive forward

[04:56:37] to the board um uh soon on uh some updates to the ordinance ordinance so i just want to let the folks know that we are working that and um and being look forward to further conversation about that thank you all right two things i'm actually working on the same tom so we need to talk and victor agreed with you about that fish it's tasty he's sitting here like yeah oh it's delicious i just want to let you know that all right thank you supervisor bodie thank you madam chair i'll say my comments around noise ordinance when we get there but appreciate the work that's being done um thank you for the presentation thank you to christina and your

[04:57:15] team and kevin for all the work you've done on it also going to thank my board members even though some of you weren't here when we did it but appreciate the couple years back as was said when you uh uh uh um helped authorize the funding that went to get this this brought to fruition so I wanted to acknowledge that as well.

[04:57:31] I'm going to ask you the sort of priority question is a tough one, so hold your horses for a second. I'm handing you a magic wand right now. If you could recommend just two or three things the county should get done right now, released from resource constraints, so imagine money and resources are no object, what would they be?

[04:57:52] I'm interested in where you would see the greatest potential return on investment in terms of economic activity, public access, and quality of life. wow christina can help you too if she has some yeah i was gonna say i mean these guys also wait i'm sorry i feel like you're being set up here okay yeah i you know i mean for me yeah i'm not from here so coming to this community it's been really great to get to know the the folks and the assets so i think as i've observed and thought about this work i think i mean the two areas i think is one is just the access piece of it like wherever that is right and i think what was spoken about earlier with the heritage trail and the blue way connection i think like that could really

[04:58:32] unlock i mean people want to have that kind of distance and those multiple experiences stay overnight and do it right like i think that's a huge that could be a big both local resident access but also a big tourism draw for people because we're seeing that all over the country i do think the other thing is if you want to grow jobs i do think there's something on the innovation side i think you know with the peer that they're talking about i guess it's a part and maybe it's partly like i think a lot about those jobs and i see a lot of it we're doing a lot of work in the blue economy space on the innovation side so I think like having that and putting that flag in the ground because it doesn't exist real well right now I think George Mason's doing some of it but I think supporting that would be probably my two priorities I don't know you

[04:59:09] guys should also yeah no I think thank you I for that question I think what Rich is actually spot on one of the things that I think about is when I came to this county you know waterfront you heard about the waterfront but the idea that you don't have access to it you don't get to experience it and so yeah if we had to prioritize one thing it would be that public access creating those connection points appreciate that actually perfect thank you for that christine because that leads me to my next question so public access of expanding public access is one of those

[04:59:47] priorities which it obviously is where do you see the greatest opportunities for meaningful improvements are there places where relatively modest investments or partnerships could open up a lot more waterfront for public use yeah you guys i would call these guys for that one so it depends on what you're talking about for public use so if we're talking boating i think the opportunity there is to help the current 11 marinas to expand their business model maybe add restaurants to it um the problem is the way that they're zoned light industrial it doesn't make that an easy thing right so considering some change to the zoning code potentially could help

[05:00:25] them in that fashion which would bring more recreational boaters which actually support the economy and produce tax revenue and all that so that would be one direction the other is to just follow up on the blue wave plan and provide more public boat access for canoe kayak because that creates an initiated group it's like the easiest way to teach people that they're interested in boating is to get them out on a stand-up paddle board or a canoe or a kayak they learn about the water they they're in a safe environment if we're connecting them with an outfitter and then potentially as they get older and have a better job they buy a boat and become a boater right so

[05:01:03] that's kind of the cyclical part of that whole recreation component in the towns right so right now right we're supporting our towns and they they have for the most part quantico aquaquan have access soon to be dumfries also to the waterfronts with recreational opportunities appreciate that and I have 45 seconds left, so I'm going to have my last one for this first round, which is, and appreciate that, Kevin.

[05:01:27] Thank you, and Rich. Can you tell us about how this study evaluated ferry service, including the earlier regional work that was done around ferry service and the technology and momentum that's come out of D.C. and Alexandria over the past couple years? Yeah, I think we did look at the prior study as part of that, and we also looked at some data relative to the tourism, what's happening, where people are coming, and where the workforce.

[05:01:48] I think, I mean, we didn't see much that changed the previous recommendation. We don't see enough flow of either commuting or even tourism, as well as some of the wake issues. I think the one question is in the future, like, there is new technology. There's hydrofoils. There's a sea glider technology that's sort of quickly going into the market.

[05:02:05] There may be a different type of ferry that doesn't have the wake issues and some of those things that can also have a smaller passenger carry. I think right now, it's just right now the industry is catching up, I think, to what you have here as a profile. But I would never shy away. the county should be part of those conversations because it is there's something there it's just i don't think we're completely there from a tech standpoint yet all right supervisor bailey so i'm a ride on the blue wave uh supervisor bode and i were and and madam chair as well we've been in presentations about the ferry boat so it's good that you're up on the technology with that because

[05:02:43] that is a economic driver for us as we go forward with this but my my question is what what types of What specific regulatory changes and infrastructure improvements should we look forward to in terms of cost and potential partnerships as we go forward with this?

[05:03:06] Because this is a great opportunity for us to think differently, not just for entertainment purposes or well-being, but for growth and transportation. So I can address the recreation component of it.

[05:03:24] Last month, I went to a meeting for the Chesapeake Gateway, which is a foundational arm of the Chesapeake Bay group from the National Park Service. And we could look at becoming a self-nominated Chesapeake Gateway, which would open up both financial opportunities through grants, but also some National Park Service aid that would help us to create feasibility studies or whatever to kind of tap into the fact that the Potomac bleeds out into the Chesapeake Bay.

[05:03:54] and is all kind of interconnected in terms of the waterway, right? And so the goal with Chesapeake Gateway is to create communities that support the water and are engaging the water from a tourism and a resident component. So I see that as an opportunity for us to partner with parks to go after self-nominating to become a gateway.

[05:04:15] And I've talked a little bit with them about that process, but we'll move towards that if that's something that everybody is on board with. So that would provide some opportunity. There's also state recreational grants that we could look for for public access. I've not told this story, but in my previous life, I worked in Botetuck County, which is the headwaters of the James River, and I created the Upper James River Water Trail there, so I have some experience in water trail development and really excited about the potential to create water trails here in Prince William County.

[05:04:45] And that's something new for the community as well. And then the other thing is we have a very robust boating community here that has been here for a long, long time. And I see what potentially does that partnership look like in terms of supporting them and having them as a part of this decision-making process?

[05:05:08] Yeah, that's a great question. And so I'm engaged in two strategic studies, right, this Maritime study and then also the agritourism study that we hope to bring to you all in December. And the parallel between the two is really kind of fascinating because agriculture is a heritage industry.

[05:05:25] So people that make a living off of the land and have done that for ages. Right. And then the maritime industry, which is also a heritage industry where people are making a living off of the water, our waterways. Right. And so we've met with both the farm community when we're doing the agritourism study and also the marinas.

[05:05:43] We had a great meeting with them. They were not afraid to speak their minds. Right. of course yes and and same with the agricultural community and what they're really looking for is just some uh support and some help right so um maybe some less regulations and that's not always regulations that are coming down from the county they're state and federal regulations of course so kind of acting being able to be engaged with them to listen to them to understand what their future aspirations are and to figure out a way to help to make them happy make that happen And so I think the most important thing to answer your question is the engagement side of it and keeping in communication with them for sure.

[05:06:21] And Christina. And I would just add to that one of the recommendations is for the marinas to look at creating a business association. And that's where our office could actually work with the marina to give them that technical assistance to, you know, create that association and then really help support that association through our resources and our tech.

[05:06:43] And then that really solidifies the entire engagement piece. That's great. And then quickly, 43 seconds. This morning we were in a presentation this morning with the airport, Manassas Airport. And one of the things that Senator Cain mentioned was there's a bipartisan federal funding grant kind of thing where the surrounding areas can use the grants.

[05:07:05] Is that something you're looking at? Something similar, actually. We will. Okay. Just a little nugget. Okay. Thank you. All right, Supervisor LaCroix. Well, I think this is really exciting. I'm a paddle boarder who does not eat snakeheads.

[05:07:24] Ugh. No. And, oh, no. And I put in my paddle boards at Mason Neck, Occoquan Regional Park, Leasylvania. So I love that we need to have, I don't do Belmont, even though I live in Belmont Bay, the doors lock behind you.

[05:07:43] So unless you own a slip, that's for the protection of the boat owners. So I understand that. But if you had more access, that would be great. And last week, I was meeting with some of the marinas down by Lieslvania who are extremely excited to meet with Christina.

[05:08:03] And I can't wait to bring you back because it's a beautiful property. They own it, and they're ready to put all kinds of stuff down there with whatever you all want. And it's going to be a really cool thing. And it's really fun, by the way, to be the supervisor of the most water in, you know, all of my property is on the water, like starting at the Occoquan down the Potomac.

[05:08:28] So it's very exciting, and I hope that there's going to be a lot of good changes. I'm excited about your initiatives. Thank you. All right. So I just want to make sure, because you want some functional direction. Do you want me to answer some of the questions or post in the slides?

[05:08:43] Because I can. if you would like to we weren't asking for any action but i think again just to reiterate you know at this point we would not be um continuing on this we would consider this project closed so unless the board really wants us to follow through on any of these action items we would have to be directed to do so so i want to say this i do want to follow through i know it's going to cost money guys let's be ready everyone get their christmas wishlets together because one of the things i am going to really think about and work with your department, Christina, is what do you need to be

[05:09:23] successful? What are the things that you need to be successful? If we want to grow the county in a different way, what does that mean in terms of agritourism? What staff do you need? What staff do you need or what resources do you need to make this happen? So that is what I'm going to be looking at as part of my budget analysis. I see you too, Tanya. I'm not going to shortchange you, okay? I just won't let you know. We've been paying a lot of attention to you and we see the results earlier with that you know proclamation you had an entourage i mean fire and police should be

[05:09:56] watching their back okay not literally though okay i just want to so i like a lot of this um i'm just going to pick out a few things um i do like the implement the smart marina assets they allow for the testing of use of electric and autonomous boats we've talked about that at cog just last week so that's something i know that nvrc is looking at if we can jump in there oh charlie grimes charles grimes has gotten to me advance all advanced completion all prince william county segments of the potomac heritage national scenic trail we're not going to do that in one budget

[05:10:34] season but i think that that's something we need to discuss and prioritize i think it'd be great to work with the hoa to increase public access to the waterfront that's out of our hands but i think that's great. I really do like creating continuous public waterfront between Belmont Bay and the town of Bacaquan. I think that's an excellent idea. Again, something I'm open to explore. The waterfront visitation and tourism, that's an easy slide, page 40, okay? I think, I support all of it, except for Leesylvania State Park, because they're dealing with overcrowding over there. And they're having to, you have to kind of, they have to watch how many visitors

[05:11:08] are coming in that shows how popular the waterfront is and that it's truly a destination that people want access to um waterfront's future i'm now looking at page 41 i'm not sure what it needs to nominate an appropriate qualifying waterfront assistance tracks for opportunity zone 2 selection not sure um because i want more than housing there so i'm gonna before i i'll let you answer but i want to get out the rest of my spiel because i'm looking at time um i think it'd be great if we can partner with both dumphries and quantico depending on what the ask is because i know that they're both doing a lot over there and again having a continuous waterfront is an

[05:11:48] amazing thing yes we can re-engage in conversations with recreational fairing and you know it seems easily easy to consistently um engage with large waterfront landowners to understand their long-term development plans that seems like an easy lift so i've spoken respond to anything that you would like in the minute 35 actually you can go over i cannot i'm done now no uh no thank you for that feedback i really appreciate that and um we can definitely come back and and look at what what

[05:12:22] those things would um entail and be able to come back with um reporting out to the board in some sense to move any of that forward but what exactly does it mean the opportunity to zone with the housing or what the what is that that is page page 41 nominate appropriate and qualifying waterfront census tracts for opportunity zone 2.0 selection by the commonwealth of virginia and designation by the u.s department of housing and urban development is that talking about an opportunity zone what exactly does that mean i mean like a traditional economic empowerment zone yeah i think

[05:13:02] the idea is there were a couple census tracts i don't have the map with me yeah i think there are couple of census tracts so right now the designations the governor's office in every state is is designated the OZs right now they got an extension so at the end of this month they have to get their designations in so yeah we thought there was just a couple areas that could come into play there you may know specifics because I wasn't looking at the site so right now every what is it every ten years so they go through and they update the opportunity zones right now the county I believe has six opportunity zones in existence and based on eligibility

[05:13:41] the state sends out to the county here are all the different tracks that are eligible and so what basically we're saying is prioritizing those those tracks that are located on the water that could actually because you can opportunity zones are not only for housing but they're actually for business as well i remember we had those in harlem many many decades ago when i lived there all right supervisor bode thank you madam chair i'm just gonna um for time's sake ditto a lot of what madam chair just said but i also want to go back to my question which is why i asked it like to me

[05:14:19] the top priorities are the access issue like was said and also the economic development side of it right we in our basically as far as i am in our entire county's history have not really had a bd or ed type function in trying to actually help deliberately grow our maritime economy right and i know that we talked a lot about that during our interview a couple years back but it was a year ago now i'm not going to date us that much but um there is so much that can be had and so much potential there on again that bd ed side but also that access side so for me gonna say that that's

[05:14:55] sort of my thought of prioritization, but also, again, looking at, like Supervisor LaCroix said, there are just so few parcels left that aren't controlled by a park or some other entity that we have no control over, as opposed to some of these private parcels that we might be able to make a deal with a landowner on expanding our holdings and what have you. So, to me, another big part of that is identifying those last pieces. Sounds like you've identified quite a few of them already, But I'm thinking that part down devil's reach in my district where you have some of the legacy marinas that are there.

[05:15:30] But there's also that large stretch of land where there's just a bunch of houses. And not diminishing that, but there might be a real asset there that has basically been underutilized because we haven't been very deliberate or intentional about really growing that. So really interested in having that conversation.

[05:15:46] Also, since I see Tonya back, they're really looking, talking about how that we can green tape our zoning practices and our zoning ordinance to make it so things like restaurants and let's call them auxiliary businesses can go alongside those marinas and what have you to have more of a true, robust maritime sort of offering in terms of economic support as opposed to these one-off marinas.

[05:16:08] And the last thing I'll say is I'm really looking forward to working with, I'll just call them the frontline waterfront supervisors or myself, LaCroix, and Bailey to, again, like I said, bring all those folks back in so we can continue to have this as a living conversation with those folks that are already having the work in this space so we can help grow them as we bring in other opportunities as well.

[05:16:28] Thank you. Love that. One of the things I do want to point out is we do have the target industry study that is going on right now. So that work is taking the findings from this and going to incorporate it.

[05:16:43] And so when we bring back the revisions for the target industry from an economic development perspective, but you're right, we don't have a business development professional that specializes in this sector. So that would be something that would need to be considered at that time.

[05:17:00] Supervisor Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. And I just, you know, I want to partner with you and Jeannie too. I wanted to say also when we talk about the funding piece, going back to something that Madam Chair said earlier, I do know, you know, I'm not, I think we have to look at this cohesively, but when you have opportunities like Dumfries just got waterfront state granting, grants funding from the state for that waterfront piece, that helps us as well when we partner with the towns.

[05:17:36] and thank you for going to talk to Quantico, this presentation to them will help them grow economically as well and open up for the base and for the county. So this is, there's so many variants.

[05:17:53] And then the other piece is the educational piece. When we talk about the schools and how it can benefit the schools as well, growing, like my friend Clark Mercer, who was former chief of staff for Governor Northam now, the executive director for COG, where we got some of these studies from.

[05:18:12] He's a fisherman, and during college, that's what he did. And so growing him from there to a chief of staff or governor, that's a big deal. You know, that gives a student options. You know, so when we talk about, in Jeanne's district, George Mason, the science center there, and helping students understand from an environmental and water perspective, that's enriching our education to our students as well.

[05:18:40] So this is just opening the door wide. And so I just applaud you for, though it's 50 pages or how many other pages you have, when you put it on, you know, please let us know that you've put it on the website because this opens the door for entrepreneurship, for education.

[05:18:57] It's just so many windows, so many windows. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for those comments. All right. Does anyone have anything else they want to say? Do you feel good? Do you feel like you have enough direction? Do I need to prep people? All right.

[05:19:12] I'm good. Thank you very much, everyone. Thank you. All right, Mr. Shorter. All right, thank you very much, Madam Chair, members of the board, and thank you, Christina, and Kevin, and the team for just all of the work.

[05:19:41] I know this has been a culminating opportunity to present, and so thanks for the work. Next, Madam Chair, for 11-D, we are hearing a presentation, really a noise ordinance update from the Public Works team and PD.

[05:19:56] So I'm going to first turn it over to Katab Shemut, Director of Public Works. And I know Major Burkhardt is here with us also from PD to introduce the presentation and provide the update. With that, Katab, I'll turn it over to you. Thank you, Chris.

[05:20:12] I don't want to say you kept the best for last, but good evening or good afternoon, whichever. I haven't been outside, so I don't know. Madam Chair, members of the board, Katab Shemut, your Director of Public Works. I'm happy to be here today with Major Burkhardt as well from the Police Department to present on

[05:20:33] our noise ordinance enforcement. Okay so before we start a little bit of a background on the noise

[05:21:06] ordinance. We know that the board in October 2025 adopted the amendment to the noise ordinance which went into effect uh may of 2026. what did the amendment do it added the steady tonal and it also uh required the use of a dbc which is a weighted scale for um that allows more of the low end of the noise to come into the actual total noise so it focuses more on the low end

[05:21:40] than the A scale. The amended ordinance also introduced an octave band although it is not enforceable but it's something really to look at and to really highlight that to the owner of the whether it's a data center a facility or whatever is to really focus where the noise is coming from where it's generated the most so they can focus on that in the event there's a violation and in the event improvement needs to happen and mitigation needs to be take place. And of course public Public Works is responsible for enforcing the steady tonal part of the noise.

[05:22:18] The rest of the noise, it's still the police department takes care of that. What is a steady tonal noise? Steady tonal noise is a continuous type of noise that has a distinct pitch or frequency that remains relatively constant over time.

[05:22:35] And that's how we measure the steady tonal. Police department, as I said, will continue to manage and oversee enforcement of any kind of noise other than steady tonal.

[05:22:53] Karen situation. So we started the 311 system and it's in our website where people can actually go into the 311 and submit their complaint or submit their concern. And we will take it from there with our staff. In August, 2026, we procured a task order with a consultant that is really specialized in noise analysis that helps us in really reviewing some of the complex situation that we have to face in the field, and as well as to prepare some of the documentation

[05:23:29] that we will be using and I'll be highlighting later on. And in April 2026, our chief code enforcement team, about three of them, went actually to Rutgers University and got certified in noise enforcement certification coursework that will assist also with our acoustic engineer, and I will mention that in a minute, but they help and they've done a lot of testings over time.

[05:23:57] In July 2026, Public Works hired the county's first acoustic engineer, Mr. Koltai Hunter, and he sits right behind me. And we can continue to coordinate with our partners, both at DDS and at the planning office, to really be more proactive in the process and not just reactive by testing, but really be part of the process when rezonings, and I will talk a little bit more about that later on, and during also submission of plans for data centers and for other facilities as they come our way.

[05:24:36] This picture just shows the type of instrument that we use, which is the RION NL-53 class one meter. We have three of those and we have three also acoustic calibrators that are required to make sure that the machine is really running optimally.

[05:24:56] So since we started the ordinance back in May, We have received 19 residents' complaint and we've tested in those 19 locations. And, you know, the current ordinance says 73 DBC during the daytime and 60.

[05:25:12] Those are the limits of the ordinance before they become a violation. And we have not really depicted any violation out there as we did the testing. Those are the metrics that are in our GOV system.

[05:25:31] When we receive the 3-1-1 call, when we receive the complaint, we go into the system, and actually those are the metrics that we will include for every complaint that we receive, the type, the assignment by month, the time complaint submitted during the daytime, nighttime, and the complaints per district.

[05:25:51] And as you see, the 19s are shown on this slide. Response and case resolution, we would like to respond to any call that we get, to any complaint we received back to the owners within two days. That is in our work plan. However, sometimes, you know, 58% of those were within two days. Pretty good number as a starting out.

[05:26:18] And the rest of them within three business days. And sometimes weather, sometimes weekend may affect that. So I think we've been doing good in responding. And we were doing also very good in actually measuring and providing the feedback to the complainants, and we've been doing that average-wise on the 19 and 8 1⁄2 days.

[05:26:41] So managing future steady tonal noise, like I said, we're trying to become more proactive than reactive. So when development comes in and there's a rezoning or there's an SUP conditions, there may be a proffer, there may be a condition there for the developer to submit noise analysis at the time of plan submission during plan review.

[05:27:08] So that's one way of looking at that, really working with the developers and looking at their noise analysis and try to provide feedback that will help them avoid having to be in a violation situation. So that's one way of looking at it. The other way is with the Virginia Code 15.2 high energy use facilities, They are required any facility that is using over 100 megawatts of power that's within 500 foot of a residential or a hospital to submit a noise profile.

[05:27:40] And the difference between a profile and analysis is that the profile submitted at a zoning phase of things when the things have not fully developed. So it's more of a high level with a lot of assumptions in it. And as they go through the plan review process, when the building is defined, the location of the chillers and the generators and all of the other stuff are defined in the plan, a more in-depth kind of analysis, and that's the noise study that needs to be submitted, and we will review that.

[05:28:09] And both of those would be reviewed by our acoustic engineer, and also in support of our third-party consultant that may help us doing that. With that, I'm going to turn it over to Major McGarr.

[05:28:28] Madam Chair, good evening, members of the board. Good evening, Mr. Schroeder, Ms. Roble. I'm Dave Burkhart, the Assistant Chief of Police for Operations for the Police Department. We included this slide because we really wanted to illustrate the work that's being done in other areas of the noise ordinance beyond steady tonal noise.

[05:28:46] So the Police Department responded, and we took the same dates from January 1st to September 14th. The police department responded to 2,745 calls for service, having to deal with noise during that time period. 2,539 of those were residential sources and 206 were other sources.

[05:29:05] I tried to asterisk down here the other sources being commercial, recreational, houses of worship, and the et cetera would be things like we've gone to ice cream parlors. We've gone to sporting events where people think that the sporting event is too loud. We've been to playgrounds, some of the different beaches in the county.

[05:29:23] About 481 of those calls for service were for loud parties, and 747 of those were at apartments. The citations that were issued, our goal really is to seek, is to educate when we respond.

[05:29:40] Hopefully people understand the noise ordinance, the criminal element of the noise ordinance, and try to educate and gain compliance. And as you can see, we generally gain compliance. Only three times that we have to return and issue someone a summons. So one example of those citations is we were called for loud music between two apartments.

[05:29:59] When we got there, we explained to the community member to turn the music down. They agreed to turn the music down, and we were called back because they decided to turn the music back up and start banging on the wall in between the two apartments. So in those situations, we cited that situation.

[05:30:16] but as you can see it's rare it happened three times and that's really really what we wanted to capture in this slide was our was our involvement so thank you so the implementation of the amended noise ordinance was a cross department cross quadrant effort really included all of these departments to come up with this ordinance to come up with where we at right now public works police department office of communication department of economic development and tourism

[05:30:50] Department of Information Technology, Public Safety Communication Planning Office, Department of Development Services, County Attorney's Office, and Office of Performance Management. And representative from all of those who are engaged in coming up with an enforcement ordinance, and as well as really, as I said, the proactive part of this, which is really with the zoning and with DDS to review noise studies and noise profiles as they come our way.

[05:31:19] So recommendation. So the noise ordinance started in May. We're about five, six months into the noise ordinance. We've received 19 violations, so not violations, I'm sorry, comments so far or concerns that we've evaluated. And really, we did not find any violations. And actually, out of the 19, really 18 of them were not even steady-torn.

[05:31:44] However, we measured them anyways, and they're still within the numbers, and they did not rise up to a violation level. So really, the metric that we have, the data that we have, is very minimal right now to really make any suggestions or any adjustments to the ordinance back to the board.

[05:32:01] I think by having more time is not worth trying to kick the can down the road. I think we're trying to get more analysis, trying to define more the sound that we're getting, looking at the octave, and really looking at where that range that is making that sound so we could use that in our review and evaluation of both the profiles and the noise analysis and the noise study as it comes to public voice for review.

[05:32:25] It resolves identify recurring occurrences. You know, is this happening throughout the county or is there certain areas that we need to focus on and do more measurement? It allows us to go out there even when there is no violation or there's no actually comment from anybody and really measure out there, out in the county, without even getting a comment to see how the ambience sounds out there.

[05:32:49] How is that an issue? Is that a concern? Now, we know some people are concerned and some people are losing sleep and stuff like that, and I really appreciate that. And really, I'm not there, I'm not in their homes, so I do understand that that is a concern. But really, without having that metric and that data available to us, it'll be very difficult really to come back with any kind of meaningful recommendation back to the board without having that data and that analyzation and that feedback so we can give you a really good feedback and that feedback could be adjusting the ordinance I don't know or it could be we need to

[05:33:25] do some tweaks there are some missing gaps and we need to adjust that but until that is available to us it's difficult for me to really tell you this is what we need to do at this time. So thank you so very much and i know that this is a tough topic because so many communities and residents are impacted i would like to go back to slide five and that's the one with the 19 right there okay because no incidents exceeded the 73 db daytime or 68 db nighttime thresholds there were

[05:34:03] zero found a cases do we know do you know what the readings were from those 19s and do you know if any of them would have been found in violation under what the consultants had proposed? Sure, Jefferson.

[05:34:20] I really don't know too much about what the consultant, because I came afterwards. However, from just getting a feel of what the numbers were from the team, and that's, don't put me on record with this, but just the feedback I got, you know, nighttime in the 50s, and daytime sometimes in the low 60s.

[05:34:40] That's what I got back from the team. I haven't really looked at each one of them. I can get back with you with more accurate numbers. But this is just the general feel of what the numbers are out there. And I understand that. So what my concern is, is that there's not going to be people found in violations because of the ordinance where the numbers were set.

[05:35:05] It's pretty generous. And so that's what my concern is. It's pretty generous. And so I don't expect to find very many violations. Now, you're talking about you guys are being proactive. and you're going out with new development have you gone out to some of the communities where people are complaining about the noise like the great oak community for example we have tested several times at the great oaks community and those are some of the violations that we received the 19 are from that community so i mean do we hear a noise yes i'm not going to

[05:35:39] say that it is so quiet but the noise does not elevate to be to that number and and and that's ordinance that really we have to go by, and that's what we can enforce. But, you know, Great Oaks is among a lot of other things. You know, you got 234 right next to Great Oaks. You got the airport on the other side. You got VRE, because sometimes we got a call where when we tested, it was more like the VRE, really, than it is because it's a certain distinct noise at a certain time. So there's a lot of things happening in that location. But those are the kind of time

[05:36:17] we need to really look at and see what can be done besides just looking at the ordinance, looking at other things, and even dealing with the entity itself, with the facility, and see what can be done. Here's where we think that issue is that's raising a flag.

[05:36:33] So let me ask a quick follow-up question, because the way the testing has to be done. So data center A, if it does not individually meet the threshold, data center B does not individually meet the threshold data center c does not individually meet the threshold data center d does not individually meet the threshold but all four of those data centers if they go over the noise ordinance are we able to cite or is that and also is it possible to look at whatever data

[05:37:10] center tips us over should be decided i mean how do we work that out because that's one of the concerns maybe individually some of these data centers aren't making that much noise but i'm sorry but what if collectively you know yeah that that's definitely a complex and that's when we are going to bring in our consultant to really help us out along with with call tie my understanding that each data center has a standalone has to meet that threshold so if the threshold is 73 in the daytime then they have to meet that cumulatively how we work with this that's that's a that's a

[05:37:48] complex situation and we'll have to deal with it we have to isolate we have to make sure that Each one of them are within the threshold and not above before we start getting into what can we do being the cumulative sound is higher than the 73. What can be done out there?

[05:38:06] Facilities to make this a situation that can be accepted by our residents and our village. So it's a very complex, it's difficult for me to say that, because my understanding is as long as the facility is meeting the threshold, it meets, it's not in violation.

[05:38:28] I appreciate that, and I'll save any follow-up questions, because the queue is lit. Bodhi. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Katab, for the work. Appreciate your time and the team's time a few days ago when we got to meet. I really appreciate the opportunity to talk to you all ahead of this.

[05:38:45] A couple of questions. if there is a a complaint for example and the noise that folks were were concerned about may not be present may be lower or changed by the time staff gets there to to uh to identify and measure what have you what's the process there because again you know with some of the time frames you're talking about in terms of the actual reaction time to get someone out there you could be talking about much different noise environment or it could be a different time of day or different temperatures, so there may be things running that wasn't before.

[05:39:17] Can you talk about that a little bit? Yes. I mean, it can adjust slightly, but it's not – and that's why we say steady tonal. It's a tone that actually stays steady for most of the time, right? Now, if there's a jump because a generator came on and stuff like that, we'll have to deal with that separately.

[05:39:35] But that's what it is. So typically, like I said, eight and a half days, we will be out there, and we will measure. And if we're close enough to a threshold, we'll probably come back and measure again. But we haven't really gotten to a situation where our measurement was that high enough to really trigger that or to adjust that from the time it was called in to the time we went out.

[05:39:56] Appreciate that. My next question is you mentioned, Katab, that of the 19, 18 didn't really fall under the definition of steady tonal. Can you talk about that a little bit and what was different about that? Yeah, and I'm not really a scientist when it comes to acoustic. However, my understanding that when we measure, we measure for five minutes, right?

[05:40:13] And the five minutes have to be within a certain range, three and minus three. If it stays within, then that's steady. Steady meaning that the wave doesn't fluctuate significantly for it to be as steady. And then we're focusing on a hum and a buzz and those kind of noises that come out of those facilities than just a regular noise.

[05:40:32] So if it's within that, then it's steady. Now, as far as tonal, tonal depends on if there's an octave within that range of wave that is pronounced, that's very clear, that that is really the area where the noise is coming from, that's the pressure, then that's something we'll have to take a look at, and that becomes more of a tonal side of things.

[05:40:54] So that's steady tonal noise, sorry for that. And we'll have to work with the entity, and that's why we say, although it's not enforceable, the octave, it helps us in defining what that noise is so we can talk to the facility about, you know, this is where the people are hearing.

[05:41:11] You know, it is not a violation, but really this is what machine that does make that sound. Is it your chiller? Is it your this? Maybe you need to pay attention to this. You may need to maintain it or something. Change it. That's what's happening there. Appreciate that.

[05:41:27] And a couple more. We had, during public comment time, a gentleman talked about how he has sort of seen some faults in how the 311 system has sort of reacted in terms of the complaints around this. I don't know if that's you could talk to address that or who in staff would address that.

[05:41:46] But to me, if we set up 311 as sort of the front line to this and folks are already having difficulty, I feel like that's an issue and also may feed into the fact that we had such few complaints. And sort of the geographic distribution of that, because I find it interesting and kind of bizarre of the geographic distribution of those complaints.

[05:42:06] Right. I actually heard the comment, and I don't know all the details. All I know is when the gentleman actually called in the complaints, our team was already out there measuring at the same time. He says, I was out there and took that measurement right in that location.

[05:42:22] So that's what I heard back from them. But, you know, if the system has a glitch or something, we'll take a look at it. But it did not appear that we had that situation. Appreciate it. And my last one, Madam Chair. I already heard that, obviously, Surajah Gordy and you, Madam Chair, are sort of thinking about ways we can improve it.

[05:42:38] I understand that what you're saying, Katab, and you guys need more data, but I appreciate that my colleagues are already looking at ways to improve it. Colty, I know that you have been on board for very long in the grand scheme of things, But, Katab, has you or your team began at least identifying some language or parts of the ordinance that could be tightened?

[05:42:58] You know, Madam Chair talked about limits, but we can also appreciate from our conversation that language in the actual ordinance matters as well in how things are defined and how folks can or can't qualify and be violations, what have you. Are there things you're already identifying that could be tightened up? We, I think Kulta has identified some things, but I say with a number of complaints that we received minimal, give us time.

[05:43:22] That's the time we want to really define that even further, to come back to you with some really material adjustment that can make a difference. Rather than, well, let's just drop the noise, and we drop it to like 70, let's say, and we go and measure, and still there's no violation. We haven't really done.

[05:43:38] So let's base it on really metrics. Let's base it on science. Let's base it on data that we receive, analyze, and really focus on where the issue is. I mean, is the noise going to go away totally? I mean, just like highway, just like an airport, just like a hospital, there will always going to be some noise.

[05:43:58] But can we muffle it? Can we somehow manage it in a way that helps most of the people? We should be able to do that. I mean, I was in highway for a long time, and I know highway makes noise. But we try to mitigate. And the word mitigate, we don't eliminate, we're trying to work with it, really to muffle it.

[05:44:18] That's what we're trying to do. Thank you. Supervisor Vega. Katab, I don't want you to take this personal, because I understand that you just started working on this. But the recommendation being asked of us here tonight, or what's being proposed, is flat out insulting and infuriating.

[05:44:38] Okay? I've been dealing with this issue in my district more than anybody on this day is. For how long? For far too long. I'm sick and tired of the excuses. I'm sick and tired of staff getting up here telling us that they need more time, that they need more data, that they need more science.

[05:45:00] We have all of that. We had a very strong noise ordinance proposal on the table that would have provided residents, not just in my district, but throughout the county, with real meaningful relief in regards to the intrusive noise that they're hearing. I'm tired of being told, Supervisor Vega, it's the VRE.

[05:45:18] It's the traffic on 234. Perhaps I should start bringing the recordings that I am getting from my constituents that live almost three miles away from these data center campuses. It is not the VRE. It is not the traffic on 234. It is a distinct noise that is waking people up in the middle of the night, and they've been tortured for far too long. So no, I reject the recommendation here tonight. I would suggest that instead of wasting time issuing directive after directive, that we bring back the data that was presented to us in the past, and that we had a serious conversation about that noise ordinance

[05:45:56] so that we can provide meaningful relief to our constituents. I will say this, Madam Chair. The issue at Great Oak was not caused by me. That issue predates me, but I had to get involved, and I've been fighting for my constituents, with my constituents, to hold this billion-dollar corporation accountable so that they could come to the table with honesty, with integrity, to fix the issues that they have caused. A very important question was asked, can we consider the data centers that are together within the same vicinity? And the answer was no, we cannot consider

[05:46:31] cumulative noise. So then that should be our first indicator that perhaps the threshold should be lowered. We don't have to reinvent the wheel. We don't have to drag this any longer. We've been going at this for long enough, long enough. And it is time, Madam Chair, and to my colleagues on this day is that we for once not just say that we're taking a serious an issue seriously but that we're actually going to do something about it if we want to go ahead and continue to talk about the industry and how we can partner and do all kinds of things fine but by god we have to

[05:47:07] mitigate the issues that they have caused i'm not interested in more directives i am not interested in six months madam chair my recommendation to you and to my colleagues would be that we ask staff to bring back the noise ordinance that was presented to us at our next board meeting so that we can take action once and for all so i'm going to weigh in because this is also a process question and i spoke with mr shorter earlier before our meeting about this about what is the procedure to bring back that previous noise ordinance do we need to do announce an intent

[05:47:43] for a directive and bring back a directive so i'm holding before i let you go i want to ask mr shorter if that is what anyone on this board wishes to do because it's certainly something I wish to do what is the correct procedure well I'll first ask the team if you know what what we would need to do to get prepared obviously we have not published the next meeting agenda it is not until November 17th so we do have time from a sort of agenda you know sort of public publication process but I would need to work with the team to make sure that we are in a position to go back and pull those recommendations forward and present.

[05:48:21] If the board is ready now to give direction to us to come back on November 17th, then we are certainly prepared to do that. Now, I will say that that is the only meeting in November.

[05:48:36] It is going to be a very busy agenda, and there might be an opportunity for us to work offline to come back with a more organized approach, but it is the board's prerogative. So I know we also have, we'll be taking a vote.

[05:48:52] There will be no evening meeting on the 17th. So we'll just have a very long 2 p.m. meeting, which I'm fine with. Longer than today. Longer. Just had a knock on wood. Because today's going to be pretty long. There seems to be, and I'm going to go to everyone else on the case, but I just had to interject because I had this conversation with you earlier.

[05:49:16] Tom had mentioned something. Him and I had a little conversation. I think that there is sufficient interest, and I would like to work on getting the directive language, let's consider this the notice of intent, whether it's I do it, Vega does it, Gordy, whomever.

[05:49:33] But it seems like a lot of us, you know, are feeling, or enough of us are feeling this way. And I haven't had a chance to talk to everyone, but I know that you and I are aligned. I know that I'm aligned with Gordy. I'm not aligned with Stuart. Yeah, so I'm going to go back into Q. I'm just saying this is a process discussion right now.

[05:49:51] This is process. So what we will do is the intent, because under General Assembly, we can't just do things. We have to give this notice of intent. So let's say this is our notice of intent. We will work on the directive, and it will be properly distributed to all board members and their chiefs of staff ahead of the November 17th meeting.

[05:50:16] Madam Chair, if I may, for clarity. Mr. Shorter, could it just be as simple as we direct county staff to come back on November 17th? I'd ask for the county attorneys. Madam Chair, members of the board, to amend the ordinance, you have to first hold a public hearing.

[05:50:32] And you cannot amend the ordinance without it. And staff needs to know clearly from the board what is the language in the ordinance that you want to be amended. We need to know what the edits are. Because when the public hearing is advertised, then it's up or down on that.

[05:50:50] If you're going to change a word here and there, you need to then re-advertise and hold another public hearing. The board has had the practice of authorizing a public hearing first before scheduling the public hearing so that everyone knows exactly what verbiage you want with the amendments to the ordinance.

[05:51:07] So the staff would need clear direction from the board. What edits do you want? We would then have to advertise the strikethrough and underlines of the new changes to the ordinance, advertise the public hearing, hold the public hearing, and either adopt the changes or not adopt it, OR IF YOU WANT NEW CHANGES, NEW WORDS, NEW EDITS, THEN YOU HOLD ANOTHER PUBLIC HEARING.

[05:51:32] HOLD ON. I DO HAVE OTHER PEOPLE IN CUE. I JUST WANT TO GIVE US ONE SECOND TO SEE BECAUSE SUPERVISOR VEGA BROUGHT THIS UP AND IT BECAME A PROCESS QUESTION. DO YOU WANT TO ADD ANYTHING ELSE? THEN I WILL GO THROUGH EVERYONE IN THE CUE. COULD WE PERHAPS PUT IT ON THE AGENDA FOR THE NEXT MEETING SO THAT WE CAN HAVE THE CONVERSATION AND HAVE A BETTER UNDERSTANDING WHICH DIRECTION WE WANT TO GO IN SO THAT THEN IT COULD BE PROPERLY ADVERTISED IF IT IS THE the consensus of the board to make the changes that the county attorney referenced?

[05:52:03] I think, I mean, I don't see any issues with that. I mean, it would have to be, I'm thinking, an actual discussion. It would have to be an open discussion. I am seeing this two ways. So, yes, in terms of the presentation, really just giving the board a reminder about where we were at the point where we were having a discussion about the ordinance.

[05:52:29] separately the process that Michelle laid out where we are then taking actual feedback from the board, advertising that feedback as a change to the ordinance, having a public hearing, and then coming back with an actual, well, authorizing the public hearing and then coming back for the actual public hearing for a vote.

[05:52:50] And so those are, in my mind, two separate paths. And if what the board is asking for this evening is for us to come back for a presentation, where we just give a reminder, then I want to make sure that I'm reading this the right way, Michelle.

[05:53:09] Madam Chair, members of the board, because you referenced the change to the Freedom of Information Act, it needs to be on your agenda for you to act on it. Therefore, the authorized public hearing with the edits needs to be on the agenda. So from what I'm hearing from you, it sounds as if you want some discussion on that, and then the next board meeting would have the resolution that authorizes the public hearing with the changes, and then a meeting after that would be the public hearing.

[05:53:41] Because staff does not know what edits to the ordinance at this time, doesn't know where the board is at with regards to it. This is my recommendation. I'm going to make it, and I'm going to go through the queue, and I will have a sidebar conversation. I do think we need to have a presentation, and I will say that.

[05:54:01] It's because we have new members on this board. we have new members on this board and i do think and it's been a while i think we need to have the presentation so that we all understand what is going on after that i think the board needs to give feedback we need to discuss it and then at that time we can move forward with the next step which would be the authorized the public hearing am i correct in saying that is that the correct sequence you'll have a resolution that authorizes the public hearing with the edits in that staff

[05:54:36] can't prepare that resolution until staff knows what the board wants but I understand we're not going to do all that this is the secret we're not going to do it all at one time correct so there will be a discussion and then at the next board meeting yes will be the resolution to authorize the public hearing with the changes and then advertise the public hearing and the next one will be the public hearing the board can adopt it up or down all right is everyone clear on that process but if I can madam chair what that means is that the discussion will result in some direction and that we will not be able to come back to that follow on meeting with with changes

[05:55:14] to the ordinance without some direction from the board when the presentation occurs yes all right i'm going to go back unless you had something real quick just just just for the purpose of clarity the the the conversation that we're going to have in the presentation that we're going to have for the folks that are new and um you know to give staff also who's new in regards to this issue is going to be what was provided to us previously and presented to us previously by the consultants and the work that was conducted by the DCOAG, correct, Madam Chair?

[05:55:48] Because that is what I'm referencing. That is the noise ordinance that was given to us for our consideration. You have a copy, Supervisor Stewart. I actually also have one, and that is the 2025 ordinance, and that is what, Madam Chair, I'm requesting.

[05:56:03] So this is what, yes, that's what I would like to say because we spent how much money on consultants? a lot of money. We spent a lot of money on consultants. I think that it is a fair request.

[05:56:20] And I just want to be clear. I don't want to litigate everything that happened in the past. I don't. I don't. This is where we are. Supervisor Gordy wanted six months. And at that time, we were hoping to have more data. Unfortunately, we don't have that data. We don't. And I also just want to say to the staff, I am not at all, let me just be clear, blaming you or upset that We don't have the data.

[05:56:48] I mean, it is what it is. But this board does have a responsibility to the communities that are impacted. And we have to be mindful of that. I see, I don't know if you guys want to.

[05:57:04] I'm going to continue on in the queue. And if we need a recess or anything to go through process, I'm happy to do that. I know no one wants a recess, but we want to push through. But this is very important. We have to get it right. Supervisor LaCroix. I thank Supervisor Vega.

[05:57:24] Because I was thinking the same thing. First of all, I agree with everything she said. I just would have said it so much nicer. But having said that, you know, you're kind of the police, and they gave you a threshold, and the threshold was too high.

[05:57:41] And that tonal threshold, you know, it wasn't hitting it properly because there were people that were calling us on a regular basis saying that they couldn't sleep. And like you acknowledge, you're not in their room. You just were given what you were given and did the best that you could with it.

[05:58:01] But I am thrilled to death, and I'm looking forward to reading every page of this and being ready for us to do something so that the organization, I mean, he even said there's noise. He hears it.

[05:58:17] I was standing at the polls in the last election, and on top of the school, there was some kind of a slow hum. And I was just there for three hours, but it drove me crazy. And that is what they're dealing with day in and day out.

[05:58:36] And I do believe that we have a team that is willing and wanting to support whatever data we give them. So it's up to us to make sure we get it right. And I think with the experts that we spent a lot, a lot of money on, and to re-review it, I think that we got it wrong before, and I hope that we can get it right this time.

[05:59:02] And I'm glad for the opportunity. Thank you for expediting it, everyone. Supervisor Stewart. Thank you, Madam Chair. Katab, thank you, but you don't know what you don't know, right?

[05:59:21] And you were sent here unprepared to read a slide deck, right? let's go back to the background slide slide number two please you're missing the last sentence on the fifth on the fifth bullet point which which is really the meat of it which which should read the sound level from the source must remain essentially constant for the duration of any given measurement now that got ripped right out of the experts report okay let's go to slide four

[05:59:55] please what you're showing in that photo let me ask you this question is that how the those devices are utilized? For testing? Yeah. Just like that. It depends on the situation. Sometimes it could be higher. How much higher? It depends. And sometimes, you know, we've measured as far as a second floor. All right. Well, that's how it should be because this is why we have residents moving into their basements. The way homes are built in Prince William County, the bedrooms are on the second floor. Great Oak, everybody's living in their basement. One of the gentlemen that was

[06:00:31] on public comment time today, right, he's famous for having to move his entire family to his basement. So those pictures are off. The 73 decibel versus day, 63 at night, the decibel is not the issue. It's the actual sound and how it affects human mental health, right? And at 35 decibels, it starts doing damage. 35 decibels constantly, you're cooked. Yesterday, we were in a room for a joint town hall, and there was a compressor in that room. You didn't hear the

[06:01:10] compressor until it stopped. Everybody in this room, everybody in the sound of my voice has been in a space where you've heard what you're hearing right now. And you didn't hear that until I pointed it out. But what you're hearing right now, now if the compressor was in the ceiling, the tones that we would be receiving to our eardrums would be very, very different. And when it did turn off, when the thermostat kicked it off, all of a sudden you get this profound sense of peace that comes over you. Like, ah. Now it wasn't loud. You didn't have to elevate your voice. You didn't, You know, those 63, 73, you didn't have to elevate.

[06:01:48] Just the fact that it was running at 35 decibels started doing literal damage to your brain and to your psyche. What the studies show is that that throws your brain into this type of overdrive that has a deleterious effect, mental health, physical health, the whole nine yards, right?

[06:02:13] So that's completely missing from your study. It's the octave bands, right? It's what was in Nelson and Zwerling's basis and background document that I have here.

[06:02:30] Now, I spoke to them on Friday. We had a Zoom. I spoke to them for almost an hour and 20 minutes. And while I already had an education about it, boy, did I go PhD level, right?

[06:02:46] They're willing to come back and talk to us. And I think, Madam Chair, we need to have that conversation so that everybody's on the same website, right? We need to get it from these consultants that we paid a tremendous amount of money from where the DCOAG, a bunch of our residents, spending time, their own time, their own money to have these meetings and to come up with these findings, and we just threw it in the trash.

[06:03:12] We just threw it away. Gainesville didn't even have representation, and I think that's sacrilege, right? But, Madam Chair, when we do do this, I think Nelson and Zwirling, and I've asked them, and they said that they would be more than happy to come back and talk to us directly.

[06:03:32] That's all I have for now, Madam Chair. I might go for another five minutes, depending on what comes up. So I'm going to quickly interject. The decisions that were made about the noise ordinance were made by the board. And, Katab, I understand that your hands are tied, that you're new to this.

[06:03:49] I just want to say that I know things get heated, but I will ask supervisors to have a little bit more decorum when it comes to staff. Please. He was not here for this. He was not a part of the process. He's doing what he can. We give direction to staff, and I truly ask, particularly in a public forum, that we show more decorum. Supervisor Bode. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I just, to go back to process for a second, because I like to go by actual board date, board meeting dates, so I'm

[06:04:29] clear on what the timeline looks like so it sounds like we're having on the 17th that conversation you talked and i i support that i'm fine with that i just want to go through the dates so we're clear and when we're talking about even advertising changes to the ordinance there are notice guidelines that we have to consider as well so 17th we have a conversation we give general direction feedback to staff based on that conversation right then on the first is that when we're authorizing the public hearing or is that when the public hearing is going to be So, no, the public hearing will not be on the first, because that's what we would have to advertise it, correct?

[06:05:07] Madam Chair, members of the board. I'm sorry, county attorney. Madam Chair, members of the board, if on the 17th you have the discussion and staff is clear, you're not going to be able to have a directive on the agenda for that. Staff could work together to place, without a directive maybe, on the 1st, the authorized public hearing, and the 15th is going to be too quick then to have it.

[06:05:34] And I apologize to the board. I want you to be able to act as quickly as you want to act, but I'm going to throw in some additional information here. The Commonwealth attorney is the one that prosecutes these. When we were going through the drafting of this noise ordinance and the changes, Mr. Q and the police department worked consistently with the Commonwealth attorney to see whether or not she could support these and would feel comfortable going forward with prosecuting them.

[06:06:01] I would recommend that you allow time for staff to meet with the Commonwealth Attorney based upon whatever proposed changes you want to do to the ordinance, build that in. Because you don't want to change the ordinance and then go forth and have all these violations that are then null prost in the court.

[06:06:18] Yeah, I appreciate that. And that's one of the reasons why I asked because, again, I appreciate the expediency that folks want to go. I'm not trying to poo-poo on that, But I might want to make sure that everyone's clear on what the time frame would actually be based on our legal requirements on notice. So that means that we likely wouldn't be able to actually hear it until January 12th, which is our first meeting, 19th.

[06:06:40] So we couldn't even hear it on the 12th. Okay. So the 19th of January. I just want to put that out. I'm not weighing in either way. I just want to put that out. Second, understood and appreciated that folks want to bring back the exact recommendation that the Nelson folks made before there was sort of the half measure that was done by staff last year.

[06:07:04] I guess my only question is, part of that discussion in November, on November 17th, can we also maybe ask if staff wants to incorporate some of their language changes into that? So it's not exactly the same, but we have acoustical engineer on staff now.

[06:07:19] I would love for him to be part of that conversation on what he believes should go into the ordinance as opposed to just taking a copy-paste from the Nelson stuff. So that's a question, I assume, to the rest of us. Right. I'm going to have to think about that one because we have spent so much money and time, and I don't want to, Colty, I don't want to leave you out of this conversation, but so much of the conversation has already happened.

[06:07:51] And I'd like to call you to the podium because I want to see that if we go ahead, you know, how familiar, if you would please come forward, how familiar are you with the previous work? Do you think that you have sufficient time to comment or to weigh in or to add your guidance if we do this, if we do a presentation on the 17th? Good evening, board members. My name is Kooltai Hunter. I'm the new school engineer. Not quite 90 days in. I am familiar generally, kind of anecdotally about the work that's happened before my arriving and the work that

[06:08:28] happened a year ago i haven't seen the the numbers the levels the reports i'm not quite sure the methodology and things like that were actually done um you know i have a general anecdotal understanding but it's very loose but i haven't seen anything yet all right i am familiar with the consultants that were involved like i you know i've done work adjacent to one of them some years ago and um you know the acoustical community we tend to know about each other's work and stuff looked at. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to call on Supervisor Bailey. We may need to have

[06:09:06] a little bit of a recess for people to have a few conversations as to the best way to move forward. I just want to be very clear. I understand the urgency. Get it. I get the urgency. But I want to make sure that we do this right. And again, I've had conversations with some of the people on board, you know, not everyone. There is definitely a desire to look at previous work.

[06:09:28] I just want to make sure that we are following, you know, in a process and making sure that we have enough engagement. I have Bailey on the queue who hasn't spoken yet. And then, oh, I'm sorry. Sorry, you took up the rest of my time. I'm sorry. I'll be quick. The reason why I ask is, again, and I appreciate it, because the thing, again, my thing is, and I'm not saying we should cast out or throw anything else away.

[06:09:48] I just want to make sure that now that we have an acoustical engineer on staff, he has a chance to comment on what we would be doing. Because, again, work has been done, But we also have a person on staff now that was not here, just like we have supervisors that are involved that weren't here. So I would love to get his expertise to inform what has already been done to see if there's things that we can do to improve it further.

[06:10:08] That's all I'll say, Madam Chair. Supervisor Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me just start there with our new subject matter expert that we have so diligently searched. And it's not a question, you know, searched and hired because of the importance of this.

[06:10:28] I would like to have his input also as he digests all the work that has been put into this, the COJ, all the reports that we've had. I'd like for you to read them, digest them, and have input as Madam Chair has just asked you the question.

[06:10:51] I think that's important because we're spending money for a reason. We're spending money for studies for a reason. And we want to make sure that when we get this right for the citizens, it's right. That's the first thing. The second thing is the process, the legal process.

[06:11:09] I don't want to be in the newspapers for something we did that was not right. I want to be in the newspaper for something that we did that was right for citizens. But I don't want it to be a knee-jerk reaction. I understand the importance of people not being happy with the noise ordinance.

[06:11:30] But the noise, I mean, we started from a 20-plus-year-old noise ordinance that hadn't been approved. And so we've invested in making sure that it's good for the citizens, not for ourselves, but for the citizens. And so I don't want to do this in a knee-jerk way.

[06:11:48] I understand, Supervisor Vega, your concerns about the noise you're having in your district. You've been talking about it since we've been on the board, and I respect that. But in order for us to get it right for everybody, and it doesn't impact me the way it impacts you.

[06:12:04] I'm next to Quantico, but in your backyard is where Quantico is. So we've got to do this holistically and make sure that we're getting it right for the citizens. Katab, you did a great job. You're an intelligent man. You weren't just put in front of the slides just to repeat. You're taking this on.

[06:12:21] So I know whatever you're given, you're going to take on. But I think you have a partner. What's your first name again, sir? I'm sorry. cool tie mr hunter i know his last name is hunter you have a partner now where you can partner with with with mr hunter and get it right for the citizens and that madam chair that's what i would like to see uh in respect of what the concerns are now and i would like to understand what those new concerns are if they're not new if they're old let's revisit them but if if they're new i would like to understand that and madam chair i'd like to have a discussion with you on

[06:12:56] that because we haven't talked. And so I think we really, to get it right, we really got to make sure that we are utilizing what's in our toolbox and not just do it in a knee-jerk reaction. So I'm going to say this. I don't think this is knee-jerk. And looking at the calendar, it's four weeks. Four weeks. Personally, I'd like to bring back what the DCOAG recommended. It's four weeks.

[06:13:21] It will be a discussion among the board. It'll be a presentation for those who are not familiar. and it's a refresher. It's been a while. There's been so many things that have come up that we, I know the board collectively has been focused on. I think in four weeks, we can do a presentation that'll give Mr. Hunter a chance to get up to speed. It will give people who are new on the board a chance to understand what's going on and will give the rest of us a refresher.

[06:13:50] And the reason why we're trying to move this forward quickly is because we thought we were going to be in a better position today. And I will also say, I do review the agenda, but I don't get the staff packets ahead of time. I get them the same time as everyone else.

[06:14:06] So to look and see that another six months of data is recommended, again, I'm not placing any burdens on staff. It's up to this board to act quickly because we have residents who are struggling. So that's where I stand.

[06:14:23] Supervisor Stewart and then Bailey again. Madam Chair, I think it's important that when we do hear this again, we do hear from the experts that we paid. i i i think they agreed to be here i want to have them here um i'd love to have mr cool tie i'm sorry i used your first name i just wanted to say cool tie and um um um um you know i i'd love to have him talk to them but before beforehand as well all right i can set that up i got you um

[06:14:58] and i think i do think that for four weeks is plenty of time you know i i i even have you know just in my office i i have a local acoustic signal processing expert uh sonar sound guy that has over 30 years of experience i mean this guy keeps us safe with the with literally submarines the silent service so i mean this guy knows sound um let let i'm just saying like let let's let's go to work i've i've i've got pieces i've got pieces and and i and i'd love to see this come back madam chair

[06:15:37] i'd love to see this come back katab i'm sorry if i was disrespectful to you it wasn't my intention i just wanted to say that publicly thank you madam chair for pointing that out did not want to leave you with that thank you and i appreciate that thank you supervisor bailey yeah and let me let me flesh out what i mean by knee jerk knee jerk to me is rushing to do it without doing our homework that's important to me because i want to deliver a better product to the citizens than than what we've done and and i want to make sure that we're not rushing through it that bless you

[06:16:17] we're not rushing through it that now that we do have a subject matter expert we're put we're fine-tuning it because they deserve quality and and that's what i meant by knee-jerk i want it to be quality not rushed and so i think we do need to have a discussion a collective discussion to make to make sure we're making a more informed decision obviously decision that you know the citizens are not happy. So we don't deserve to do it in a rushed, knee-jerk way. That's just a descriptor. So I just wanted to make sure that my august audience understands what I'm saying.

[06:16:54] Supervisor LaCroix. I just wanted to add one thing. I tell this to everyone. Katab's my favorite in the whole government. And so everything that comes out of your office is always, always professional. It's always well thought out. And I appreciate you so much for everything you've done for the Woodbridge District in the way you handle everything and I think this board at some point gave you measurements that you know just aren't working for the citizens and so I have

[06:17:29] no doubt when you come back you're going to be on fire and ready to work with us and to help the citizens and I appreciate you. All right I don't have anyone else in queue so I want to take a moment to thank the team again I know we have a lot of new people who are now a part of this process I'm going to work with our CXO to make sure this is going to be on the agenda I do think it's a good idea again if we can get the consultants here that's who really needs to present it but we

[06:18:06] will be having more discussions on this and you know I can't wait for the 17th all right so thank you very much. Before we go into supervisor's time, I need to turn it over to our county attorney. Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the board. I was informed there is an additional item for closed session. It will be personnel discussion relating to the appointment of the director of the area agency on aging. And this item is appropriate for closed session pursuant to 2.2 dash 3711 a one of the code of Virginia. This would be a separate motion, a separate motion

[06:18:41] and resolution. So authorized. Second. Probably moved and seconded. Let's take a vote. Supervisor Vega. Oh, we did work? Vote unanimous. Supervisor Gordy absent from vote in all subsequent votes.

[06:19:07] All right. Thank you so very much. Now we are going to go into some more fun supervisor's time. We have a couple of directives, and then we are going to amend the calendar for November 17th because we do not have any land use cases. So first, for 12A, I'm going to turn it over to you, Mr. Stewart.

[06:19:26] Madam Chair, I'd like to defer. Okay. You would like to a date certain? November 17th. You would like to defer to November 17th.

[06:19:41] Madam Chair. All right. Supervisor Vega. Supervisor Stewart, can you explain your reason for delaying? We just talked about how packed that day is going to be, and I just want to make sure that we're going to collaborate, perhaps, with each other, talk more in depth.

[06:20:04] That's exactly what I would like to do. Yes. All right. Thank you so very much. So I have a directive about doing a scenario-based economic and market analysis. This was separating out something that Supervisor Stewart was going to do.

[06:20:28] Now that he wants to defer, I'm debating if I want to go ahead and defer based on, I will go ahead and defer based on the conversations you have. But I'm going to take a minute to explain because I've been getting a thousand emails. Well, not a thousand. I've been getting a lot of emails for people for and against.

[06:20:49] People have been asking me, what are you doing? Am I putting the thumb on the scale? A lot of people, I don't feel really understand the intent. So I'm just going to take a moment to, since it's on. Supervisor Stewart, you have inherited some real challenges.

[06:21:06] I think you're the third supervisor in like four years. That's a lot. We have people who were fighting the digital gateway, but then joined an assemblage. We have people who want rural areas, but they don't like agritourism.

[06:21:26] I don't understand. I think, and then Michelle Trenum said something. She was talking about, you know, decisions made behind closed doors. I feel like we need to have conversations and we're not having them.

[06:21:44] I feel like, yes, decisions are being made behind closed doors and that there needs to be a public process. And Rachel has said something. We're watching who shows up to support him and who's wondering who's working against him. And then we have, I'm sorry, I didn't write your name, but thank you for still being here because I was going to reference what you said, you know, that we need to listen to the private sector.

[06:22:08] Oh, I thought you were someone, I remember you, but okay, sorry. Thank you. I mixed you with someone else. Why can't we have conversations? And I think that that's the big thing that I'm struggling with, is that we're not having conversations. We're talking past each other. We have some people who want to see this, and anything that's not in line with their thoughts or expectations is bad. We have another group of people, this is what we want to see, and they're

[06:22:40] the ones who truly represent Gainesville. If we don't want piecemeal development, we have to have a real and actual public process and we have to have actual conversations that's where i stand when i put out the directive that's what i was getting at economic development can mean many things to many people it can be i and i i also have to state i'm the one who brought forth the

[06:23:13] directive to look at agritourism back in 2020 20 um 24 that was one of my first directives if not my first directive. I also understand, I think it's a great idea, I understand it's not going to work everywhere. But I am disappointed that wanting to have a public conversation, wanting to get the information, because at the end of the day, we need information to make informed decisions. We are allowing other people to make decisions for us. That's the intent of my directive. Because you're deferring yours, I don't think it's fitting for me to move forward with what I was looking to do.

[06:23:53] And my directive, to be clear, was to separate out the small area plan from a market study. That was it. So with that, I've said my piece. We are going to move on to 12C. Oh, sorry, Supervisor Bodie.

[06:24:09] No, I was going to say so moved on 12C. All right, we have a motion for 12C. It's been properly moved and seconded. Any discussion? All right, let's go ahead and take our votes. Vote unanimous.

[06:24:42] All right, thank you very much. Now we get to go around the dais. I'm going to start with you. Supervisor LaCroix, you ready? All right, Supervisor Vega. Sure, just want to thank our partners at Kaboom and Amazon.

[06:24:58] Today was the first day in the kickoff for our second Kaboom project in the Coles District. They were building an all-inclusive playground over at Helwig Park next to the Miracle Field. So it was an early day for me starting at 7 a.m. Later, we went to Manassas, Washington Manassas Airport for the groundbreaking ceremony of the new traffic control tower.

[06:25:22] It's a really exciting time, not just for the city, but also for Prince William County, considering the fact that we are such an important key partner, I would say, when it comes to all things the airport. So I'm certainly looking forward for the additional improvements that are going to come and when this is all complete and said and done for the next phase of bringing in commercial air flights to this area.

[06:25:44] I also want to remind folks that on November 7th, we will be having our annual Kohl's District coat drive. So if you know of a child who's in need or if you might have a need for a coat for a child, no adult jackets, please reach out to our office and we will be more than happy to accommodate.

[06:26:04] And lastly, Madam Chair, this is the appropriate time, I guess, since we want to go ahead and enforce when we can say comments and ask questions. I will just ask that there is some consistency when it comes to how you handle, you know, the meetings. I will say that I will be very, very clear. My comments today were not directed in any way towards staff.

[06:26:22] I said that from the get-go. I think that my frustration and my passion is warranted, considering the fact that I've been dealing with these issues for over five years. Not just my constituents, but folks in this county have been patiently, anxiously waiting for a solution and a response.

[06:26:39] and I think that it has been long overdue and so you know madam chair when when when we have a process I just ask for consistency you know you made a comment about hey I want you to do that during discussion time but then when we were having other presentations nobody was asking questions it was discussion and you didn't correct it then and so you know I'm very proud of where we are as a board I certainly don't want to go back to the way that we were during our first term and I certainly you know welcome the passionate feedback from whoever it is because you're entitled to it as your representative of your area and so just just consistency madam chair and i will never apologize for fighting for the people that i represent but certainly want to be

[06:27:15] on the record letting staff know that as always i appreciate you i value your work but i also expect and will demand accountability when possible thank you madam chair so quickly i'm gonna say um i am not what i my comments were not directly what you said because you were very clear about what you said and it was not directed at staff now what you were asking earlier i am trying to get better with making sure we contain discussion and emotion this got a little because we were acting asking about process so i did throw to some people so i apologize nothing was directed at you

[06:27:52] but i also want to make sure we had clarity around everything so with that genie are you ready now all right victor thanks manager first i want to thank everybody that came out to the community day it was a great event um so again thank you for that um just real quick some upcoming events on friday this friday we've got our first tee golf tournament over at the prestigious prestigious forest green golf course noting that we have two courses in the county that course is probably the best i've seen two robert trin jones so robert trin jones always going to be the best

[06:28:28] got it but that's a great course yeah right it's a great course i also want to um we've got the Salute to the Armed Forces Luncheon coming up on the 28th of October. And then, really, I know whether you celebrate Halloween or not.

[06:28:44] You know, we're going to have a bunch of kids out in the streets collecting candy. We've got a lot of trunk of treats coming up, a lot of daytime stuff. So just be mindful of the kids. You know, they love dressing up in these little costumes and, you know, little, you know, ghoul stuff. And I know a lot of people don't celebrate that, but the kids love that time.

[06:29:01] It's the candy, okay, it's for the candy. So just want to go out there and defend the kids as we look at this time of year where they get to collect all this cane and have a good time. And last, I just want to say this here. It's not that this board isn't talking. It's that this board functions like it's seven counties.

[06:29:19] And it's not seven counties. It's one county. And until we realize that, you're going to have the same feuding that we have in many of these neighborhoods, in these districts. You're going to have the same feuding on this board. And that was a lot to just witness today. So I'm going to leave it at that, but the day we start functioning as a county will be the day we stop a lot of this bickering back and forth.

[06:29:41] Thank you, Madam Chair. Agreed. Supervisor Bodie. Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a few things from me. One, I wanted to thank everyone that came out to Barktoberfest a couple weekends ago. Unfortunately, because of a high schooler in my household who made a poor choice the night before.

[06:29:58] I had to be on daddy duty at the hospital instead of there, but I appreciate everyone who came out despite the weather. and my team, of course, who held down the fort while I could not be there. A couple of events going into the next couple days. First is I have a joint town hall virtually with Supervisor Bailey on various issues around flat cameras, some of the things that folks talked about today.

[06:30:22] I know we had a very robust discussion last week with a delegation about it, but Supervisor Bailey and I are hosting a virtual town hall tomorrow night, 6.30 to 8 o'clock. we'll have the PD there, we'll have the ACLU there, Senator Jennifer Carroll-Foyd will also be there. It's going to be a great conversation. Then, because my staff and I are glutton for punishment, we're having a town hall. Just my office is doing Thursday, the 22nd, at 630 to 830, our Mobility Matters Town Hall. This one's going to be focused around transportation issues on the Minnieville corridor and Old Bridge Road. It's going to be hosted at the Lake Ridge uh tall oaks community center it's going to be hybrid so folks can come in person if they live

[06:31:01] in the lake lakeage area or if it's too far to drive you can always tune in online but again that'll be uh thursday the 22nd uh 6 30 to 8 30 um wanted to also just talk about a few of the things that we uh went through actually before that housekeeping issue i sent all of you all earlier today my notice of a directive for the 17th for brt brt prioritization i just wanted to say that officially and then um a few things that we look went over today that i didn't get a chance to sort of talk about is one the solar canopies really appreciate the county exec and his work on continuing to work with that both on the way with we had the directive that i did a few months

[06:31:40] back but also the conversations we've been having with other parties um also appreciate um the bi-directional express study um folks who may not remember back near the very end of us adopting the the 2040 comp plan in 2022 um we actually had a good discussion at the board at the very end to add that as one of our goals as a county uh in the comprehensive plan so i'm glad to see that work is moving through um also really appreciate the conversation today around the pathways uh 2035 for the parks folks and all the greenways and blueways that are part of that um folks may not

[06:32:17] remember this but back in 2022 when the board adopted my climate and resiliency fast track a directive and resolution we did talk about incorporating the uh the trails and the trails coalition's um aspirational trails map into the comp plan including the mobility chapter so that came full circle as well um and then finally um just want to uh remind folks that you need to be careful when you're driving i'm serious all those of us that went westward for uh the manassas the

[06:32:49] manassas the washington manassas regional airport uh groundbreaking there were three main and one minor um roadway that was blocked because of three separate accidents i was on purcell road when it got blocked off then i went down try to turn right uh southbound onto holdy that got blocked i had to go all the way down dale to sprigs and then go around to get to to 234 all mostly avoidable accident that people are getting into. There was not bad weather today, not bad visibility conditions. There's no reason why a car should have flipped. Other than people

[06:33:26] either doing this or whatever else they're doing, they need to stop. Frankly, we can't engineer our ways out of people not driving properly. We can do all we want around traffic safety. I know we talked a lot about that. I continue to support those efforts, but at the end of the day, part of it needs to be human behavior and it needs to change in this county.

[06:33:43] Thank you, Madam Chair. All right. Supervisor Stewart. Thank you, Madam Chair. Just three very quick things. I want to thank everybody who came out to Haymarket Day, the premier event of Prince William County, this past Saturday.

[06:34:01] It was tens of thousands of people that were there throughout the day. Started off cold in the morning, but ended without a cloud in the sky. It was awesome. I also want to acknowledge Madam Chair for the joint town hall that we did in the Sudley Corridor last night.

[06:34:22] Greatly attended and information well received. I also went to Fairfax Water, checked them out, went on the tour. What initially comes in to what goes out the back end.

[06:34:41] Well, not the back end. Boy, that's a bed. Okay, that's not what I mean to say. So what comes out to the residents, I mean, I've never seen a water treatment plant before. So, yeah, that's the word. It was amazing. So if you get a chance to go on a tour of that place, it's worth every dime.

[06:35:02] And, you know, in the interest of time, I want to keep it on moving on down the line. But thank you. Supervisor Bailey. Thank you, Madam Chair. So on the 7th, I attended the 18th Annual Mental Health Awareness Event, where I presented the 2026 Jenny Vaughn Bates Voice of Recovery Award.

[06:35:27] It was excellent. And then on the 8th, I had the privilege of meeting with the Ashland community to talk about the Potomac District Islamic Center that is coming in with the client and the community. And it was an excellent meeting.

[06:35:42] We've had two. And so we're moving forward with that project. But thank you to the community for coming out. And then on the 9th, I was asked to be the guest speaker for the Jail Basic Academy 45th graduation. Thanks to Colonel West and Lieutenant Gantt for your invitation.

[06:35:59] And to the families, congratulations. Sorry for the noise. Also on that day, there was a chamber ribbon cutting for the 703 Dental Disease Awareness Memorial Walk. And that was fun as well. So thank you so much for coming to Dumfries.

[06:36:15] We really appreciate you, and thank you to the chamber for supporting that. And then on the 10th, I had my inaugural Families and Disabilities Awareness Fair. I thank Shakira Johnson, Community Services, Justin Wilk, my school board representative, Councilman Miles, Salonia Miles, and parent advocate Brenda Bowden for being my panelists at that affair.

[06:36:38] It was wonderful. It's the first. We're going to keep going for our citizens with disabilities. And thank you to Lisa Madron and her staff for coming forth and supporting. And that afternoon Hispanic Heritage Family Day was fun.

[06:36:53] It was fun. It was fun. To the county exec, thank you so much for the fun, the fun, the fun. It was great. The community was happy. And then later on that night, my staff attended the Bill Maher Banquet and the 20th National Museum of the Marine Corps. Congratulations for your 20th anniversary for being here in the community.

[06:37:15] That evening I attended the Fairfax County NAACP 2026 Freedom Fund Gala. It was excellent. Got escorted by the state president, who I just happened to be married to. And then on the 14th, I attended the Carpenter's Local 197 community that was themed Helping Our Community.

[06:37:37] And it was really a lot of fun just connecting with workers in our community. Congratulations to Ms. Ernestine Jenkins, bride of our very own, John Jenkins, for being inducted as an honoree for the Boy Scouts Award Dinner that night.

[06:37:53] And to the honorees, Mrs. Michelle Parker, former mayor of Manassas City, and John Walvritz for your continued support of our scouts. On Haymarket Day, we had a blast, October 17th. It was an amazing day. That's all I can say about that. And then today, the Manassas-Washington Airport groundbreaking.

[06:38:13] Prince William County is on the map and surveyed our citizens at a different way as it relates to transportation. So we have to be very proud of that. Tomorrow I will be with my colleague, Mr. Bodie, for we're going to talk about flock cameras and all that.

[06:38:30] You know, we're not going to highlight surveillance because that's not what our police do. But we're going to talk about that, and we're going to partner with the NAACP, the ACLU, and Senator Jennifer Carroll Foy, as he said before, and talk about what that means in our county.

[06:38:46] I'd like to make my notice of intent for Gretchen Johnson to be on the Housing Board and Orlando Jones to be on the Weapons Control Board, and I will get resumes. One is on staff already. I think you have them, but I'll get them to you as well, Andrea. And I just want to highlight what my colleague said, Ms. Vega.

[06:39:07] Thank you for your bravery. You know, she gets passionate. She does. And I like it. I like it because passion brings results. And so we have to be very much astute on how we serve this county. And when we make mistakes, we have to own up to them.

[06:39:23] And we can't politicize that because people see through when you've done what you're supposed to do and when you haven't done what you're supposed to do. And so I'm in the trenches and understanding better and more about this noise ordinance. And we're going to get it right. Thank you, Madam Chair. All right.

[06:39:40] Supervisor LeCoy is ready. I am ready. Of course, we've done a lot in the Woodbridge District. And I am so lucky that Orlando comes with me to everything. But this week, we had the opportunity to go to Celebra.

[06:39:58] Celebra. Prince William. i couldn't even say that right and and uh with orlando had the opportunity to talk to a lot of our latino community we were able to give out the resource guide that is also in um it's spanish and and english um and we talked a lot about you know people were coming up saying that they didn't have a lot of needs so it was a really good community for us to meet and greet um the

[06:40:35] other thing that i am very excited about is we have been working with vdot and the county to pick up uh prince william um the the roadways uh the weeds the grass the trash and we have been going out monthly and we went out last week um to pick up trash and us we have also gone door to door and asked the businesses to adopt the properties around them. And some of the properties have, businesses have gone out and picked up trash as well. So it's really a community effort in

[06:41:13] trying to clean up Woodbridge. I also met with people that were interested in taking away and buying the junkyards so that cleaning that up on Route 1 as well. So what I'm most proud of is that our office is working really hard to make a difference in the Woodbridge District that you don't just feel, but you actually see it.

[06:41:37] So I'm very proud to be a part of that. And that's all. All right, I'm working on my Spanish. I studied French. Celebre Prince William. All right, thank you. So it was a great event.

[06:41:55] And I really wanted to do that to make sure that, you know, we're highlighting Latino culture during Hispanic Heritage Month. So thank you, Jeannie, for coming out. I'm learning Spanish. I'll get better. We'll see if I can pronounce it next week. I want to respond to a couple things.

[06:42:13] You know, Greg McThurn made a comment about responding to constituents, and I had my team pull the email, and I wasn't sure if we had failed to respond or not. We do our best to respond to everything we receive. We get a lot of click and send emails. We get a lot of form emails, trying to stay on top of things.

[06:42:31] I also briefly want to touch on what my colleague said, that, you know, we're a board and we're functioning like seven counties. We do, unfortunately. A lot of people look at it as my district, but we're not really getting to know the county. I shouldn't say we. I'm trying to get to know the county because I'm chair and everyone is on the ballot.

[06:42:48] But having the conversations and understanding why different people feel what they feel, that's why I've been always a big fan of discussion. and I've said that. I used to talk about the public square, which is a theory and philosophy about having open discussions around political, social, whatever concepts. I think the discussion is something that we can do better on the board, and that's why I've been doing the Reimagining Prince William County series, which more days are coming, just trying to align with people on their schedules. But doing things like that, hearing from the community, even things that we may not

[06:43:23] want to hear, is very vital and important. So with that, I am actually heading to Stanford University tomorrow. I was invited to participate on an executive roundtable called Data Center Growth, Power, and Social License. It's hosted by Stanford Bits and Watts Initiative and the WRI Polsky Energy Center. When I got the invitation, I'm like, do I really want to talk about this?

[06:43:50] And with some of the people who are going to be there, I'm like, is this really my audience? They're going to have a lot of discussion around energy, water use, maybe noise will be part of it. hope so. Want to hear that. But the most important thing that's missing, and I feel is sighting, is that it's hard to overcome bad sighting. And that's why we're having discussions about things like the noise ordinance. It's hard to compensate or mitigate poor sighting. And I want to make that point. I want to make sure that people are understanding the concerns that we have in

[06:44:26] Prince William County. And hopefully for the industry to do better, not just here, but when they're looking at places to go, what are the things they really need to be talking about and discussing. I haven't been to California in a very, very long time. Don't want to mention how long, but I am excited and honored to be a part of this. And I'm hoping that we actually have a real discussion that will lead to real outcomes and real change, because that's what we need. I appreciate your passion, Supervisor Vega. I appreciate people's willingness to have a

[06:45:00] discussion about the noise ordinance and what the potential next steps could be. I've heard a lot from advocates and thank you for still being here, Donna and Kathy. I know that Donna in particular, you have been fighting this. You have been living this. I know that your community has been struggling and other communities such as Great Oak, who we reference a lot. And I reference that community because they invited me out early on when I was running in 2023 to understand the issue and to listen. And they've been willing to speak with me each step of the way. So I know at our next board meeting, it's going to be a long one, no evening session, but we're going to have a lot of weighty

[06:45:37] things to tackle. And I hope that everyone again has a willingness to have an open dialogue and that we don't come with preconceived notions or needing to defend or to score points. Our constituents expect better of us. We need to really have a real discussion about, not about the past, but how do we move forward. That's what I'm looking forward to. So with that, I'm going to give everyone, I don't care if you're mad or not, we're going to take 10 minutes because everyone

[06:46:08] always takes extra so 10 minutes and then we will meet in the back for closed session. Can I get a

[06:48:34] motion to certify the closed meeting? So moved. Second. I'll give it to Vega. I've been properly moved and seconded. Let's go ahead and take our votes. All right thank you very much. Thank you Mr. Lee for still being with us. Mr. Shorter. Thank you very much Madam Chair, members of the

[06:49:11] board. I'd like to invite Joshua Lee down to the podium and really be the first to congratulate him for being appointed as the next director of our Area Agency on Aging. Madam Chair, members of the board, as you know, Josh has been with the Area Agency on Aging since 2018 and has been serving in roles within Health and Human Services for over 20 years.

[06:49:38] Josh, welcome, and thank you so much for your leadership. Thank you, thank you, and good evening, members of the board, Mr. Shorter. First of all, I just want to thank the board, thank you, Mr. Shorter, thank Mr. Johnson in the back there for your continued trust and confidence in me to continue to lead the Area Agency on Aging.

[06:50:02] I thank you. I thank the work that I'll be able to continue to do with the staff there, ensuring that programs and services for our older adults continue to be brought to the forefront, and we continue to have a strong community here in Prince Wharton County.

[06:50:17] Thank you. Thank you so very much. And we just have one resolution. Madam Chair, I make a motion that we direct the county attorney to engage outside legal counsel to investigate an anonymous complaint against a member of executive leadership or management and transfer budget and appropriate up to $200,000 from contingency for outside legal counsel and any other costs related to such investigation.

[06:50:52] Second. It's been properly moved and second it. Let's take our votes.

[06:51:05] Vote unanimous. All right, everyone. at favorite time of the night. Motion to adjourn. Second. All right, let's take our votes. And while we're doing that, our next meeting will be on Tuesday, November 17th.

[06:51:34] Vote unanimous. All right, thank you very much, everyone. We are adjourned.

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